I think your goals and belief in your abilities are commendable and you should keep them.

When this thread was started, it was to discuss someone entering later into golf and the possibility of becoming 1) "good golf player" and 2) "a professional"

I said "Good player? Yes. Professional? Probably not."

I should have bolded the "Probably". Of course there is never any absolute, but the word "probably" is a statistical word meaning that the majority will be this way...take 51%, 99%, this is all a mater of interpretation.

I never meant to offend anyone who has become a Professional and started Golf later in life. And I never said it was impossible. And congratulations by the way, on your success at the pub links! That is great!

To continue with your other discussion about the difference between a +3 and a +8.

I don't quite understand your comment, "It is just a matter of getting more out of the shots you hit." Are you talking about luck?

OMHO, here is what the difference between a player on the Mini-Tours (about a +3 hdcp) and the top on the PGA (+6 to +8 hdcp): Experience. Tons of it. Beyond what anyone can imagine. These players on the top have all the experience playing in pressure situations on golf's biggest stage. They all started young, showed talent, drive, had the means, and were filtered through all the levels of all the tournaments that they played in (just like any other sport). There is no substitute for it.

Where do you get this experience? By putting yourself in it as early as you can and as often. Which brings me back to my original statement that to play professionally there is a very low probability you will compete successfully unless you have this type of experience.

If you start to try to gain experience late, you will gain some of it yes, but unfortunately, you will not get out of it what a young brain would get out of it. Late golfers really have already seated their personality, accepted their abilities (within reason), and are simply using what you have to see how good you are compared to everyone else...the thrill of competition...all great in its own right.

But a young player is able to absorb vastly more amounts of information, adapt easier, and use the experience to shape their developing abilities better. It's just the way it is. And this is why to compete these days, with the game as readily available to young players, that the professional levels are packed full of them, and they simply have an advantage, so much so that their only competition is among themselves.