Ronnie Rickner will be one of the participants in the PDC Q-School next week.
This name isn’t as well known, but he is working on a unique experiment with the end goal to compete with the professional players.
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Rickner started playing darts several years ago but retired due to work commitments and starting a family. However, in 2020 he took up darts again after reading Malcolm Gladwell's book 'Outliers'. That book describes how to become an expert at something by investing 10,000 hours in yourself.
It was a challenge he utilised for darts and created the Instagram account RR10keexperiment. It is a personal study in which a bad pub player tries to become a pro darts player. In 10,000 hours he wants to be at the level to play in the top 10 in the PDC.
Made rapid progress
He is currently on 564 hours of training and has an average of around 70. Since he started at 45 he has now reached a nice level. He expects to achieve his goal within 5000 hours, although time will tell whether that will actually work. Next week he wants to gain some experience at Q-School.
Rickner has made so much progression thanks to online competition 'IEDB' (Insta Eredivisie Darts Bond). This competition, which was run by Marco Vrolijk, turned out to be a real boost due to the quality matches and support from opponents.
Mach Darts collaboration
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It even led to a collaboration because Rickner and Vrolijk have now founded the company Mach Darts. They want to expand the online darts company with the largest Order of Merit ranking with many top talents from the Netherlands on Instagram. Each year they will also offer at least one player a contract with which they can participate in Q-School, Development Tour and Challenge Tour.
Samuel GillChief Content Officer
Samuel Gill is the Chief Content Officer (CCO) of DartsNews.com, a role he has held since 2020. He is responsible for editorial governance across the platform, including setting content standards, overseeing accuracy and consistency, and guiding long-term editorial strategy across professional darts coverage. Since joining, he has contributed more than 10,000 articles and editorial pieces, playing a central role in the development and daily operation of the site.
Based in Leicester, Samuel has extensive experience in darts media and has been closely involved in coverage of the professional darts circuit for several years. Within the UK darts community, he is a recognised figure known for his consistent editorial output and ongoing reporting on major tournaments and developments across the PDC calendar.
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