Outliers

I'm listening to a fascinating book now called "Outliers". It's an in depth study of success. I've read self help books in that past that proclaimed to study the habits of successful people, but his book goes much deeper and actually seems to explain things in terms that really make sense.
The author says that success depends not only ability, but also opportunity. He got started down this path while he and his wife were at a Canadian Youth Hockey tournament. His wife made the observation that almost all the the players on both the all-star teams were born in January, February or March. When he looked at the roster which gave the player's birthdays he saw she was correct.
He dug deeply trying to explain why this was so. What he found was the age cutoff date was January 1st. So kids born the first few month of the year had up to nine months head start in maturity and growth over kids born in December. The Canadians are serious about their hockey so they identify the best players early on and they get put into other teams that are more competitive with better coaching. They practice more against stiffer competition which makes them better and better. Practice makes perfect.
Now I just started the book today so I have a lot more to hear before it's over but what I've heard so far has been very interesting.