From: keith tokash (ktokash@hotmail.com)
Date: Mon Jun 30 2008 - 17:28:46 ART
Awesome. Sometimes while studying it sounded easy when people got their
number in a few months (which makes you wonder why it's not easy for you...).
You did a good job conveying that you did in fact bleed for the digits. Now
comes the fun part, where you start getting bashed in the head by all of the
things you put off to study. :)
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> Date: Mon, 30 Jun 2008 06:52:53 -0400
> From: dalek77@gmail.com
> To: ccielab@groupstudy.com
> Subject: Damn, I finished the lab in 4 hours and had 4 hours to verify and
I still didn't...........
>
> get served that coffee Brian Dennis was talking about. At least I got my
> number on my first attempt though, 21330 baby!
> BTW, never ever ever take your lab on Friday, the wait was worse then the
> night before christmas as a kid! I didn't get my results until I woke up
> this morning and have been on edge with people all weekend.
>
> Some people already know me from class and know my story. I began studying
> because of all the paper CCNPs out there, especially my work. Now I have
> nothing against CCNPs or any paper certs if you did it the right way, but
> what pissed me off is that our employer thought this other guy was as
> qualified as me because he got his CCNP and this guy announced himself as a
> Senior Engineer. Well this schmuck took two days to get an SVI on a Cat
3750
> up and just started networking about a year ago. While I worked hard for
> mine and have recertified it twice over the past 7 years now, he got his in
> weeks with you know what...... Pretty blatant about it as well as they
> passed them around work talking about how they can get CCNP in just a few
> weeks. These guys blow and I wish Cisco would do something about their
> testing system.
>
> In any case, I got mad, I mean really mad that nobody could see through the
> charade of these fake qualified network engineers. February of this year I
> had enough and I knew there was only one thing to do. Get something that
> they couldn't get or at least they would have to work real hard to get and
> based on their work ethic, I doubt they would ever get it, the CCIE. I
> worked my @$$ off since I got the materials end of February, and by the
> grace of GOD and my lovely wife I was able to get my number in RTP on June
> 27th. I pretty much shut my family off for the last 4 months, while my
wife
> took care of everything, the kids, the house, the dogs...... To give
> everyone an idea of the hours I put in.... I worked 40 hours a week, I
> studied everyday after work, from 6 pm to 2 am labbing and 12-15 hours
each
> day on the weekends. I took one day off and that was Mothers day and then
I
> attended InternetworkExperts 12 day bootcamp. I actually finished their
> bootcamp material by the 3rd day of the bootcamp and Brian Dennis and
> company was nice enough to let me mock lab the rest of the days I was
> there. The InternetworkExpert bootcamp was nice to get away for 12 days
> and lab for about 12-15 hours a day. I went outside once the entire time
I
> was there and that was for a 5 min walk to look at the pool and I didn't
> turn on my tv once. I probably squeezed in about 3 weeks of lab time in 2
> weeks of time. In essence, I was driven to get the CCIE from start to
> finish in about 4 months. Granted I have about 8 years Cisco experience,
> but it hasn't been hands on everyday the past 3-4 years because I work in a
> lab environment now and no longer do operational support, thank god for
that
> too.
>
> It was a hard road, and there was many times I kept telling myself this is
> too hard and will I never get there. However, I kept telling myself as
long
> as I keep studying and as long as I keep labbing I will always learn
> something and will get closer. You might think I'm crazy, but I had a goal
> and my wife said go for it. As I've said in previous posts, my motivattion
> was not money, but to gain the knowledge these other guys didn't have and
to
> achieve CCIE status, something most of these paper certifiers won't ever
> get. I have to say that I must thank these guys at work for the
> motivation, and I will today when I go in to work in 2 hours after I get my
> Cisco polos embroidered with the CCIE logo and install an LED behind it. :P
> Seriously though, they gave me that spark that I was missing for years and
> passing this lab attempt has ignited it even more. Now if you've managed
to
> endure the past few paragraphs of blah, all you first time CCIE candidates
> enjoy my recommendations, which you've all heard time and time again I'm
> sure.
>
> Study the Core, lab the Core until your fingers bleed. Get your Core down
> to at least 3 hours or less. InternetwokExpert WB3 labs are awesome for
> this, I got those down to 2 hours or less, some of the hard ones took 2 1/2
> hours. Speed and time management was huge for me. I probably put in about
> 500 hours of harcore lab time the last 4 months. I initially started
> InternetworkExperts WB2 doing labs in like 10 hours, learning and
> understanding the theory behind things. They were tough at first, but I
> constantly would go back and reread the DOCCD and reference all my books, I
> have ton of books. I watched their technologies COD 2 1/2 times in it's
> entirety. It took a lot of coffee and doing it hands on with them to stay
> awake. Brian Dennis's jokes couldn't even keep me up anymore after the
> first go around. ;) After a few months I started completing their labs in
> entirety in about 4 hours. Once this happened, I would do them and then
> look up everything in the DOCCD, no matter if I knew it or not. This was
my
> DOCCD familiarization stage. I actually picked that up from Scott Morris
> from somewhere I believe. Here it comes, you've heard it before, and
you're
> going to hear it again....
>
> KNOW YOUR DOCCD.. I guarantee you will get something in the lab that you
> haven't seen before. This is where speed on the CORE was essential for me.
> By lunch I had completed the lab once over , ran my TCL script, and was
> feeling a little uneasy still, but I had the meat done. I'm a paranoid
guy,
> you can ask others. The only thing left was verification and digging in
the
> DOCCD for those few things I didn't know. I verified twice and each time I
> found one small mistake that would have cost me 2 or 3 points each. Oh and
> by the way, I still don't know the answer to one of them weird questions,
> even now that I'm home and I have google, so here it comes, here it comes
> again, KNOW YOUR DOCCD. My last suggestion is make sure you know theory
> very well in the CORE IGP, well everything you learn really, but especially
> your CORE. you've heard time and time again Switching, FR, and IGP
probably
> will be half your points. If you understand the mechanics and how things
> work, no matter what scenario you get you can work through it. If you
> memorize the vendor WBs, it won't help in the real lab.
>
> So I guess I should recognize people and materials that have helped me.
> First off, my wife and GOD. If I don't mention her first, she might kill
me
> and probably the same about GOD... O_o Next, InternetworkExperts ver 4 WBs
> and their Technology COD. I have the Brians' voices engrained into my
> head. Brian Dennis, Josh Finke and crew from InternetworkExpert were nice
> enough to hook me up in the last hours. Also, IPExperts audio CD with
Scott
> Morris. I bought their WB package, but I only used the audio portion. I
> thought it was very good and I probably listened to it about 5 times in
it's
> entirety driving to and from work everyday. It was just an extra tool to
> feed my brain the knowledge it needed.
>
> I already have the materials from InternetworkExpert for the SP track and
> will hit that at work starting this morning since this is what I do at work
> everyday and my boss will let me study while I lab it up on our 7604s. :)
> MMM Knowledge, I think these guys at work turned me into an animal. Watch
> your back Petr, I'm coming for your CCIEs and I'll probably pass up Brian
> Mcgahan in 6 months because he's a slacker. j/k man. ;)
>
> Good luck to all other CCIE candidates and I hope this email helps.
>
> regards,
>
> Dale
>
> P.S. Don't unicast me for any NDA crap either, I'll turn your ass into
> Cisco.
>
>
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