RE: FINALLY NAILED IT: #25510 is mine !!!

Mihai
Congratulations!!!
Thanks for sharing such a great story.

Thanks

--
Larry Hadrava, Larryh_at_INE.com
CCIE #12203 (R&S)
Internetwork Expert, Inc.
http://www.INE.com
Toll Free: 877-224-8987
Outside US: 775-826-4344
-----Original Message-----
From: nobody_at_groupstudy.com [mailto:nobody_at_groupstudy.com] On Behalf Of
mihai.grigore_at_onlinehome.de
Sent: Thursday, September 24, 2009 5:36 PM
To: ccielab_at_groupstudy.com
Subject: FINALLY NAILED IT: #25510 is mine !!!
Hi all,
I was not posting too much here, I was reading more what others asked.
I just wanted to let you know that I passed the certification lab. Number is
25510, learned it this morning at 4:30AM local time. 4th attempt...
I failed in January 2009 because I was simply too cautious and too slow, not
that I did not know to answer the questions. I simply read all the questions
many times, checked and re-checked and somehow, ran into a time management
issue, I did not have enough time to finish all tasks. But as you all know,
this is part of the game and I failed this....
Approximately 1,5 year back, me and a colleague of mine assembled a rack in
the
company premises and I can tell you this is the best solution for this trip.
I
used before the INE racks for 12 hours/day and this was hell. I had to start
at
6:00AM local time untill 17:30. Now having the priviledge to have my "own"
rack
that I can access via VPN tunnel from anywhere, I had a lot of freedom to
work
whenever I wanted. I stopped counting how many weekends, vacation days, etc
I
spent on that rack. Probably my wife knows much better than me. But I guess
you
all know this by now...
Back to my lab yesterday, in Brussels. I was the first one to arrive at
Cisco
location, only the security guy was there at 7:05 AM. We started the lab at
8:15 with the proctor. Very professional, nice guy. He was helpful in all my
questions when I needed clarifications. And I can tell you I needed many of
these clarifications. Do not be shy about this. You have doubts, just ask
politely for clarifications, NOT the solution.
Open Ended questions were fair if you read the many recommended books, there
is
really nothing to worry about. I spent on them 10 minutes but checked them 4
times in this period, just to be 100% sure. NO shortcuts here, as many
indicated in various posts...
I moved to the configuration part. I got the Cisco diagrams that you MUST
re-draw yourself, as Scott Morris recommended so many times. Again, it was
my
(TCP) slow start. By lunch break at 11:50, I was half done with the IGP. But
somehow was not worried, I knew I could do it.
Lunch was just to get some calories into my body, I chatted with the proctor
and other candidates a bit, took the chance to relax and reset from the lab
stuff. It is very important, you cannot configure 8 hours without having a
break, your brain cannot stand it. At least mine cannot... I have seen posts
here from people complaining about food quality in don't remember which
location. I was not interested in that at all, just get your brain some
calories, to be able to go on for the second round. Took some light fish
menu,
a drink and light desert. If I eat too much, I get sleepy afterwards, so
beware
of this. 
Round two started at about 12:30 with still 4,5 hours to go. I knew I could
do
it. Naturally, I read through the whole lab at the beginning, but you get
the
small things (which are killing us) only when you actually configure the
various tasks.
I used DOCCD 4-5 times, but I must say I knew exactly what and where to look
for. Like Anthony Sequiera once told us, it took me 30 seconds to find what
I
wanted, the Ctrl+F to search for the keywords. It worked just fine. Be sure
to
know where is located what, it will save you time. 
I walked away with a good feeling and this morning at 4:30 I could no longer
sleep, opened the mail, my lab report was already available. Logged in with
wrong credentials 3 times (what would you expect at 4:30AM ???) and at 4th
attempt, there it was: PASS. Wow, that was a big relief!!! I cannot describe
it...  of course I was no longer able to sleep further...
I noticed that many of the people that passed reported on GS a similar
behavior, learning the news at small hours in the night, not being able to
sleep. I guess you simply feel when you do good.
Some years ago there was a movie "Doing time"...  I did my time, now it's
back
to normal life, family and friends again. I am now anjoying some drinks
right
now...
 
For those still striving for it, I would recommend to do the ASET labs if
possible. These are available for Cisco partners through your Cisco SE.
There
are 15 mini-labs and 6 full labs. These are free of charge. I scheduled
about
12 sessions, 10 hours each. You get to know the way how the questions are
asked, how topology diagrams are presented etc. I found particularly
interesting the reversed lab 6. You get the outputs and you need to
configure
in such a way to get those outputs. By doing this, I learned to check line
by
line and word by word. This way I could find some minor mistake in my
configuration in the lab and saved me some points. 
John Galt Kupec is the person supporting the ASET labs and he was a great
help,
very responsive and professional when I indicated some issues. These were
addressed and corrected immediately.
Besides that, I spent my last 6 weeks with the INE R&S WB Volume1 ver. 5. It
is
a great source of information, VERY well written, with lots of details and
clarifications that I have seen nowhere else. It helps immensely understand
how
things work. I cannot recommend it strongly enough!
I was using mainly INE's materials and I would like to thank them for their
materials and great instructors. Especially Scott, he was simply great
during
the boot camp last November in Reno!! Enjoyed both the style and contents...
I will mention again INE Vol1 version5. Peter's 400 pages CoS section (but
not
only) is simply amazing. Of course, I used all 3 volumes.
Brians were also great instructors on the CoD. I still cannot understand how
Brian Dennis can speak so fast for so long. I had to listen CoD 3 times in
order to get ALL the details they talk about.
I learned also many interesting things on this GroupStudy, lots of knowledge
here and many helpful people. Just put your question there, someone will
answer
you.
Of course, a lot of noise, like in any forum that I participated, but I
guess
this is human nature...
All this helped me during my preparation. Thank you again and sorry if I
missed
anyone.
Thank you for your patience to read this, hopefully it would help you too.
Wish
you all the luck with your preparations.
NOW, you might think I am crazy, but I will still seriously ask this: HOW DO
YOU KEEP YOURSELF UP TO DATE?
A colleague of mine has got his number more that one year ago and he has to
re-certify soon. But with the blueprint 4.0 now. Naturally, I have some
ideas
but would like to hear yours.
Best regards,
Mihai Grigore
CCIE# 25510
Blogs and organic groups at http://www.ccie.net