CCIE Blog by Darby Weaver

Ok – This is not a beginner’s blog. I’ve been at this pretty seriously since about January of 2006 when I got off my horse and pony’d up and went to NetMasterClass.com’s 1 Week Bootcamp. I was pretty serious so I repeated in March of 2006. I thought I was more serious and went again to the second week of Mock Labs from NMC in April of 2006. I got slaughtered only averaging about a 57 or so on my score reports. Not enough to pass the CCIE RS Lab. I then took the CCIE InternetworkExpert Class on Demand in May of 2006. My scored averaged almost exactly the same or within 5 points as I recall. Since that Lab #4 killed me and I scored poorly on the first lab I took, I figured I was still “ok” for the lab and could make up the difference. I took a practice lab from Cisco and it told me yet a third time that I could not score about about a 60. You think I would have taken the hint, but my CCIE Written was about to expire… so I went for it in June as I recall. I was tired, could not sleep, and exhausted. I crammed before the lab day and I was keeping a diary on my thoughts, feelings, and actions for my readership who seemed pretty interested ion how I did or did not do. Well… needless to say. I failed my first lab attempt. I went again in October with little real improvement and failed again. I was working with a Cisco Gold Partner who was interested in employing me and I wanted to be “impressive”. Well, I did not take the offer that was extended to me, and I failed the lab too. Turnabout is fair play I suppose. I was working on taking a better opportunity at the time and so November and December were much of the same for me. I studied when I could. I knew where I needed improvement. I worked on improving myself, my skills, and my ego. I had now failed twice. The pressure is considerable since the average is 3.9 times by most yard sticks. I’ve heard 5 by some nice CCIE instructors. I suppose if you remove the few 1st timers from the list and then take an average, that might be right and more like it. Ok… I owe you 2007 and up to now for 2008. I should say that I’v been interested in the CCIE Certification since about 1997 or 1998 and my first book I purchased was the Giles book… maybe that’s why I needed to pursue the Sniffer Certified Master and finally attain it in 2007. Funny how things work out. I started spending my hard earned consulting money on my lab in 2001 I think and I spent more than most people, but I was a pretty decent consultant and my clients paid me well to get the job done. I did just that, but Cisco gear was expensive back then and a since 2501 might cost about $1200.00 or so used and a 2522 might cost twice that almost. Money went quick spending like $500.00 or more on AGS’s. Hah! I later gave all 6 of them away for free. Yep.