(This is a now page, and if you have your own site, you should make one, too)
Completed first half Ironman
I don’t think I’ve ever spent more time training for something than this race. On June 30th, 2024, I completed my first half Ironman — Ironman 70.3 Pennsylvania. I’ve been sharing what I learned through this experience here on my blog — planning on sharing more in the coming weeks!
Prepping first rental property
Four years ago, I started learning about real estate investing.
Three years ago, I posted this thread, sharing my journey buying my first rental.
Two years ago, I bought my first property, started doing renovations, and moved in.
This past year, we’re buying our second property and are preparing to rent the first.
Turns out there’s a lot of stuff you have to do before becoming a landlord, so I’ve been consuming as much content as I can on managing rentals. The Bigger Pockets forums have become my best friend, as well as these two books:
Plan is to get our tenant moved in by October 1st. Wish us luck!
Training to win first open volleyball tournament
Training for my first half Ironman taught me a lot. One thing being that you can only do one thing well at a time.
What do I mean by that?
For the past seven months, I was all in on training for an Ironman. I didn’t have time for anything else. Ironman training took up 10-15 hours per week, so I had to cut back on other areas of my life — stopped ghostwriting, CrossFit once per week, and rarely playing volleyball. Was kind of a bummer, but do you know what it resulted in?
Peace knowing that I was focused on one goal instead of 100
Progress in my running, biking, and swimming abilities
And me actually finishing the damn Ironman!
So my next focus is on beach volleyball.
I’ve been playing in tournaments since I was in high school, but always had other things going on during the summer as well.
A running joke with one of my friends, Tom (pictured above), is that every volleyball season we say we are only going to do volleyball. We commit for a week, and then get distracted and start doing other things.
Not happening this year.
Time to lock in!
Archive
Updated May 23rd, 2024 from Point Pleasant, NJ
We’re moving!
After two years of living in and renovating our house on the Jersey Shore, it’s time to rent it out and move. Where you might ask?
Well, we’re under contract to build a home in Sarasota, Florida! We’ll close around September / October, and will be moving down in November / December.
Passed the CISSP Exam
CISSP stands for Certified Information Systems Security Professional. In order to join the club, you have to have five years of work experience in security and you have to pass the rigorous CISSP exam. So I hunkered down for ten weeks, and passed the exam on March 12th.
It was by far the hardest exam I’d ever taken and I never want to take it again. I’ll be paying my dues until the day I die.
I wrote about my whole experience in an extremely lengthy and comprehensive post below, that also was the top ranking post on r/cissp for a day or so.
One month out from my first half Ironman
Last October, my friend guilted me into doing an Ironman. It’s always been on my list, so I said, why not? There’ve been a few phases of training:
Learning to swim
Running a few half marathons
Committing to an Ironman training plan
Each phase has had it’s challenges, but phase three is eating up a lot of time — 10-12 hours to be exact. I’m used to training 6 hours per week, max.
The training has been eating into other parts of my life. And I’ve been eating nearly double the amount that I usually do — 3500 to 4000 calories per day to be exact.
One quote has really helped me push through:
Once you decide to do something hard, you aren't in charge anymore. The people in charge are your former self and your future self. When it gets really hard and life's awful, just remember, your former self decided to do this. Your future self wants you to finish. Let those two be the guides.
The training isn’t necessarily hard. Just boring — which I guess in and of itself is hard. It's a mental game.
Miles and miles and miles.
• Swimming, staring at the same black line at the bottom of the pool for 60 minutes straight.
• Biking, staring at the little Zwift avatar navigating through Watopia for 90 minute straight.
• Running is always a good time. Especially intervals.
The training is monotonous and all but fun. But that's what I signed up for — something hard. My former self decided to do it though. And damn straight my future self wants to finish.
We’re five weeks out and I’m just about ready for training to be over, but I’m psyched to get out on the course and cross that finish line.
Oh, and triathlon is a very expensive sport. Nobody tells you this before starting. But then you sign up for a race, and end up spending $8,000+ on equipment. Wild. Just keep that in mind if your friend ever comes to you saying “So, want to do an Ironman with me?”
Updated October 5th, 2023 from Bradenton, FL.
We’re engaged!
On August 23rd, 2023, I asked Rachael to marry me. Her response? “Thank god I got my nails done…”
Wasn’t the response I was hoping for but, hey, she said yes, and now she gets to spend the rest of her life with me! What’s better than that?
Signed up for Ironman 70.3
I started surfing again last month and almost drowned. New Jersey got a massive swell a few weeks ago and I got a little too far ahead of my skis after not touching a surfboard for three years. It was a stark reminder I needed to improve my swimming skills.
So I signed up for a swim class my friend sent me through Facebook, and my buddy who does triathlons sent me this message:
Now I’m scheduled to do the 2024 IRONMAN 70.3 PENNSYLVANIA HAPPY VALLEY.
Spent two weeks in Spain
My trip to Spain deserves a full blown post, but here’s a highlight from each place we went to:
Barcelona: Tour of Montserrat
Mallorca: Cala Deia + beach club
San Sebastian: Basque cooking class with Michelin Star chefs + tour of cider house
Updated March 11th, 2023 from Point Pleasant, NJ.
Quitting
I set a goal to write a weekly newsletter about investing in fitness. I spent hours thinking about why this was a good decision, but after two weeks of writing, I decided to quit.
It’s too much work for me to commit to one high-quality piece of writing every week. Instead, I’ll be publishing a weekly curation newsletter.
CrossFit Games Quarterfinals
I’ve been doing CrossFit for 5 years. Each year I’ve competed in the CrossFit Open; a global CrossFit competition. My longstanding goal was to qualify for the quarterfinals. This involves finishing in the top 10% in the world for your region. Well after 5 years of doing CrossFit, I’ve finally qualified.
The quarterfinals start next week. I have no shot of advancing to the semifinals, but I’m really excited that I finally qualified after 5 years of working.
Playing the great online game
I recently reread The Great Online Game. I realized I’d been playing it all wrong.
I’ve been playing everyone else’s game. Everything but mine. Today I start playing my game.
Will be writing more about this later on.