September 2021 Review

October 1st, 2021

September was eventful!

I spent the first part of the month camping in Glacier National Park and driving back to Atlanta. Glacier was gorgeous and a great way to end my time in Montana. We drove back through the northern route, stopping in eastern Montana, Mineapolis, Madison, and Louisville. It was definitely strange re-entering civilization after months in sparsely populated Montana.

September 24th was my last day at Ladder. The following Monday I joined Vesta as one of the first handful of software engineers. I’m sad to leave Ladder—I enjoyed my time there, learned a ton, and made a bunch of friends. But I’m super excited to build the foundational pieces of an extremely young company!

My pre-season training is well underway—my first GPP block finished up this week. This season, I’m working with Coach Evan Gregory on both programming and technique. I’ve already learned a ton from him in the short time we’ve been working together, and I’m really excited to see how this season plays out!

Goal Tracking

🟢 Get 12% faster. I’m resetting this goal to be 2% faster than the 10.79 I ran at the end of last season—that’s a goal of 10.57. I doubled my goal mainly because I managed the 10.79 while injuring myself.
🔴 50% less discretionary spending. My discretionary spending was 22% higher than my 2020 average. Camping, a week-long road trip, and some furniture purchasing will do that!
🟡 One hour of solitary free time a day. This has been improving, and I expect it to continue to get better: my work schedule promises to be a lot more flexible with this new gig.
🟡 Twice-weekly live conversations with friends. Although I didn’t manage to do this while traveling, since I’ve returned home to Atlanta I’ve gotten back into the routine.

Track & Fitness

My first cycle was mostly focused on getting back onto the track—I’ve been doing a lot of acceleration work and more tempo than I’m used to.
I’m working on keeping my feet behind my knees as my leg swings forward and down. That should cut down on my ground contact time and keep my hamstring from entering compromised positions.

Projects

You can download a built version of the Mac JOTA app here!

Writing

Reading

Good Strategy Bad Strategy by Richard Rumelt
I’ve been slowly working my way through the Penguin History of the World, which is a 1200 page monster of a book. I’m about halfway through now!

Links & Quotes

Software Engineering & Tech

Track, Health, & Fitness

Other

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