Personal

35km in the bank. But this one hurt.

Started fresh. Finished wrecked. 1,640m of elevation over 6 hours stripped me down. Legs gave out before the mind did - but only just.

UTA50 is another 15km longer, with almost 1,000m more elevation. Today's effort wasn't even the full thing. And it still broke me. If I hit that wall during the real race, I won't just slow down. I'll stop.

That's the scary bit.

But also the point.

The course doesn't lie. You either show up prepared or get chewed up. Today didn't break me. It just showed me where the cracks are. And that's exactly what prep is for.

Every painful step now is insurance for race day.

You don't start out building dystopia.

You start with a dream. To help someone. Maybe save a life. Not growth. Not virality. Just impact.

It begins with something human. “I want to help people.” Real pain. Real need. Strong emotional pull.

So you build. Scrappy MVPs. Test empathy. Pitch it as perspective-shifting. Maybe even healing.

Early adopters rave. Investors lean in. Retention climbs. Virality kicks. So you optimise.

Empathy turns to entertainment. Immersion becomes addiction. Exploration turns into extraction.

“Total immersion” becomes your edge. Richer data. Deeper sync. Sharper fidelity. The product gets better. But better for who?

Then come the tiers. Free. Plus. Premium. Ultra. More access. More control. More fun.

Lower tiers don't get less. They just get worse. Ads. Friction. Withdrawal.

The customer's life becomes content. Their pain becomes product.

Then the customer disappears. No roadmap. No experience tracking. No consent. Because they're not the customer. They're the cost.

You're not evil. You're just in growth mode. The sprint is full. The metrics are green. Legal said yes. And besides - it's working.

Dystopia doesn't crash through the door. It slips in…while the dashboard stays green.

This route is brutal but beautiful. Elevation like this breaks most runners. But it also builds something race day can't fake - grit.

Yeah, everyone's talking about ChatGPT image generation online - and I get it. It's addictive and pretty entertaining.

One of the cooler ways to use it is by turning a rough sketch into something way more polished.

Here's one of my early, messy drawings I made for the “Cultivate and Cut” post. I always meant to come back and clean it up but never got around to it. So I asked ChatGPT to turn it into an illustration...the quality blew me away.

Here's my (ugly) original drawing:

Then I asked for an illustration version:

Next, I asked it to add some extra details:

Then I tried an isometric version:

Then photorealistic:

And finally, a Ghibli-style version:

I'm definitely going to keep playing around with turning my sketchy concepts into full illustrations. This is just too much fun.

A morning run. Half-marathon with over 700 m of elevation. Three hours on the legs.

That's not just training - that's mental conditioning. This was another brick in the UTA50 wall. Quiet work. Honest effort. A long session that burns the calves and builds the mindset.

Pace doesn't matter when the elevation looks like a mountain range. What matters is showing up. What matters is stacking these efforts week after week.

You don't finish UTA50 on race day. You finish it here. In the sweat. In the silence. In the rain. In the Sunday slogs when no one's watching.

I had to....sorry, not sorry #ghibli

Went for a 15km run over the weekend and couldn't resist snapping a photo - Sydney really is a beautiful place.

While preparing for UTA50 (total elevation 2.1km 😱) and doing some hill training, I looked at the elevation profile and got an idea for an illustration. From this...

To this..."Master small hills to conquer the peak"

Didn't know this!

The Balmoral tram line in Sydney operated from 1922 to 1958. It was a branch of the larger North Shore tram network, designed to bring people from the city and surrounding suburbs to Balmoral Beach. The tram line played a significant role in making Balmoral Beach a popular destination during its operation.

Yes, It's hard to hear criticism.

When someone points out your flaws, your gut reaction is 'WTF?!' - or in business terms, 'defensiveness.'

Of course, you want to protect your ego. You want to explain yourself, prove them wrong, or even tell them to f*** off. Tempting, isn't it?

But defensiveness kills growth. Pause. Breathe. Ask yourself: 'What can I learn from this - even though I hate it?' Growth starts the moment you listen instead of emotionally react.

Nothing to learn from it? That's also ok but still thank the person who gave you feedback.

I don't like running in the morning. Or rather, I don't like the idea of it. What I really want is to have breakfast first, drink my coffee and then, a couple of hours later, think about exercise. But once the run is done, it feels great - like I've earned that big breakfast.

This morning, I went for an easy, scenic 10km run. My legs were still sore from Thursday's hill session, so I didn't (and honestly couldn't) push too hard.

Overall, I'm pretty happy with my progress (112km) in January. I've built up mileage quickly, especially considering I was struggling to run 3km at the end of December.

And I snapped a few pics of beautiful Sydney along the way.

It's Thursday, which means hill running day. I can feel the gradual improvement compared to my last two hill runs - I'm feeling much stronger. It's still tough, but I'm covering more distance and tackling more elevation.

Today I did 12km, 437m elevation. The first 9km, I didn't switch to walking - I ran all the hills, which is a huge improvement! Looking forward to an easy run on the flats this weekend though!

A quick training session tonight: SkiErg, rowing machine, plus some shoulders and arms work. Went all out on the SkiErg 500m, then rowed 500m too. Hit a PB on the SkiErg at 1:42.7!

Strangely enough, I'm actually looking forward to the hills session tomorrow!

Getting used to running hills is definitely going to take some time. Feeling good about building up to running them without needing to switch to walking.

On Thursday, I had a decent go at the hills in my local area. Did 9km in 1h 8m with 307m of elevation. I ran more this time compared to the week before, cutting my walking time down to 7m 24s. Last week, for the same distance, my walking time was 19m 50s, so that's already solid progress.

Yesterday, I tackled the Bondi Beach to Coogee Beach run and back - on tired legs. There are plenty of hills and steps along that route, adding up to 283m of elevation. It was just over 14km in total. I managed to run all the way to Coogee but walked the hills on the way back. Calves were sore. Legs felt a bit heavy, which makes sense as I'm ramping up both mileage and intensity.

Overall, I'm pretty happy with the progress, but there's still plenty of hard work ahead before UTA50.

110 days to go!

Struggling to write? Shrink the task.

Blog post too much? Write a tweet. Tweet too hard? Write a sentence. Sentence still suck? Write a shit one.

Start small. Start ugly. Start anyway.

The point isn't brilliance. It's movement. You don't find your voice by thinking. You find it by writing. Quantity leads to clarity. Bad drafts build muscle.

Write badly. Then write better.

It's Tuesday - sprint day, yay! I mixed things up a bit this time and here's how it went:

• 2km warm-up
• 400m x 3
• 200m x 3
• 100m x 3

I hit a PB for the 200m (39.5s @ 3:18 pace) but couldn't quite beat my PBs for the 400m or 100m, even though it felt like I was flying!

The 400m x 3 was brutal. It's basically an all-out sprint the whole way.

Next Tuesday, I'm thinking of switching things up again and focusing on training for a 5km PB. The plan:

• 2km warm-up
• 1km @ 5:00 pace x 6, with 2 min rest in between

Let's see how it goes!

Sometimes I walk past the Sydney General Post Office - it's a cool spot right in the centre of Sydney.

Underneath it, there's this whole network of tunnels and basements (not sure if the public has access to it). Back in the day, they were used for postal operations and deliveries.

These days, though, it's now there: the Fullerton Hotel Sydney, shops and restaurants.

Caught the UFC at on of the pubs in Manly. I was supporting the Russian fighters, Umar and Islam. Absolute machines. They're incredible athletes, sharp and relentless.

Watching with my mate, we couldn't get over how insanely well they understand movement - both their own and their opponent's. Every single move is calculated and lethal.

Me in the cage? I wouldn't last 10 seconds.

One of my posts on LinkedIn went viral'ish. It wasn't exactly groundbreaking or full of deep insights.

But it's certainly a topic that has two completely opposite camps and no one in between.

I've written better and more helpful content (at least in my opinion), but LinkedIn's algorithm doesn't promote it because it doesn't drive engagement.

That's why I don't like algorithms. Instead of promoting good content, they push controversial or clickbaity posts that spark engagement.

Thoughtful and insightful content stays invisible.