Okay, let me tell you about this thing I started calling my “triple crown race for short”. Sounds kinda weird, I know, but it perfectly describes this one crazy push I had to do recently.
The Starting Gate
It all kicked off on a Monday morning. You know how Mondays can be. Well, this one dumped a big project right on my lap. Usually, this kind of stuff takes a good few weeks, maybe a month, to sort out properly. But the boss comes over, all serious, and says, “Need this wrapped up by Friday. End of day.” Just like that. My jaw nearly hit the floor.
Turns out, it wasn’t just one thing. It was three distinct, pretty chunky parts that needed doing. Three big deliverables. That’s when the “triple crown” idea popped into my head. Like those horse races – the Kentucky Derby, Preakness, Belmont Stakes – all crammed into five days. A triple crown, but the short version. A really, really short version.
Running the Race
So, what did I do? First, I locked myself away for a bit. Had to get my head straight. Panic wasn’t going to help. I grabbed a notepad and just started breaking everything down. What needed doing for part one? Part two? Part three? Made a rough timeline, which basically looked like “do everything, now.”
Here’s kinda how it went down:
- Monday PM: Sketching out the plan. Figuring out what tools and info I needed. Sent out a few emails begging for quick replies on stuff I was missing.
- Tuesday: All guns blazing on Part One. Head down, focused. Skipped lunch, just powered through. Got the first chunk mostly roughed out by the evening. Felt like the first leg was done, kinda.
- Wednesday: Started on Part Two. This one was trickier, involved digging through some old files and making sense of them. Drank way too much coffee. By late night, Part Two was taking shape. Progress, but I was already feeling the burn.
- Thursday: The final stretch – Part Three. This was the beast. Hit a major wall around lunchtime. Something wasn’t adding up. Had to backtrack, redo a bunch of calculations. Seriously frustrating. Felt like the horse stumbling before the finish line. Stayed super late, just grinding it out.
- Friday: The home stretch. Spent the morning cleaning everything up, making sure Part One, Two, and Three actually made sense together. It was a mad dash, checking details, fixing typos, making it look presentable. Felt like pure adrenaline.
Crossing the Finish Line
I hit send on that final package literally minutes before the deadline. Just slumped back in my chair afterwards. Totally drained. Physically and mentally exhausted. It wasn’t the prettiest work I’ve ever done, not by a long shot. But it was done. The three parts were there, they were complete.
Was it worth it? Hard to say. It was satisfying to meet the insane deadline, I guess. Proved I could do it. But man, that week took a toll. It’s not sustainable, doing sprints like that all the time. It really was a race – fast, intense, and left me needing a serious break afterwards. So yeah, my “triple crown race for short”. Glad it’s over.
