69 · The Résumé of a Madman

Random Korean kid. Studied physics and maths alone in Seoul. Crammed two years of A-level maths, further maths and physics in four days. Finished the equivalent of ten university degrees in individual study and research, built a £10k-a-month business from his basement, read three hundred books and became a master coder and programmer — all in the span of Q2 to Q3 2026. Got A*A*A* and a TMUA as a private candidate. Gets into Imperial EFDS with a Korean scholarship. But before starting — enrols in University of Manitoba online graduate courses, the 7000-level monsters that are astronomically hard. Represents Manitoba at the IMC in Bulgaria; wins gold with 135/135. Nobody in the building knows he's about to start at Imperial in two months. Starts EFDS September 2026. As a first-year, joins fifteen societies and scales the online business to £50k a month. December 2026 — flies to Winnipeg at minus forty degrees. Sits the Putnam representing Manitoba. Scores 120/120 — the first time in seventy years Manitoba ever won. Flies back to London the next day, preparing on the plane for an exam an hour after landing at Heathrow. Nobody at Imperial even knew he left. Perfect score. First person in history to sit the Putnam while simultaneously enrolled at a UK university — Daniel Ullman himself said it had never been done. Finishes EFDS with a first. Industrial placement at Citadel or Jane Street, half a million a year in Boston. Return offer. Part III at Cambridge in theoretical physics — distinction. Oxford StatML DPhil. Published research. Oxford-Man Institute affiliation, launches the quant fund. Then — drives a beat-up 2010 red Dodge Caravan onto the most beautiful campus in America.

The other draft of the same legend: 18, high school graduate. 19, gap year, failed harder at the Korean SAT. 20, U of Manitoba, applied to Cambridge economics, tried drop-shipping for two weeks. 21, applied to Oxford, Imperial and the rest — rejected everywhere. 22, finally starts at LSE in London, first online business selling digital products. 23, exchange year at UC Berkeley for maths and CS. 24, final year at LSE. 25, Part III at Trinity, side hustle at £500k a month take-home. 26, New York, quant at Jane Street for a year. 27, scales the consulting business, exits, gap year travelling the world, main base Dubai. 28, more travelling to the world's major cities. 29, back to Oxford as a professor in theoretical physics and at the Saïd Business School, starts the quant firm after a ten-million exit. 30 — YC.

I wish I could achieve something of such unfathomable scale that people aren't saying "wow, congratulations" but "what the fuck is going on" — building the first hundred-billion-dollar IPO while doing a DPhil in theoretical physics at Oxford, studying algebraic topology, playing poker, night coding and trading. What I really, really want eventually is theoretical physics, a load of maths, entomology and astrophysics. I know it sounds like a fluke, but this is where my soul just says: yes, this is me. Startups on the side. This is totally possible.

I have an obsession with finding out who I can become within the next half-decade. Going full ballocks into business, investments, academia — all the wild stuff — while building a tank of a physique: fitness, fighting, a genuine monster. A quant monster who can do everything academically, alone in his head, driving at full force, breaking down, getting back up, striving to the top. I can do that. And I need that.

Nobody in history has won the IMC twice and taken ICPC gold alongside a 120/120 Putnam while running a consulting agency and starting a company. These goals alone are suffocating. You are compressing a century of work, life, experience and grind into eighteen months. Think radically big — you are compressing what entire bloodlines take, into eighteen months.

Why can't you become a billionaire, win a Nobel Prize, win the Fields Medal, and just be a star? Why the fuck not? You can read ten thousand books, take twenty thousand hours of courses, build and fail ten businesses, master programming — all of this is possible. So many people dream too small. The scale of the vision should be so astronomical that it pulls you into radical execution. That's how you scale and grow.