Well, one more week until I am attending the CCIE Expo down in Wilmington, DE with the CCIE Flyer man, Eman. 
If you are not aware, Eman is hosting what they are calling a “CCIE Expo” where he will have CCIE Training for R&S, SP, Voice, and Security.  The price for this class and the hotel stay where too hard to pass up – especially when you consider that it is about a 2 hour drive from where I live in PA.  I know I am not as ready as I wanted to be, so I have a few days to refresh my memory and get ready.  Whatever happens next week, the one thing that I know is that it will be a learning experience.
I will learn my strengths and weaknesses – and once I am sure of them I know where I need to focus.
If you want to read more on the Expo, here is a link to the CCIE Flyer Article or to the CCIE Agent site
In case you where wondering who is leading the classes there, below is the list:
Ringmaster
Eman Conde
 CCIE Agent™ known to many CCIEs around the world will play ring master to an historic and memorable week of training and networking
 
Serivce Provider
CCIE #14856 Paul Negron
Paul is a CCIE Service Provider with over 12 years of networking experience and numerous published works on topics such as MPLS Paul is a giant in the Cisco networking arena.
In his own words
The changes in our industry have motivated me to improve the CCIE Service Provider Track to help with the various issues that come up in deployment as well as preparing for the lab exam. I want people to leave my class knowing they got more than they expected. I approach this responsibility with much humility and I am very grateful for the opportunity to work with the people I have so far. I can’t wait to help more of them.
With the goal of helping others in mind I have been finishing off the labs that are a part of my SP boot camp in Colorado this March.  The SP track is a more significant certification these days and interest in professionals with this certification and skills becoming more valuable.  Training is one of my passions and I am humbled by the way many of the students I have tutored have responded to my approach.
Security
CCIE #19860 Piotr Matusiak
Piotr is a dual CCIE R&S and Security with over 10 years experience in the field.  His work is interesting and focussed on security architecture and risk management in complex enterprise class networks. 
Advice on preparing for the Security CCIE lab
As the Security is a very broad topic there is no chance to go through everything from the beginner level. Hence, all students should have at least CCSP level of knowledge. This does not mean you must have CCSP certificate but an equivalent level of knowledge and two years of experience will help a lot. Of course I will be teaching core topics from scratch but some of the topics will be touched on at the higher level. Moreover, I highly recommend subscribing to Group Study mailing list as this is the place where someone can learn a lot and dispel any doubts.
The most important thing is that I will use Narbik’s philosophy of teaching using only a whiteboard and markers, without trying to bore the students through PowerPoint. This approach is much better and current Narbik students, including myself, like it a lot
Routing and Switching
CCIE #12410 Narbik Kocharians
Narbik is a triple CCIE R&S, Security and SP with over a dozen years of experience.  His training background is a history of who’s who in the Cisco certification training arena.  His textbooks have been used by these companies as he developed his art.  As the brain trust of Micronics Training he has been personally responsible for mentoring some of the brightest in the industry.
Thoughts about obtaining a CCIE certification
Believe it or NOT, the CCIE cert is NOT hard at all. As a matter of fact, it is ridiculously easy, but its so easy its hard. Let’s just say my grand mother could do it. But she is a dual CCIE (just kidding).  On a serious note, you need to study thoroughly.  You need to study very hard and know every topic and sub topics.  Cisco wants their CCIEs to know their material. If you look at the blueprint and go over each item one at a time, you will pass. It is as simple as that. There are some “007” configurations that you may have to perform, but all in all its NOT that bad.