Just passed my SP yesterday, first try.
Wouldn't be fair not to thank Brian, the workbooks, the videos and the GNS3 gods; made the process quicker and shorter, a little less than two months in all.
Also, Narayan, who took the time to give me his point-of-view in a couple of things that I thought very important.
After going, I'd like to offer a piece of advice for future candidates: once you get a hang of the key technologies, practice building a strategy for a big scenario (say INEs full labs) and practice speed until you break your fingers (you know, build configurations in some text-editor, then apply). I think the exam is a race again time more than anything else. (of course you need to know what you are doing, but still...)
I mean, if you can solve all INE's labs and understand everything you did, you should pass the exam no problem IF they gave you 12 hours to solve it. unfortunately, the don't give you 12 hours, so...make sure you, at some point, practice doing everything quickly. make a habit of whatever your methodology is...
Also: account for nerves. I came in having promised myself to read everything, outline a strategy and do the exam in such a way I'd have time left over to check everything. Nerves can get the best of you and they did in my case, I started doing everything in sequence instead of strategically. I didn't save time by outlining my strategy and trying to visit routers couple of times instead of actually going in to do stuff 10-15 different times for each router, which is what i ended up doing
By that I mean, it's better to try consolidate as many tasks as possible and configure as many things as you can in one single visit. I know it sounds easy, and if done incorrectly can get you in a whole lot of trouble, but still, I think this is the way to go.
I wish you all good luck!!!
now, a hard-earned break...
c.