Blog Archives

The Audacity of Scale: What Real Estate Leaders Can Learn from JFK Airport’s Master Stroke

JFK-Airport-from-Idlewild-Golf-Course

There is a distinct magic in stepping out of a world-class venue and into a global transit hub, reflecting on the sheer physical ambition it takes to make both exist in a world-class city. Sitting in the grandstands at the U.S. Open in Flushing Meadows and then heading home through John F.

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Reframing Defeat - The Hidden Longevity Victory Behind an Absolute On-Court Thrashing

Tennis Sprint Interval Training

There is an unmistakable, humbling weight to a match where, as it unfolds, you realize your opponent is simply better than you in every conceivable phase of the game.

It wasn’t just that I was losing points; it was the realization of total mastery across the board.

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Remembering Who You Are

The Republic Plato
Remembering Who You Are 
Reflections on Mick Jagger, Norman Lear, Tennis, and the Hidden Importance of Memory 

The other night we hosted a live ball session at The TenniSphere with a group that included a lot of younger players. At one point I put on some Rolling Stones music and found myself doing a little arithmetic in my head.

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Dancing with the Storm

storm mindset tennis performance

I was watching the new Rafael Nadal documentary on Netflix when something his Uncle Toni said stopped me:

That line followed me onto the court.

Because despite all the matches I’ve played, despite knowing—intellectually—that it’s “just a match,” I still felt the familiar surge: the tightening chest,

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From Inversion to Aspiration: Choosing Vitality Over Comfort

Charlie Munger Inversion to Aspiration

Last week, my reflections were guided by Charlie Munger’s favorite mental model: inversion.

Rather than asking how to design a good life, the question was simpler and sterner: What does a bad life look like—and how might we avoid it?

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How I Won a Tennis Tournament by Doing Less, Not More

challenges winning tennis doubles

I recently won my first doubles tennis tournament in a few years. This was the most satisfying because we won four matches on three surfaces, with one of the battles being quite challenging, requiring a come-from-behind victory.

Gary Carmell won his first Doubles title April 2026

It took longer than I expected—and probably longer than I wanted—but in retrospect,

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Playing in Our Own Plays

Playing in Our Own Plays

Barcelona, the zoo, clay courts, and the art of living awake

We were in Barcelona—intentionally and accidentally at the same time.

Heather and I arrived after spending the prior week at the Rolex Monte‑Carlo Open,

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Trade-Offs in Monte Carlo

Monte Carlo Heather and Gary Carmell

Sometimes the Place Trumps the Play
On Trade‑Offs, Tennis, and the Economics of Time

Thomas Sowell famously defined economics not as money, markets, or math, but as the allocation of scarce resources that have alternative uses.

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Beyond the Baseline

Gary & Heather Carmell BNP Paribas Open 2026

Heather and I had the great pleasure of seeing some incredible tennis at Indian Wells We saw 12 matches, including the best match of all, Djokovic versus Draper, which had what the announcers categorized as one of the best points they have ever seen It was an epic 26 shot rally with incredible,

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From Tennis Courts to Ticker Tapes: A Micro Story Inside the AI Software Selloff

SaaSpocalypse

The last few weeks have been brutal for software stocks. Words like carnage, panic, and even “SaaSpocalypse” have crept into investor vocabulary as shares of companies long viewed as durable compounders—Salesforce,

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