I think you're missing a key point, which is that by extensively reading the R1 outputs, I'm able to observe how R1 thinks about things, which I can then replic

I think you're missing a key point, which is that by extensively reading the R1 outputs, I'm able to observe how R1 thinks about things, which I can then replicate. There are good ways and bad ways to think aloud, R1 just gave me a large set of examples of doing it the "good" way. It's uncommon to read hundreds of paragraphs of a smart person's internal reasoning process. Usually we're only able to read the final results of their thoughts.