We spent 6 weeks shaving latency off our agent router. Got median response down from 4.2s to 1.1s. Felt like a win.
Nobody noticed.
The thing that was actually breaking us sat two layers up.
Where the Time Went
I had assumed the model call was the slow part. It wasn't. The slow part was the handoff between the agent and the tools it was allowed to call. Every tool decided, at runtime, whether it was relevant. That decision was cheap per call. Across 40 tools, checked every turn, it added up to most of the wall clock.
We'd been tuning the engine while the transmission was slipping.
The Tractor Analogy
It's like a tractor with a clogged fuel filter. You rebuild the injectors, swap the pump, blueprint the cylinders. None of it matters because the engine is starving three feet upstream. Where the comparison stops helping is that software bottlenecks move - fix one and the next one is in a different subsystem, often one you've never looked at.
Same System. Opposite Culprit.
What I Don't Know
I'm not certain the router optimization was wasted. It may matter again at 10x the load. I haven't stood in that traffic yet, so I'm guessing.
Stated Bias
I built the router. I wanted it to be the hero. That probably extended the time it took to look elsewhere.
Wrote a couple weeks back about measuring the wrong layer in evals. This is the same mistake wearing different clothes.
The fastest code is the code you never had to run. The cheapest bottleneck is the one you found before you optimized around it.
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