Silicon Valley billionaire got root canal without Novocaine to see if he was a badass

Billionaire venture capitalist Doug Leone once underwent a root canal without Novocaine — deliberately putting himself through the excruciating procedure to find out whether he was really a “badass.”The 69-year-old Sequoia Capital chairman said he had to get the dental work done before heading to a meeting — and ordered his incredulous dentist to skip the anesthetic.“My whole life I wanted to see if I was a badass or not,” the exec said during a lengthy interview with podcaster David Senra that was released online over the weekend.“In other words, I’m a fake badass that has this envelope nobody could tell, or am I really a badass on the inside?”The bizarre test was an extreme example of how Leone — whose fortune Forbes puts at around $11.8 billion — says he has harnessed fear throughout a career spanning nearly four decades at one of Silicon Valley’s most powerful venture-capital firms.“Drill without any Novocaine,” Leone recalled telling the dentist, without specifying when the painful session took place.“You’re out of your mind,” the tooth doctor replied, according to Leone.The drill initially caused Leone to jump.He then told the dentist he would not move again — and said he kept his word.To endure the pain, Leone said he tried to put his ordeal in perspective by imagining the suffering of soldiers grievously wounded in combat.“I used the trick of thinking what it must be like to go to war and lose an arm or two legs,” Leone said.

“That’s pain with consequences.Mine was pain with no consequences.”He then focused on the physical mechanics of what he was experiencing.“It’s just nerve endings from there to my spine to my brain,” Leone recalled telling himself.

“F–k it, I’m not moving.”The ordeal nevertheless took a physical toll.“Now I had to go home and change my shirt because I was a puddle of sweat, but I didn’t move,” Leone said.Root canals are normally performed under local anesthesia because t...