I would guess the bulk of the time is being spent in compilation. You might try "codon build -release day_2.py" then "time ./day_2" to measure just runtime.
time python day_2.py
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Executed in 51.26 millis fish external
usr time 23.38 millis 48.00 micros 23.33 millis
sys time 21.88 millis 617.00 micros 21.26 millis
time day_2
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Executed in 227.06 millis fish external
usr time 8.17 millis 70.00 micros 8.10 millis
sys time 6.69 millis 708.00 micros 5.98 millis
time python day_8.py
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Executed in 53.63 millis fish external
usr time 22.11 millis 51.00 micros 22.06 millis
sys time 24.63 millis 714.00 micros 23.91 millis
time day_8
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Executed in 115.89 millis fish external
usr time 5.83 millis 92.00 micros 5.74 millis
sys time 4.59 millis 856.00 micros 3.73 millis