Beat The GMAT a GMAT & MBA community

I've been a long-time lurker to the board on this site, and found their test prep suggestions extremely helpful. I finally took the gmat yesterday so I figured now was as good a time as any to share my experience and hopefully give back to the board.

Background: Graduated college 05, med school 09, currently a 3rd year anesthesia resident. I'm planning on getting a job out of residency, paying my debt, then going to bschool. Since the gmat is good for 5yrs and I had a small lull in my schedule, I figured now was a good time to concentrate on the test.

Preparation: To be honest I started out by more or less copying Eric's prep, since his result was outstanding. Imitation is the severest form of flattery.

Princeton Review: Like Eric, I started here. The book is geared mostly toward those who have a goal of maybe 500 or 600 at best. The CATs online are decent, especially to help get your timing down, but at the same time they recycle their RC passages which makes for a skewed result. I do recommend the book as maybe a 3-4 day warmup, to re-acclimate yourself with geometry, circles, etc, especially if you have >2mo to prepare. If you're strapped for time, skip it.

GMAT Cram Plan: One of my buddies who just took the gmat told me this was a great book, so I bought it. This book is geared toward people who have a very limited amount of time to get ready for the test, and are shooting for perhaps 450-550 range. I took the practice test which was nothing at all like the real gmat. The questions were all one-step thinking, and much shorter than the real thing. I'd skip this book altogether.

Master The GMAT: I did the one week free trial but didn't end up buying it. The online course setting is a novel idea, but there was far too much repetition for my palate. Can't say much more than that.

Kaplan Math Workbook: Quant was my weakest section on every practice test, and then again on the real thing. This book is great for getting down the basic concepts, but doesn't really come close to the kind of integrated, multi-step problems you see on the real test. I've heard good things about Kap 800 for these types of things, but I bought this book instead for some reason. It's a nice warmup, but again will not get you ready for the actual test on its own.

OG: Everyone praises this book as a silver bullet or bible of the gmat. And they are right. I did all my other prep and practice tests BEFORE starting OG; I did the entire book in the 6 days before my test. I figured I would dedicate every study moment to practicing timed questions with OG in lieu of doing another practice test. This book is the entire reason I bumped 70pts in the week before my test. My plan was to finish one section per day (word probs, ds, etc), and this proved to be quite a time requirement. I was spending 3-4hrs a day doing 150-200 questions, but it was worth it because I didn't get the slightest bit tired during the real test, and I felt like it was just another practice session. I didn't work backwards through OG as some others have suggested, but it doesn't seem like a bad idea.

Practice Tests:
gmat cram plan test, 8wks before test: 750 (this isnt representative in the slightest)
gmat free software cat 1, 6wks before test: 670 (45Q, 37V)
PR CAT 2, 1wk before test: 680 (44Q, 40V)

Test: I won't go into the essays because there's not really much to say. The quant section for me was much harder than I anticipated, I finished with <30sec left. I felt like it was easy at the beginning, super hard in the middle, and then easy again at the end. This freaked me out a bit but I figured since there was nothing I could do about it, I just plugged on. It took me about 10 questions to get in a good rhythm and thinking straight. I thought doing the essays first would get me into rhythm but I was wrong. The verbal portion was a lot more what I was expecting. Very similar to the hard bin in OG. I finished with about 6-7mins left. My goal coming into the test was 720, but since I hadn't hit that on any practice test it seems like a little much. Seeing a 750 (48Q, 44V) was a little bit of a surprise since I thought the math section didn't go that well. Verbal pulled me up I guess. Again, going through OG in a week was painful but is 100% of the reason I bumped 70 points. I think leaving it for the end really helped.

So that's it. I worked little for the first 4 weeks, medium for the next 2wks, and then like a madman for the last 2. This was my strategy in med school and luckily it carried over to the gmat. I'm more than happy to answer any questions or respond to any comments. Thanks again to this board for helping me get started!

Drew