I just Beat The GMAT!

Background

25. Russian.
Education: BA in Economics. MA in Political Economy
Work experience: 1,5 years in Business Consulting, 1 year of project management in the Industry


Preparation

Started Sept 12, 2008
Target score: 730

Took the test on Dec 12, 2008
Scored: 720. Q50. V38.

Prep materials reviewed (chronologically):
a) Arco
b) OG11
c) Kaplan GMAT 800
d) Manhattan Sentence Correction
e) Manhattan CR and RC
f) Ace the GMAT
+ Software: GMAT 800, Kaplan 2004, GMAT Prep, Ace the GMAT CD, GMAT Club online tests

Things I would do different way

a) take the actual test like 2 to 3 weeks earlier
b) NOT spend a second on Arco and Ace the GMAT prep materials
c) begin taking practice tests earlier, long before i was thru the prep books


Reflections

Quant: GMAT math is OK. I think I was able to score Q50 after one week of problem solving. Took me a number of evenings to review the concepts tested. The key to scoring high on Math is not the concepts, but having a fresh mind during the test day and paying attention to details

Verb: English is my second language, which I learned in 2002 thru 2003 when I was an exchange student in Alabama. Oh yeah, I had 2 great semesters at an all-black school (AAMU). Imagine what kind of jive I soaked in taking it as if it was the text book standard. Anyway, GMAT Verbal was a pain in the neck despite the fact that I can talk pretty well. The highest I scored in verbal during my practice test was 40 to 41. So I was hoping to score about the same during the actual test. That would take me up to the desired level (730 or above). Manhattan books helped me a lot to become able to identify types of verbal problems and taught how to approach them correctly. For some reason I couldn't break thru the 40 score level in verbal no matter how hard I tried

Note to non-English speakers

My experience. I was in the peak shape about 3 weeks before the test. I noticed that my score in verbal was actually decreasing since then as I was practicing. I find two primary reasons for this. First, no single test throws at you questions from all grammar topics/ question types that you have read in the book; thus, some topics/ question types fade as you don't meet them often. Second, practicing too much simply gets you tired. And Verbal demands a fresh mind in the first place. Other things are secondary. The key to success is to plan your prep well so that your peak performance matches the test day.


3 days before the test

From my CFA studies I learned that rest before the test day is crucial (excuse me for tossing the same thing over and over, but I believe rest is truly important). I decided to stop practicing Dec 9. During the evening my girlfriend and I wend to the mall and got ourselves a Christmas tree with all great decorations. Had a great night. Dec 10 I did nothing again except for packing my luggage. Dec 11 I flew from Ukraine to Saint-Petersburg (my hometown). On that day i stopped by the test center in order to figure out where it is and try out the notepad. At night I split a bottle of good Italian wine with a friend of mine and went to bed. My buddy offered me vodka, but i decided not to mix on the test eve )

The test day

Math was easier than the stuff I did during practice. I started receiving challenging problems when i was half way thru and was worried whether I was getting many of those wrong. Completed on time.

Verbal. The first 10 problems were my level ). in 11 thru 41 I was balancing between the tasks i was confident about and those problems that took me a couple of readings to understand ). Frankly, at some point I thought I messed up the whole thing.

In the end, I got 720. I guess that's ok given my verbal abilities. 730 would give me more confidence in application next Spring, but I guess 720 would motivate me to produce a good quality application to make up for the score. So I will stick to the result.

One more thing

This is a great website. With great participants. But one thing from this side. Everyone has unique abilities. Please, do not take anyone's comments (including this page) too personally. Be confident. Be fresh.

Peace out holmes. Holla. ONE

kostya

Nice debrief Kostya! Good luck with rest of the process!

amazing score....congrats!!!

great work and great debrief...!!!
..!!!!


for advance quant.. wat were the books you concentrated on???

OG11 + Kaplan 800. that's more than enough for math. OG 11 is a good way to get familiar with the question types; Kaplan teaches you to detect tricks. if you feel confident, go to www.gmatclub.com. for $80 they give you 25 math tests. i did like 6 of them. if you hit 33-35 out of 37 there, you have nothing to worry about on the test day (in terms of math).

hope you will reach the 740 desired. good luck

raunekk wrote:amazing score....congrats!!!

great work and great debrief...!!!
..!!!!


for advance quant.. wat were the books you concentrated on???

Congrats jdkster
Good Show and a very great score. good luck for applications

jdkster wrote:Background

25. Russian.
Education: BA in Economics. MA in Political Economy
Work experience: 1,5 years in Business Consulting, 1 year of project management in the Industry


Preparation

Started Sept 12, 2008
Target score: 730

Took the test on Dec 12, 2008
Scored: 720. Q50. V38.

Prep materials reviewed (chronologically):
a) Arco
b) OG11
c) Kaplan GMAT 800
d) Manhattan Sentence Correction
e) Manhattan CR and RC
f) Ace the GMAT
+ Software: GMAT 800, Kaplan 2004, GMAT Prep, Ace the GMAT CD, GMAT Club online tests

Things I would do different way

a) take the actual test like 2 to 3 weeks earlier
b) NOT spend a second on Arco and Ace the GMAT prep materials
c) begin taking practice tests earlier, long before i was thru the prep books


Reflections

Quant: GMAT math is OK. I think I was able to score Q50 after one week of problem solving. Took me a number of evenings to review the concepts tested. The key to scoring high on Math is not the concepts, but having a fresh mind during the test day and paying attention to details

Verb: English is my second language, which I learned in 2002 thru 2003 when I was an exchange student in Alabama. Oh yeah, I had 2 great semesters at an all-black school (AAMU). Imagine what kind of jive I soaked in taking it as if it was the text book standard. Anyway, GMAT Verbal was a pain in the neck despite the fact that I can talk pretty well. The highest I scored in verbal during my practice test was 40 to 41. So I was hoping to score about the same during the actual test. That would take me up to the desired level (730 or above). Manhattan books helped me a lot to become able to identify types of verbal problems and taught how to approach them correctly. For some reason I couldn't break thru the 40 score level in verbal no matter how hard I tried

Note to non-English speakers

My experience. I was in the peak shape about 3 weeks before the test. I noticed that my score in verbal was actually decreasing since then as I was practicing. I find two primary reasons for this. First, no single test throws at you questions from all grammar topics/ question types that you have read in the book; thus, some topics/ question types fade as you don't meet them often. Second, practicing too much simply gets you tired. And Verbal demands a fresh mind in the first place. Other things are secondary. The key to success is to plan your prep well so that your peak performance matches the test day.


3 days before the test

From my CFA studies I learned that rest before the test day is crucial (excuse me for tossing the same thing over and over, but I believe rest is truly important). I decided to stop practicing Dec 9. During the evening my girlfriend and I wend to the mall and got ourselves a Christmas tree with all great decorations. Had a great night. Dec 10 I did nothing again except for packing my luggage. Dec 11 I flew from Ukraine to Saint-Petersburg (my hometown). On that day i stopped by the test center in order to figure out where it is and try out the notepad. At night I split a bottle of good Italian wine with a friend of mine and went to bed. My buddy offered me vodka, but i decided not to mix on the test eve )

The test day

Math was easier than the stuff I did during practice. I started receiving challenging problems when i was half way thru and was worried whether I was getting many of those wrong. Completed on time.

Verbal. The first 10 problems were my level ). in 11 thru 41 I was balancing between the tasks i was confident about and those problems that took me a couple of readings to understand ). Frankly, at some point I thought I messed up the whole thing.

In the end, I got 720. I guess that's ok given my verbal abilities. 730 would give me more confidence in application next Spring, but I guess 720 would motivate me to produce a good quality application to make up for the score. So I will stick to the result.

One more thing

This is a great website. With great participants. But one thing from this side. Everyone has unique abilities. Please, do not take anyone's comments (including this page) too personally. Be confident. Be fresh.

Peace out holmes. Holla. ONE

kostya

Cheeseburst,

I'm not familiar with Manhattan Math stuff. However as far as I learned from other folks' posts, MGMAT is about the same level as GMAT Prep.

Of all the GMAT math I have done/ seen I would make the following comparison according to (average) difficulty level:

Arco and other online stuff < OG11 < GMAT Prep < Actual GMAT < Kaplan 800 < gmatclub.com

My impression is that the hardest problems that the GMAT actual test gives you come from the areas of numbers' properties and elementary theory of probabilities (including combinations and permutations). However on the actual test you will see a maximum of 2 to 4 such problems.

For these two topics go to gmatclub.com. They will give you a plenty of great challenging problems with adequate explanations. For the rest topics Kaplan is great. Many people say that gmatclub is much more than you need for the actual test, but I purchased it anyway, since I had done all math stuff I had like a month before the test day. So I needed something else to keep in the Math GMAT mode while practicing my verbal

Since you are not from Math background, i would suggest that you take notes of concepts used in math problems and displayed in explanations. I did that. And by the end of my math studies i had something similar to GMAT Math shortcuts that you can download on this website (well, I had 3 pages only). GMAT does not want you to make extensive calculations during the test, each task is solvable in 2 steps max. Learn the shortcuts

Good luck with preparations. Hope these notes are helpful

k

cheeseburst wrote:Congrats jdkster
Good Show and a very great score...
Can u pls suggest me sth for quant??wht shud I do to take it from 43-44(In Manhattan test) to 49-50 in real GMAT??I m NOT from a quant background.......Wht shud I do??I have around 30 days left for my test??Is it possible to take tht jump in a month's time??Wht were ur earlier scores in quant??How did u do it??My verbal is going good,only quant is a pain in the neck...Waiting eagerly for ur reply.....Not able to figure out how to start off preparing for quant n time is passing by...Pls relpy elaborately jdkster...will be highly grateful.....
Pls suggest.
Thanx n good luck for applications

jdkster wrote:Background

Hi kostya,

Thanks for your invaluable post I just started preparing for my GMAT, and I think I'll definitely be able to take some positives out of your experience.

Cheers

Good luck AJrulez!

Don't forget to defocus once in a while during practice and before the test day. That will put another 50 to 100 points in your score basket.

best,

k

ajrulez wrote:Hi kostya,

Thanks for your invaluable post I just started preparing for my GMAT, and I think I'll definitely be able to take some positives out of your experience.

Cheers

Thanx jdkster for the prompt and genuine reply....

Thanx once again.Take very good care