I just Beat The GMAT!

This board has been an invaluable resource for me over the past four months, so the very least I can contribute back to the forum is my debrief:

I began my test prep in January 2010 with no set date that I wanted to take the GMAT. My intention was to take it when I could break the 720 barrier on the practice exams.

Materials Used:

OG 12th ed.
OG Quant
Manhattan GMAT Series (All 8 Books)
198 700-800 Questions (found on this site)

Prior to any studying, I took the diagnostic test in the OG to get a feel for where my abilities were at starting out. I missed more than half the quant questions but only missed a half-dozen of the verbal questions. After seeing my results from the diagnostic test, I read and worked through all the problems in each of the 8 MGMAT books. I was pretty impressed with both the breadth and depth of the topics covered by these books. The questions and explanations at the end of each chapter helped immensely. I'd work through a couple of chapters each night, watching an episode of The Office or 30 Rock as a study break between chapters.

Once I completed all the MGMAT books, I worked through all the problems in the OG. I noticed that I had a pretty high hit rate on the majority of the questions up until the last 30 or so of the quant sections. For the problems I couldn't get, and couldn't understand the OG solution, I'd do a google search for the question and read the explanations posted on the forum because the question had invariably already been asked and answered here.

After completing the OG, I picked up the Quant Review because I didn't feel that I was as strong as I needed to be in math to go and take any practice tests. After completing the OG Quant Review, I made an error log and reworked those problems after a couple days. If I still missed them, they stayed on my list to rework. If I got them right, they came off my "most wanted" list.

The next step for me was to start taking practice tests. I was about 2.5 months into studying at this point. I started out taking the MGMAT CATs on March 17th. My plan was to wake up Saturday and Sunday morning and take a practice test each morning. After I took the tests, I would write down all the problems I missed and then spend the weeknights reworking these problems until I understood them and got them right. My scores on the MGMAT CATS were as follows:

MGMAT CAT I - 46Q, 40V - 700
MGMAT CAT II - 45Q, 41V - 710
MGMAT CAT III - 47Q - 44V - 740
MGMAT CAT IV - 48Q, 39V - 710
MGMAT CAT V - 48Q, 44V - 750
MGMAT CAT VI - 49Q, 45V - 760

As a disclaimer, I felt that my last two MGMAT CAT scores were a little inflated because I noticed in my review that I received hardly any 700-800 level questions on the quant on either test. I think I had depleted the 700-800 test bin by that point. Once I hit 740 mark on my third CAT, I scheduled the GMAT for 27 April (3 weeks out).

So, I was done with the MGMAT tests. I had heard the quant is harder on these tests than the actual GMAT. I followed the advice of a poster on the forum and decided to take the GMAT Prep tests as my final workup to the test itself. I don't have the score breakdowns on me, just my overall scores:

GMAT Prep I - 740
GMAT Prep II - 760

At this point, I reinstalled the GMAT software and took each test again the following weekend. I saw 6-7 repeat questions on the math section and maybe one repeat reading comprehension article on each test. Those scores were:

GMAT Prep I - 750
GMAT Prep II - 740

I was then two days from G-Day and I felt pretty confident that I'd hit my goal of 720 and would be ecstatic if I hit my overachiever score of 730. The only things I was a little concerned about were that I could screw up the math and miss 80th percentile and I hadn't practice any essays.

Monday morning, I found the 198 Questions document on this site and wished I had found it earlier. I skimmed the problems at work that day and said I did as much as I could for my quant skills.

Monday night I committed to memory myohmy's AWA template from this site and decided I'd just base my essays off of that. It worked like a charm. I followed the argument template pretty closely and then just adapted the format for the analyze an issue essay:

P1. Introduction, relevancy, thesis
P2. Issue from perspective A
P3. Issue from perspective B
P4. Discussion as to why A is stronger than B and emphasis that the issue is not clearcut
P5. Conclusion

Here's the link to myohmy's argument template:

https://www.beatthegmat.com/argument-ess ... 38032.html

I showed up to the Pearson facility 45 minutes early on test day. I took a Gatorade to drink during my breaks (I remembered the endless praise one poster on this site had for Gatorade on test day) and a few granola bars as well. I went to the bathroom before checking in. After I checked in, I got started on the test about 30 minutes early. The testing facility was quiet and the temperature was perfect. I opted to use the headphones because I get distracted by noises easily. I was completely in my own headspace. Whipped through the essays in about 20 minutes apiece. Then I took my break before the quant section and said here comes the hard part. As I worked through the quant, I figured I was having an average or slightly off day because I got quite a few problems that I had enough time to narrow down to 2 or 3 choices, but had to pull the trigger to stay on pace. Finished the quant with about 16 seconds to go. After the quant, I took my break and then scanned back in to take the verbal. The verbal wasn't anything I wasn't ready for and it was an exercise in patience as I plodded through the questions so I could see my score and see how much I had goofed on the quant section. Finished the verbal with 4-5 minutes to spare, and filled out my demographic data. Test scores came up and 750 flashed on the screen. I was hoping for a 49Q, but I wasn't going to complain about a 48Q, 45V. I threw my arms in the air and mouthed "Yatta" (reminiscent of Hiro Nakamura from Heroes). I realized that my 4 month relationship with the GMAT was over and I couldn't have been happier to break up with it...so needy and taking up all my free time at the expense of my social life and my sanity.

I'd say my big takeaways from this experience are that the GMATPrep tests and the OG are spot on with the actual test. MGMAT is definitely a great resource and it overtrains you so that the actual test is actually a little bit of a relief in comparison. One final note would be standard deviation questions were notably absent on the MGMAT tests and I didn't see those questions until I used the GMATPrep software.

Here's a short additional note about pacing: Stick to it! The easiest way to get off track and have a bad test, whether it's practice or the real deal, is to sit there and spend 4 minutes on a problem. If it's taking 4 minutes in the first place, I'd say you're likely to not know it was well as you think, and the bruise to your ego for pulling the trigger on a question you don't get will be smaller than the bruise to your score if it causes you to run out of time on a section. I abided by the 12-50, 25-25 rule. That means make sure you're done with question 12 when 50 minutes remain on quant and that you're done with question 25 when 25 minutes remain. And 2:00/problem is the rule, there's rarely ever an excuse for going past the 2:30 mark, IMHO.

There's my .02. I hope it helps at least one person out there.

congrats

Conratulations

Many cong.Could you please provide the link for those 198 questions so that others can use it.

Regards,
Ravindra

Many congrats..

Could you please share your strategies to improve reading passage,
did you get any bold face question in the real gmat.

thanks in advance.

Would you be able to provide that doc..."198 Questions"?

It's strange, I felt the AWA questions to be very easy. I used to teach English writing, so the main setup of an essay quesetion is all they ask for.

My quant skills SUCK, but I sure can get that 6 on my AWAs. That is about it. I wish my confidence was the great when doing the quant problems!

Thanks! If you can pass that link forward that would be so great.

@chander: here's the link to the 198 quant questions:

https://www.beatthegmat.com/198-level-70 ... 43783.html


I didn't really have a strategy for the RC questions. I just jotted quick notes in outline format as I read through...particularly denoting paragraphs, examples, and whether a paragraph supported a particular position or offered an alternative explanation. Nothing too fancy.

I remember seeing one of the "relate the phrases in boldface" questions but I just tried to tackle it by process of elimination.

Hope that helps. Still waiting on my official score results and AWA.

What was your strategy for SC? Congrats on the great score.

@skins,

For sentence correction my strategy was first to find the 3/2 split in the answers if one existed. I'd check first for verb agreement Then I'd check my pronouns to make sure they had antecedents and agreed in number. After that I checked for correctly placed modifiers. If I couldn't narrow it down to one answer on those things alone, it was usually some sort of idiom issue. Def check out MGMAT SC guide. It's a wonderful resource.

congrats....

CONGRATES!!!!!!

Congrats!!

Congrats

thanx for sharing an inspiring debrief