I just got back from writing my exam a few hours ago - my mind is a bit of a mess right now (and I am terribly exhausted), but I just wanted to share the great news and debrief in hopes that some will find this helpful.
Anyway, as per my topic header, I received a score of 700 today - with a breakdown of 49Q, 37V. I am ecstatic
I had a few surprising twists and turns that led up to today's festivities...
1) We had a vicious thunderstorm in my area the entire night last night, with extremely strong gusts of wind, which made for a very restless night (my worst case scenario) in which I only managed to get about 5-6 hours of sleep tops (and very poor quality sleep too). Woke up this morning feeling very lethargic, and as a result, very, very stressed out.
2) Extremely important note to all who have yet to make an attempt: DO NOT consume too many liquids during breaks! I learned this the hard way - with about 30-40 minutes left in the Verbal section, not only was my mind feeling ready to shut off, but my bladder was literally crying for the toilet. Writing today's Verbal section was probably the toughest and most uncomfortable exam-writing experience I've ever faced.
3) I had trouble with the ear-plugs - they kept popping out of my ear, and were very uncomfortable as well - so despite having a person writing right next to me, I just decided to throw them in the garbage. So as a note to future-writers: try to account for and anticipate distractions during the test (squeaky chairs of you or your neighbour's, loud typing sounds, etc.) and maybe play around with ear-plugs before test day to test them out.
Anyway, that's the funny stuff... some things to keep in mind that people may not anticipate in advance. Here are the meat and potatoes:
A brief timeline of my studies:
March - June 2010 - Went through the entire Manhattan GMAT set of books (Books 1-8), taking notes and doing all assigned problem sets along the way. Very light study schedule.
July 2010 - Took my first GMATPrep CAT mock. Scored 540 (39Q, 26V). Quite the big demotivator.
July - August 2010 - Went through the entire Veritas Prep set of books (Books 1-14), taking notes and doing all assigned problem sets along the way. Kept error log. Supplemented studies by reviewing Manhattan SC periodically.
August 2010 - Enlisted the help of Ian Stewart begin_of_the_skype_highlighting     end_of_the_skype_highlighting (a GMAT Quant genius on these forums) to help me out with a lot of the tougher, higher-level conceptual areas of Quant. Needless to say, he played a big part in providing me with the tools to score in the 49-50Q range.
August 2010 - Did my first full MGMAT CAT. Scored a 700 - 44Q, 40V.
August - Sept 2010 - Final month of studying consisted of essentially the following:
1.5 weeks - Focus entirely on solving the 400 or so Quant problems in OG 12th Ed., in both DS and PS. Kept track of Error Log. Hit rates averaged between around 85-90%.
1.5 weeks - Focus entirely on the Verbal questions in OG 12th Ed. Kept track of Error Log. Hit rates averaged around 85-90% as well.
Final week - Reviewed notes, reviewed Manhattan SC, re-did all problems that I made errors on, and that I circled for self-review.
Final week - Did a GMATPrep mock CAT - scored a 690, 48Q 37V.
Note: the most important thing that helped me build mental stamina was doing all of my problem sets in sets of 10 before debriefing, and timing myself. I made sure that for every set of 10 questions (with the exception of RC), I was always within the 2-min time limit average (for Quant/CR) or 1-min time limit average (for SC).
For the AWA: I didn't really do much other than read a few templates online, a few sample essays, and just practiced during my mock CATs. I obviously won't receive my AWA score for another 2-3 weeks, but I can't imagine my writing skills to be so poor that I'd score anything below a 4. The biggest key to remember is not to stress out and waste too much energy on the AWA section (as I did today, unfortunately) before you get to the good stuff.
Anyway, hopefully that helps some of you out a bit. Just remember - I spent 6 full months studying for this exam. Six!! Obviously my first few months were very unproductive and inefficient, but the first "read-through" of the Manhattan GMAT books did help me familiarize myself with the concepts that I'll be required to be tested on. Utilizing other sources, such as Veritas (which I fully endorse by the way), and the OG materials, just helped reinforce a lot of the concepts I learned from Manhattan and from Ian Stewart. Reinforcement through practice is KEY! Simply learning the concepts is not enough, I cannot stress this enough.
Resources that I recommend:
1. Manhattan GMAT - Quant Books 1-5, and SC. Excellent resources for conceptual learning. Unfortunately, I found that some of their methods were a bit tedious and drawn-out, but of all the books that are available on the market, this is the best for teaching Quant concepts.
2. Veritas Prep - the entire set, Books 1-14. Excellent practice problems. Really helped hammer down concepts into my brain.
3. OG 12th Ed. - the most accurate representation of actual GMAT-type questions. I purchased the Manhattan GMAT OG Guide as well, and found Manhattan's solutions to the OG questions to be excellent.
4. GMATPrep CAT's - it's imperative to get to know the interface the best that you can before test-day, as this is exactly how the computer screen will appear. Plus, as many have said on this forum, it's the most accurate indicator of ability level.
Final thoughts:
From Day 1, my original goal was a 700+. I had always pictured it as a bit of a long-shot, but I worked hard and was persistent in my efforts. But now that I've reached that 700 score, I'm left feeling a bit iffy, simply due to the fact that immediately after my exam (and during my exam), I knew that there were a few questions that I would've been able to answer and not resort to guessing on, had I been able to get more sleep the night before, and not run into the "overconsumption of liquids during breaks" problem.
But either way, I'm very happy with my score, and think that re-taking the exam with a 700, just to potentially see if I can score a 720 or 730, would not be worth it. I've already spent 6 months preparing - I think it's time to move on from my obsession with this bloody exam
FYI: I'm looking to apply to Top 20 U.S. programs, a couple outside the Top 20 (namely USC), and potentially a few non-US as well (Oxford Said, HKUST, Rotman/Ivey).
Hope this helps, and provides some hope to those of you out there who started off with a low baseline mock CAT score (540 in my case) and are hoping to achieve that illustrious 700-club score. Thanks to the BTG community for all of your help, and I'll definitely be sticking around in the coming weeks, months, and years as it'll be at least another year or two before I start applying to schools. Lots of research and decisions to be made by then![/b][/u]
