I just Beat The GMAT!

Guys,

I appeared for GMAT on July 26th 2008 after studying for 2-3 months and managed to score 590 Q49, V23. AWA 4.0. Verbal was always my weakness and Quanta my strength. Anyways hearbroken I took almost a month's break and resumed my studies in Sep.

Studying religiously for 2-3 hours and 4-5 hrs in the weekend, I was progressing really well. I observed that my SC and CR were improving gradually. The books I believed helped me a lot were as follows:-

1) PowerScore Bible CR
2) PowerScore Bible SC
3) Manhattan SC

I also took the Veritas weekend course, but I found it worthless. May be people will differ with me.

I took various CATs from

1) 800Score
2) Princeton (good)
3) CrackTheGMAT
4) Veritas
5) Thomson ARCO
6) GMATPrep (Definitely the closest to real)
7) ManHattan (Next closest....good questions)

My test date was 20th Dec 2008'. I was super confident for two reasons.

First, I bought the Manhattan's SC third edition, just a week back before the exam, to get access to its CAT. All the CATs were great. I managed to appear for first 4 CATs and scored as follows :-

Manhattan CAT score

CAT # 1 690
CAT # 2 690
CAT # 3 670
CAT # 4 680
CAT # 5
CAT # 6

Next thing, I observed that the mba.com site changed completely in look and feel, so I downloaded the GMATPrep once again from the site. I took GMATPrep in consecutive days and scored 680 and 720 respectively in the two sets. Interestingly, I observed a lot of new questions in both the sets.

Whole night, I couldnot manage to get a good sleep may be because of anxiety or may be because I slept for a hour and a half in afternoon. My apointment was at 12:15 PM, but started lot earlier as it snowed heavily a day ahead and I don't wanted to get stuck. I have to struggle for 15-20 minutes to clean my car and then take it out of the driveway as the car was not moving ahead because of ice formation. I took help of my wife and few people to get out somehow, I reached the test centre, way before the scheduled time.

I completed all the formalities, including taking the photograph with a big cheese (its called 800 smile). Environment and coordinator both were very friendly. A lot of other guys also came for GMAT the same day, so it made me lot comfortable.

AWA.....no surprises.....super fine...should score 5.0
Quanta (no surpises...pattern and difficulty level...same as GMATPrep..completed on time....made guess in 2-3 questions to maintain the time)
Verbal ( my weakness...started with 3 SCs..then few CRs and RC. I got 4 RC passage( 3 in the beginning and 4th one in late 20s)...all of them were so cute and innocent that I answered them like I knew them from my birth. Again, finished it on time.

I was more than confident to score 700+, at least near 690, but gotcha...I scored a dismal 570..unbelievable....man....simply unbelievable. I was already exhausted after the exam and on the top, this score literally killed me. From that day to the moment, I am writing this long boring story I am not able to forget my experience. Nothing to learn from my story.

I spoke to my wife and she just couldnot believe it. She was thinking that I was joking which is my second nature. After convincing her that I am not lying about my score, she advised me to go them and file a concern, which I did promptly. I reported to the coordinator that I am not satisfied wit my score and want it to be re-evaluated. She filed a case with GMAC and provided me a case ID. I am still waiting to hear from them.

Good luck to future aspirants. Write me if you think we can of mutual help or can simply write me.

Last but not the least, I shopped a lot to get out of the frustrations (but didnot drink, didnot smoke, didnot fucked a whore...which I never did and will never do whatever I may have to get through). My wife's kind word also helped me a lot; in fact she is my best source of console. So guys, I want to declare that I am not out of the race. I will come back after a month, as I am travelling to India. After that I will restart the battle.......Till then fight it for me. Don't give up. Your success and failure stiry will lift up guys like me and million others.

Rajib....the invincible.