GMAT Strategy

Guys I got a 47 in quant in attempt 1 in december. That was in fact the highest I ever scored in Gmat preps as well as MGMAT practice cats.

I am planning a reattempt in July 2011. What should I eat to jack up my quant score to 49-50 ? I am an engineer and believe in myself however, I have not been very keen on quant recently. So I have recently decided to buy grockit which creates the right atmosphere for reluctant quant solvers like me.

Material used last time for Q47 :
og-12(twice)
kaplan 800(too easy)
manhattan guides-all 5(excellent-i owe much of my score to these)
MGMAT 5 cats (too harsh but good at the end of the day)



Material lines up for July 2011:
repeat all material used in attempt 1 and add below :

1>some topic such as number systems from a CAT(indian MBA test) book.
2>Grockit online practice
3>GMAT club tests(all-purchased recently,heard a lot good about these)
4>og-Green supplement(looks useless-too easy)


I have over 2 months. Any inputs folks ?

It seems you have a great plan to start with the quant section . I guess MGMAT 8 guides + Gmat club tests are a good combination to shape up for quant . Even i am looking forward for the same combi . Grockit is good , it resonates the OG questions and a good practice . Timed practice with a stop watch .... very manual study bores , Grockit serves as a good simulator . In case you can also go for R S Agarwal book ... thats a good book too ... reminds me of placement days .Infact you have more than enough material for GMAT .You said something about reluctant quant solvers , i echo the same , you will hardly find me at the Quant forum ... anyways that is the point where i am lacking i dnt study enough quant nowadays ... Your post reminded me of that .... will be get going with the Quant ... 50 seems a natural target ... Are you aware how much diffrence it counts from Q48 to Q49 ... is it in terms of questions or level of difficulty ?

I got a 49 in gmat prep with 9 incorrect, a 48 with 10 incorrect and a 47 with 11 incorrect.

However its idiotic to link the number of questions to the score after knowing gmat for almost a year now.

I think u get the make or break questions intermittently when u are doing ok for say 4-5 questions, if you get them wrong your level(score) does not go up. If you do you crack the stuff.


Have you used GROCKIT ? how is it ? I was thinking of knewton for practice questions but both company reviews reflect they have OG model questions. Thats exactly what I want. But knewton is way too expensive. I will try out their free cat this weekend and then decide whether to take knewton as well(however I only need good questions. have most concepts clear already).

Hmm ... i get that quant can be conquered with a bit of alertness . Grockit is cool , i have used it , gives a great practice environment . One can create game based on a specific topic with customization of levels of difficulty as well . And playing along with other people gives a edge to perform in shortest possible time .. added advantage of such simulator . About the quality of questions , no doubt , on similar lines of official questions . I dont have much idea about Knewton quant but i have read good reviews about knewton Verbal .

Have you purchased Gmat tests ? What is your opinion about those tests ?

Gmat club tests i purchased for 79$, have tried one of the free one's earlier and it was great. However I have not attempted any tests now. will take em up in june as they r a bit on the tougher side.


One question: my mozilla browser sometimes gets stuck when I press the submit button in any question in grockit, have u faced any similar issue ?

bblast wrote:Gmat club tests i purchased for 79$, have tried one of the free one's earlier and it was great. However I have not attempted any tests now. will take em up in june as they r a bit on the tougher side.


One question: my mozilla browser sometimes gets stuck when I press the submit button in any question in grockit, have u faced any similar issue ?

I was going to mention the drawback of Grockit but refrained . Yes , its slow sometimes and face issues while answering , either it gets stuck or throws one out of game . I too faced similar issues.

I dnt think one needs to do too much to raise the score from a 47 to a 50. I mean, I was averaging 46 on my mgmat CATs and gmat preps but on the real one I got a 48 and twice i realised my mistake after I confirmed the answer :p.So I could have scored more. A lot depends on what questions you get on the day. I came across nil probability and permutations/combinations questions which I am very very weak at. So I was lucky in a way. I was unlucky that the CR's in the verbal section were killer....very diff to understand.....got a 36 even though I used to average 38 on the mgmat CATS and gmat preps. MGMAT books and OG 12 should be good enough.

@ bblast

I think the material u have listed above is more than enough for scoring 50 in Q.
I am sure you must be solving BTG forums questions simultaneously..they r just awesome..i learned a lot from them..
You need to check where exactly you are going wrong.
According to me by this time you must be clear on all the formulas n fundas u need to crack quant.
At this stage,analyzing mistakes is most important.
I am sure few silly mistake r pulling u down to 47 from 50.
Do you face shortage of time in last few questions?
IMO first & last few questions are most important.
Try to spend sufficient time on those questions & get them all right.
I am sure you will score 51 & not just 50.
All the best!!!

add on 800score.com CATs. By doing one of their CATs a week and studying all mistakes you should score 49 in quant. The 50th is more about testing ability than math wiz. Considering you show the best performance from attempt 1, quant 50 is attainable too.

Thank you all for the inputs. I will be working hard on both Q and V in the next couple of months.
I have brushed up basics and started with the gmat club test-1 and got 27/37. Hope to improve further.