My 5 weeks of slogging == 740

dubinsky: Senior | Next Rank: 100 Posts; Posts: 40; Joined: Sun Apr 17, 2011 12:22 pm; Thanked: 5 times; Followed by:8 members; GMAT Score:740

by dubinsky » Fri Jul 08, 2011 8:05 am

Well my journey began about 5 weeks ago.I was told that this site is the best place to start off with.
I started my Gmat prep with a weeks course of MasterGmat .The course was really helpful as it gave me a solid base in Sentence correction. I frankly believe that with a structured approach, and learning from each mistake you make, Sentence Correction accuracy can reach great accuracy only limited by your determination to learn.

After a week of MasterGmat I moved on to Grockit.com . The site has an amazing database of questions especially for verbal. Well I was always strong in Quant , so never bothered practicing.
Grockit helped me to analyse my strenghts and weaknesses in over 40 different categories of Verbal sc,rc,cr.

Advice

The best advice I can probably give is to start getting accustomed to solving 41 Verbal Questions in 75 minutes. From the first week of my preparation I would give timed tests of 800-verbal tests and TMH-Paper based Verbal tests. These tests helped me develop my timing strategies from the very begining of my preparation. I would time myself and I had set several milestones for myself.For instance...
when 60min were left on the clock I shud have completed 9 Questions else I wud hurry up abit to ensure I was on track....
TRUST ME -- this is one of the most crucial parts of your preparation.

Focus on basics.Use POE (process of elimination) .No ones goin to judge you for gettin the right answer by eliminating wrong answers! What I found really helpful and a time saver is to write down
A B C D E
A B C D E
A B C D E
A B C D E
A B C D E
...

WRITE IT ABOUT 24 TIMES during th break you get in between math and verbal....
This will immensely help you in striking off answer choices and reaching an answer choice real quickly.

Well resources I used...
MasterGmat
Grockit.com
This forum ofcourse--beatthegmat.com
OG
Kaplan 800 and a little of gmatclub.com

My mock scores were
KAPLAN-600 25-May
MasterGmat-660 28-may
several verbal tests of 800 and TMH
Princeton review-590 m-42(just 6 wrong),v-30(11 wrong) their algo is screwed up!!! level was good
3rd JUNE
MGMAT(FREE)-690 5TH JUNE (M48 V36)

GMATPREP1-730 (M50 V38) 21 JUNE

MGMAT 2- 750 (M51 V41) 25 JUNE

MGMAT3 -750 (M51 V41) 28 JUNE

VERITAS PREP 690-(M51 V41) 29TH JUNE

MGMAT 4-780 (M51 V45) 30TH JUNE.... went crazy... took a break didnt do anyhing the rest of the day!

KAPLAN-ONLINE 730 (M50 V39) 1ST JULY

KAPLAN CD-700 (M48 V38) 1st JULY evening... Had seen many questions previously!!

POWERPREP- 710 (M50 V35) VERBAL GOT JUST 9 WRONG! still confidence super high!!!

GMATPREP1(SECOND TIME)-770 (Q51 V41) few questions did repeat... at this time was on cloud 9.. 2 JULY

MGMAT 5- 780 (Q51 V45) 3JULY... was becoming a habit now!!

GMATPREP2-730 (Q51 V37) gave it in da morning wid jz 4 hours of sleep ... Had a long chat wid someone... real "distraction"!!!! 5july

GMAT -740 (M50 V40 AWA-6) 7 JULY !!!

finished my quant with 10min to spare... Was confident of a 51.., Guess I just missed out! Any way cant complain ... 740 is pretty awesome...

Last edited by dubinsky on Mon Jul 18, 2011 2:02 pm, edited 3 times in total.

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