I will make this short. Maybe not. Wrote my GMAT last November and wanted to post this ever since. It so happens, now is when I found the time to type away, on my way back from Hyd to Chennai, a few thousand feet up in the air. I prepared fo…
I will make this short. Maybe not. Wrote my GMAT last November and wanted to post this ever since. It so happens, now is when I found the time to type away, on my way back from Hyd to Chennai, a few thousand feet up in the air.
I prepared for about 2 months, the last 3 weeks of which I took off from work and distributed rather unevenly between GMAT prep and sitcoms.
The tools: OG12 (of which I wish I had completed all questions, my strong advice to you would be, please do so!)
Manhattan Guides, those 8 books that I feel are absolutely essential.
If you're a math loser like I am, the McGraw hill book is a good one to start with. It's the kind of book that builds your confidence and keeps reassuring you quite literally that the Gmat isn't all that tough a nut to crack.
Kaplan Higher Prep: A rather outdated CD published in 2005 if I'm right. Has 4 tests that will bring your morale down so much that it would make the Indian cricket team in Australia appear like bunch of super-motivated heroes with nothing but victory on their minds (forget the fact that a 4-0 washout is less than 24 hours away even as I type this a thousand feet above the air hoping I will strike a deal with lady luck floating by my plane window and send her to Adelaide.
I took 3 out of these 4 tests, the first being my best attempt, scoring 600. Scores of 550 and 560 would've looked good on team India's scorecard, not mine, so the next two attempts pretty much convinced me I would be lucky if I scored 650 plus in the actual exam.
I took up Gmat Prep test 1 about two weeks before my exam. Scored a 680. Some respite there, but little did I know two of those 3 kaplan tests were to follow. A manhattan free test (670) later, I took up the Gmat Prep 2. This was the day before the exam, and I scored 690.
D-Day: Cold feet, a bladder that kept refilling itself constantly, and a dead end at my very second math question. I hadn't prepared Coordinate geometry as well as I thought I had, and had to guess the very second question that the system threw at me. Overall I felt I did the quant section okayish. Thank God for the eight minute break between the sections, and probability of the single restroom in the exam center being empty working in my favour. Ran out of time as usual, and guessed the last but two questions.
The verbal section seemed quite tough initially, a lot of sentence corrections, and overall my confidence wasn't great. It wasn't bad, but I had the constant feeling the questions were sort of okayishly tough but easy at times. Tried not to think about the algorithm and it's weird ways, and to my surprise finished the section just in time.
As I rushed through the pages that appeared next, my gut feeling screamed 650. I guess that is about the time lady luck decided she needed some action and I was her man that day. I clicked "View scores" and voila. 720 (Q47 V42) and I jumped and screamed and hooted silently in my seat. The first and only time I ever crossed 700 came in the actual exam!
A big thanks to this forum, without which my preparation would've been incomplete. Hope this post helps all you folks out there! Oh and btw the AWA went just fine (6.0) with zero preparation. Just make sure you write on the topic given, and write about three clear points for each essay.
The pilot's landed the plane barely at the starting of the runway, saving the Muthus from Meenambakam fried "me" for dinner. This is me signing off. All the very best to all you GMATters out there!
congrats vijay,
So you did overall 3 tests? GMAT Prep1, prep2 and Manhattan (Free)?
In GMAT Prep is there AWA section too?
Did you prepare for AWA?
congrats vijay,
So you did overall 3 tests? GMAT Prep1, prep2 and Manhattan (Free)?
In GMAT Prep is there AWA section too?
Did you prepare for AWA?
Like I said I didn't really prepare for AWA. It's there in Gmat prep but no one will evaluate it. You can still just try typing away within the stipulated time and get it evaluated by your friends I guess.