710 (Q50, V35)
To sum it up - I FAILED
2 hrs later I am still in disbelief at my verbal score.....
AWA went smoothly again. I think I wrote killer essays with more than 500 words each as usual (who cares?). I just can't believe the number of keystrokes coming out of fingers during the AWA especially since I hadn't written an essay since the last time I took the GMAT.
Quant started smoothly with a very easy mixture problem. I saw just a few really hard problems. I thought I solved them except one on which I guessed. The only other problem I guessed on was the last one since I was running out of time. I did manage to read it though and it was an easy number properties problem, so it couldn't have affected my score. I must have missed somewhere else. Anyway, since 50 is what my true level on practice was, I was happy with that score.
Verbal - I am in utmost confusion....I scored 41 in my previous two attempts and in practice tests I consistently scored better than that. I was always pretty strong in SC and most of the time in RC. Most of mistakes were in CR but never as many as to completely kill my score. This verbal section seemed alot harder than the previous times I took the test. Which gave me the feeling that I was doing better than 41. I don't think this affected my focus much since the questions seemed so hard and I had to keep concentrated, but who knows. I was pretty confident on the SC. The RC passages were very very twisted but short and the questions didn't seem all that hard. The 4th passage which came at q34 was particularly hard as it was a science one with a lot of terminology. Seeing that passage that late again made me feel I was doing well up to that point. I couldn't have been more wrong.
When the question popped about seeing score, I had never felt better about it after taking a GMAT. Only to have my confidence crashed to pieces.....
I don't think I'll be taking the GMAT any more. I may though re-evaluate my strategy and apply to more lower ranked schools and maybe to at most 1-2 top schools. Despite how I was doing in practice tests and how much I felt sure I could score 750+ on the real test, reality is reality, and this certainly wasn't meant to be for me.
All in all, I had a 730 when I discovered and joined this club. So, number-wise, I didn't benefit from my time spent in here. Yet, I do not regret one second of it.
I am so grateful for getting to interact with so many of you and brush up and improve my quant and verbal skills. I have learned a lot from many people here, not just GMAT tips, but also life tips in general. So, I thank each and every one of you.
I won't have much time to spend in the GMAT sections any more, but I will be around and hope to keep this learning experience grow and most importantly keep in touch with so many smart and driven people.
God bless!