Okay, its my time to give a debreif:

Just got out of my exam. 710 (Q47 / V40, IR 8, AWA TBD) I'm satisfied with my score but not thrilled. That said, I'm done so I can concentrate on moving my applications forward.

Background: I'm a mechanical engineer by training (B.S., M.S. from two top 5 engineering programs), though I made a role change about 5 years ago. I'm nearly 40 so I haven't taken a standardized test in over 15 years (I was a little rusty when i began preparing).

Prep

I started preparation with the economist course as I thought it would fit my availability best. I took my initial test via the economist program (630, Q45, V33) and felt like this would be pretty easy to get a 700. I plodded along for about 3 months, completing about 15% of the course and took my second exam the economist program - significant regression (590, Q43, V29).

I then accelerated the pace from May through July and took my 3rd exam via the economist program, not good on quant but verbal finally came around(620, Q37, V40). At this point, I began to augment my studies with GMATClub questions. I knew the content pretty well but didn't fare well on the timed component of the quantitative section. I focused on timing and with my remaining exams via the economist program I scored:
Test 4: 680, Q47, V38
Test 5: 711, Q50, V37

I felt ready for the exam and scheduled it for the end of August. I took the to GMATPrep CATs:

T1 710 (Q49,V39, IR7)
T2 710 (Q47, V40)

And the second exam nearly matched my final score.

I focused about 2/3 of my studies on verbal to try and increase that score. I think the economist does an OK job on Quant but it seemed to get stuck in a rut and focused on combinations and geometry more than was appropriate for the exam. It did a good job with absolute values though. The economist does a good job on sentence correction once the training is complete. I'm ambivalent on the RC and CR sections.

My beef with the economist was the the process seemed so random that I needed to go back and used GMATClub to pick specific topics to focus on. Once I did that, I began to keep an error log and that was tremendously helpful (Economist, please allow us to look at an error log). I also used the MGMT advanced math text which was helpful.

In all, I error logged 400 Quant and 438 Verbal questions (258 were sentence correction).


Test Day:

Got good rest, ate well, felt good through AWA and IR. I flubbed a few on quant and wish I had that section back (also had some timing challenges at the end). Verbal went a little too fast (slowed way down at the end to try and gain any points I could... the questions were pretty challenging at that point).

Score came up - I was satisfied and feel like it will get me into the EMBA or Night/Weekend programs I'll be applying to.

I do appreciate reading everyone's stories - that was truly motivating. I hope this helps folks talk the exam and score well.

Best,

Fred