Encouraged by the scholarship granted him for his athletic ability, th

Question

Encouraged by the scholarship granted him for his athletic ability, the young basketball player  decided on a nearly 50 percent increase in the amount of scheduled time he’d previously devoted to practicing free throws and layups .

(A) decided on a nearly 50 percent increase in the amount of scheduled time he’d previously devoted to practicing free throws and layups.

(B) decided on an increase of nearly 50 percent more than the previously scheduled time for practicing free throws and layups.

(C) increased by nearly 50 percent the amount of time scheduled to practicing free throws and layups as he had previously devoted.

(D) increased by nearly 50 percent the time devoted to scheduling free throws and layups practice that he’d previously devoted.

(E) decided to increase the time scheduled by nearly 50 percent the number he’d previously devoted to practicing free throws and layups.

BillyZ · Accepted Answer

OFFICIAL SOLUTION

For this question, we need to make sense of the sequence of events. First the player had previously scheduled practice-time then he decided to increase it. Since the first action was completed before the second (he scheduled the original practice-time, then increased it), it makes sense that the first action would be past perfect and the second action would be simple past tense. What it confusing about this sentence is that the first action is placed after the second action. While this original sentence may sound wordy, it is grammatically correct.

In (B), the increase is modifying “scheduled time” rather than “amount of time,” which is the more precise meaning, while (D) has a similar problem in “time devoted to scheduling.” It’s the amount of practice-time that is increasing, not the amount of time spent scheduling. In (C), “scheduled to practicing” is awkward and unclear, and the construction of (E) also suffers from a lack of clarity with the use of the word “number” and the placements of “time scheduled.”

Before you read through the answer choices for any SC featuring underlined past tense and past perfect verbs, try to write down the sequence of events. Get the meaning as clear as possible, and you can more eliminate the tricky answer choices that change the verb tenses to distort the meaning of that sequence!

ehsan090 · Answer

Can anyone please explain the reason

BillyZ · Answer

Dear aniket1025 , Unfortunately, the correct answer is not E. You may refer the answer in the original post. The official answer is A .

bluetrain · Answer

Even after reading all the replies
I still can`t understand why (A) is better than (E)

Experts please help.

Decide on (NOUN) VS Decide to (VERB) 
The latter looks better for me.

prabugmat · Answer

IMO A

C and D -- Change meaning

B and E -- Not better than A.

sayantanc2k · Answer

In my opinion, "decide on" is wrong in this case. "Decide on" is used when the meaning implied is one possibility among several available. "Decide to" does not imply so.

We decided to go to the park. (We simply decided, we were not choosing from various options.) 
We decided on going to the park. (We chose going to park from several options, e.g., we were considering going to movie or inviting a friend to dinner, but we decided ON going to the park.)

HAPPYatHARVARD · Answer

E could have been an answer if it was written in this way.

decided to increase the time, he’d previously devoted to practicing free throws and layups scheduled , by nearly 50 percent the number .

sumitgoyal2727 · Answer

Hi!!
In answer choice A is it correct to use "to practicing". Should't it be "to practice"??

AjiteshArun · Answer

We have "(that) he had previously devoted to practicing free throws and layups". To check what we can put after the  devoted to , we can actually ask ourselves this question: "what had he devoted his time to?", and then check what sounds better.

1. "What had he devoted his time to?"
 Practicing free throws and layups

2. "What had he devoted his time to?"
  Practice free throws and layups

prikh · Answer

Hi.

Could you please elaborate on why E is incorrect?

Thanks!

DmitryFarberMPrep · Answer

prikh  The problem is with "by nearly 50% the number." First, we'd need "of the number." Second, "the number" is not a clear measurement here, since there is no mention of hours, minutes, etc. For that reason, "amount" makes much more sense.

prikh · Answer

Yes. Makes perfect sense. Thank you!!

Posted from my mobile device

GDT · Answer

VeritasKarishma

Why is it to practicing and not to practice ( we use to+ infinitive , for+v-ing isn't it)

vishu48 · Answer

Hi,

The sentence seems right, but do we need 'the number' at the end?

OR

-decided to increase the time, he’d scheduled previously devoted to practicing free throws and layups, by nearly 50 percent.

This ?

jatin093 · Answer

(A) decided on a nearly 50 percent increase in the amount of scheduled time he’d previously  devoted  to practicing free throws and layups.

Shouldn't the bold word be 'devote'?

EducationAisle · Answer

Interesting. "he'd" apparently can mean either of the following:

(i) he would
(ii) he had

Here, a past perfect ( he had ) is more appropriate and hence,  devoted  is correct.

BlueDefender · Answer

Shouldn't "increase in the amount of scheduled time he’d previously devoted" in the correct answer be "increase in the amount of scheduled time THAT he’d previously devoted" by GMAT standards?

EducationAisle · Answer

"that" is  implied  here.

This is quite common on GMAT.

ExpertsGlobal5 · Answer

Hello  jatin093 ,

We hope this finds you well.

To answer your query, the use of the past participle is correct here because "he'd" stands for "he had", and the correct past perfect tense construction is "had + past participle"; the use of the past participle is appropriate here because the action of the player devoting a certain amount of time to practicing free throws and layups is the earlier of two actions that concluded in the past - "decided" and "devoted".

We hope this helps.
All the best!
Experts' Global Team

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