Done with it! Finally! 720 96%(Q47 V42)

Hi Friends,

Finally it's over. I re-took the GMAT today and scored a 720 (Q-47 81% V-42 96%; 96%).

First things first, I am extremely thankful to GMATclub and all the members -
GMATT77, himalaya, fresinha12, laxieqv, rahulrao, vikramm, HongHu, ywilfred, duttsit, sudhagar, nakib77, Antmavel, rigger, automan, rahuluec, christoph, bhai, nero44, bsmith75 and so many others that i have missed to mention (pls forgive me, i am not able to think clearly right now!) And, Oh...Titleist - (Thanks to you for all the fun we had!!)

The quality of questions and more than that the quality of discussions that I saw here are beyond exceptional. Keep up the good work guys. I am sure everyone one of you will get great results!

Now to the briefing.

My 1st Experience:
I first took the exam on Sep 2nd week and scored a miserable 640 (Q47 V31). Everything that could possibly go wrong did go wrong. I thought I screwed up on the Quants. So decided to do well on the Verbal and screwed up there even more! But I didn't even think of cancelling the scores. If i did bad, I needed to know how bad really I had done! Infact seeing a 640 was a surprise, I expected even less. I took 2 weeks off. Thought about it. My ego wouldn't let me move on, though 640 is good enough to get me admits in many places (My acads are good and I have 3.5 years of work ex).

My 2nd Experience:
At the end of september, I decided to go for it again. All this 4 weeks, with respect to my preparation, I didn't do anything other than just be hooked on to this forum full time. That really made the difference. I urge eveyone to participate in the forum disussions. It will do a world of good - to me, it did.

I changed the test center this time. Eventhough it was farther from my place, I didn't want to go to the same old place and get the same old feeling as last time! Went to the new center, had no problems with the ID. The prometric guy wanted me to sign like how I had on my licence and I managed to do after a 3 tries!! Went in. I had a template for the AWA this time unlike last time. Completed both essays on time. Took the break.
Quants -
Started the quants. The 4th Q was a probability - that's my weak area and I am sure I got it wrong. I somehow had a feeling like I was getting all tough (really wordy) questions and getting most of them wrong. It was like a repeat - or maybe even worse than last time. Guessed on the last couple of questions and was throughly disappointed with the performance. Though it is against my principle, I thought of canceling my scores! That very thought shocked me!
Verbal -
I was really relaxed by the time i started this section as I thought everything was over - I screwed up Math beyond imagination! The verbal section did go as it should have. Picture perfect! I didn't have to guess on any Q until the 40th. Even for the last question, i had 30 seconds on the clock and think i got it right. Q's 3 to 10 were RC's, 2 of them. I got 3 BF CR's and some wordy SCs. I sincerely feel my participation here made all the difference. The whole verbal section was like - being logged on to this verbal forum and working on the posts! Finally, it was over. I skipped all the screens to go to my score section.

Scores -
If I really did bad, I need to know! Even if it is a 500, I need to see that. I don't like to escape from reality. I clicked on the report scores and saw -
Quantitative - 47 (81%)
Verbal - 42 (96%)
Overall - 720 (96%)

I simply couldn't believe my eyes. Especially my Q score! The only difference from last time was on the verbal and it had made all the difference in the end! Maybe I underestimate my work on Q both the times, but if I deserve a 47 in Q, the people like HongHu deserve 147 there! World is not fair!

3 hrs past the end, I am regaining composure now and almost finished with the briefing. I sure will stick around here and try to give back what I got from here in my own little way. But I really put in the effort this time and I think it paid off!. Just do your best and leave the rest, results will follow! Life is a zero-sum game. For every negative, there is a positive. Things just can't go wrong everytime! Keep pushing and you'll get what you want, just that at times the going gets hard and most important, don't give up!. I give up a lot of times but somehow come back from the brink to put on a decent show. I have learnt this many times in my 25 years of living!

I didn't take many practice tests. But here are the results of what I had taken.
GMATPrep (3 weeks back) - 680
Kaplan 1 (2 weeks back) - 630
Kaplan 2 (last week) - 580
GMATPrep (2 days back) - 710
PowerPrep (Yesterday) - 710

Again, Friends, I would like to thank you all for everything. Wish you all Good luck in each of your endeavors!