760 Summary- GMATPrep / Kaplen / MGMAT / Princeton / GMAT

Question

I took the GMAT this week and got 760.

I had a little over 4 weeks to study for the GMAT between the time that I reached the decision to apply for the upcoming school year until the deadline for my MBA application for the upcoming year (in the specific university that I'm interested in).

I decided to divide that time frame as follows - the initial two weeks were dedicated to studying and solving questions from books (Kaplan, OG etc.), and another two weeks for solving a single CAT on a daily basis. In the final 2-3 days before the actual test, I added a little bit of OG question solving on top of the daily CAT.

Below are all my home test CAT scores + the actual final GMAT score, for anyone who may be interested in estimating their final test score based on the GMATPrep / Kaplan / MGMAT / Princeton Review scores (the list is chronologically ordered from the first CAT taken to the last):

1. GMATPrep test #1: 750
2. Kaplan 2009 CD test #1: 620
3. Kaplan 2009 CD test #2: 640
4. Kaplan 2009 CD test #3: 630
5. MGMAT #1: 710
6. MGMAT #2: 690
7. MGMAT #3: 730
8. GMATPrep test #2: 760
9. MGMAT #4: 730
10. MGMAT #5: 730
11. Kaplan 2009 (online test): 700
12. MGMAT #6: 770
13. GMATPrep test #1 (retake after reinstall): 750
14. GMATPrep test #2 (retake after reinstall): 780
15. Princeton Review online CAT #1: 730
16. Actual GMAT score: 760

One last comment / suggestion – the test center where I took my test is about 1.5 hours by car from where I live. In order to avoid unnecessary traffic-related stress on the morning of the test (1.5 hours by car can easily turn into 2+ in certain scenarios), I decided to narrow the gap and sleep over at a friend's house (much closer to the center) the night before the test,. In reality, what happened was that because I wasn't sleeping in my natural surroundings, I ended up waking up after less than 4 hours of sleep, and wasn't able to fall back asleep afterwards. By morning (after rolling back and forth in bed for a few hours), I was so tired that I was extremely close to deciding to skip the test, as I was certain that I'm about to unavoidably flunk it (luckily, I ended up taking my chances and got a decent score). My point is, that you should try to avoid (as much as possible) any major changes in your daily routine in the 24 hours prior to the test (I was actually aware of this and did in fact avoid any changes, except for the "minor" issue of where to spend the night).

Good luck.

Royaldane · Answer

Congratulations! You must be natural at standardized tests. What study material did you use & what helped you the most? Could you break down your study plan for a mere mortal test taker looking to replicate your score?
Thanks a mil & congratulations once more! -Royaldane

Posted from my mobile device

bb · Answer

Congratulations on the 99th percentile and thank you for the tip!!!

gil123 · Answer

Royaldane, this is more or less a breakdown of how I studied: 1. I started out with the Kaplan 2009 Premier book (which is what I had, I understand that the CATs in 2010 are supposedly better) – I went over all the chapters and solved the practice questions in each chapter (I didn't bother taking the full length test at the end of the book, though, as I suspected that a hard copy GMAT might not be adaptive... :wink:

). Since it was the beginning of my studies, I was paying more attention to getting the answers right and understanding the different question types than to pacing myself, but I did keep track of the time it was taking me (for progress reference) using my iPhone stopwatch (I timed each 10 question batch, and wrote down how long it took on my answer sheet). After having completed all the questions in the book, I did some of Kaplan's online quizzes (didn't have time to do them all), as well as the quizzes that came with the CD (not the greatest quizzes I've come across, but I did them anyhow). 2. Second book was Princeton Review – same as with Kaplan, I went over the chapters and solved the questions per chapter. At this point I started paying more attention to the time it was taking me to get through them and attempted to fine tune my pacing. 3. Then I started solving questions from OG, but realized that if I end up going through the entire OG Trio, it wouldn't leave me enough time for proper CAT practice before my exam, so I put OG aside and proceeded to doing CATs. 4. I started solving one CAT per day (see above list) – I realized very quickly that there's no substitute for doing CATs in terms of understanding where you're standing in terms of GMAT pacing. In my first few CATs I kept running out of time with 5-6 questions left in Quantitative. In addition, I would reach the end of the Verbal section feeling that I'm completely drained mentally (I could barely think by the time I reached the final 10 Verbal questions). After doing about 7-8 CATs, this mental exhaustion was gone – I was suddenly "in shape" and would finish Quant. relatively on time, and Verbal with 9-10 minutes left (sometimes even more), and more importantly - without a headache. I also realized that Quantitative is my weaker section in terms of pacing, which is why in the final few days before the actual GMAT, I went back to solving questions from OG on top of the daily CAT, but I only bothered with the Quantitative chapters of OG and never touched even a single OG Verbal question (perhaps I would have, if my time frame allowed me, but as it were I simply didn't have enough time to complete everything and had to put emphasis on Quant).

gautrang · Answer

Congratulation on your score!

In your quest to get "in shape" for CATs, do you do the AWA section each time as well? Since that would take total of close to 4 hours and a night is just not enough, I can only do a 4 hours run on the weekend.

Have you done the CD "Higher score on GMAT" by Kaplan? It seems to me that both that CD and the CD companion of 2009 Books have the same CAT, I'm just not sure whether they have the score calculation and percentile.

gil123 · Answer

gautrang,

I didn't do the AWA each time, I placed more emphasis on the Q & V sections pacing.

In relation to Kaplan – yes, I believe that the name of the software that came with the CD companion was Higher Score. As I've written in a previous post, the CATs that came with that CD were awful in terms of questions, adaptive nature (or lack thereof) and the scoring algorithm itself (which placed me in the 620-640 score range and made me lose my self confidence, which was regained once I moved on to MGMAT etc.). Unless the CD companion of their 2010 books have an updated and improved CAT version, I would avoid doing their CD CATs (unless you have a lot of spare time before the actual GMAT test, in which case I would get those CATs out of the way before proceeding to better quality ones – GMATPrep, MGMAT etc.). In relation to Kaplan, I also did one of their online tests, and I believe that it was better than the CD ones.

nonameee · Answer

gil123, weren't you exhausted after taking so many practice CAT's?

gil123 · Answer

At first, I was very exhausted after *each* test. However, after 7 or 8 tests it became much less exhausting. Originally, I planned to take a break from CATs about 4-5 days before the actual GMAT (to regain my mental strength), and to return to doing CATs only in the two days prior to the exam, but once I realized that CATs aren't exhausting for me anymore, I decided not to take the break and to do CATs consecutively until the day before the actual test (inclusive). In retrospect, I'm not sorry that I took this approach, but I guess that it may differ between individuals – perhaps some people would find it much better for them to take a few days off in order to regain strength after having taken a few CATs. By the way, towards the end I even found it somewhat enjoyable to do the practice CATs.

nonameee · Answer

Thanks for your reply. Did you analyze the results of CAT's? If so, how?

I am really surprised that you were able to remain in a peak form and not to lose it after taking so many CAT's during the preparation.

Posted from my mobile device

serhio · Answer

great debrief

gil123 · Answer

To say that I "analyzed" the results would be too big of a word - I mostly paid attention to the mistakes in the Quantitative section (as it was my weaker one), and made sure that I understand  why  I made the mistake (I made it a point not to leave any question behind without realizing what went wrong). If the question was of a type that I haven't previously encountered, I made sure that I completely understand the idea behind the best approach for solving those types of questions.

As far as not losing it after taking so many CATs, I would have thought the same beforehand. After the initial 5-6 CATs, I didn't believe that I'd be able to continue doing them for an additional 10 consecutive days (hence my initial thoughts of taking a few days off CATs, which ended up not materializing). As I've already mentioned, just the opposite happened – the final 7-8 CATs were actually much easier, enjoyable and less exhausting than the initial ones (go figure). Bottom line - the fact that you find yourself exhausted after having done 3-4 CATs doesn't necessarily mean that you'd feel the same way 8 CATs later. Whether the same applies for you or not is something that you'll only be able to know in retrospect.

	Magoosh increases your score, guaranteed - 15% off ALL Magoosh GMAT plans with code GMATCLUB15 + Free GMAT Club Tests.
	Manhattan Prep: $79 Bonus Score Higher on Your GMAT Exam. Guaranteed.
	Target Test Prep - Save up to $325 $200 Discount + $79 Bonus GMAT Club Tests
	e-GMAT: 60% Off on GMAT Focus Get to 735+ from any starting point
	Experts' Global - ~~$1720~~ $960 End-to-End GMAT Prep + App Support: 150+ Videos, 2000+ Questions, 15 FLTs +
	GMATWhiz - $299 ~~$499~~ Experience the course through a free trial.
	GMAT Club Tests - Free Included with every course purchase of $149+ View all deals

760 Summary- GMATPrep / Kaplen / MGMAT / Princeton / GMAT

Prep Toolkit

Top 5 GMAT Debrief Videos

615 to 715 in 15 Days (Ria's Strategies)

More than Quant/Verbal Abilities: Speed vs. Accuracy

745 with Only Self-Prep and GMAT Club

From 555 to 765: 210-point Improvement

Perfect 805 Score Debrief by Julia

My Rewards