The ordeals of an oil man!!!

Question

Profile : Indian, M25, Mechanical engineering Degree with a GPA of 3.0 WE : 0.5 years in a manufacturing plant (irrelevant); 3.5+ years in an Indian Upstream oil company, out of which 2+ years as a driller and 1.5 yrs as a drilling engineer Target schools : ISB, NUS, NTU EC : average I started my preparation several times in the last 2 years and each of those never lasted for more than a week!! 8-)

But i became serious in the last 2-3 months and started devoting a few hours every day. Preparation materials : Manhattan SC book, Powerscore CR, OG 12, and random questions posted in Gmatclub I am extremely thankful to bunuel,his explanations were really helpful during my preparation. Practice test scores : Gmatprep 1- 590 (before prep) , Gmatprep II - 690(10 days before the test) Manhattan scores were from 660 to 720. The 720(q 48, v40) was on cat6 taken 2 days before the actual exam. I went for the exam with a target score of 730-740 with 49 in quant and 40 in verbal. Gmat experience : The AWA was alright-not my best, but hopefully should still fetch around 4.5-5. In IR, my plan was to skip the 3 multisource reasoning questions as those questions were time consuming in the Gmatprep and mgmat cat tests. In the real test, the first 3 questions were multi source reasoning questions, but it looked pretty simple. So i just skipped through the passage and answered/ guessed those 3 and moved on in 3 minutes. But this was a huge mistake as a second batch of 3 multisource questions appeared as questions 8-10. This second batch of MS questions were way too tough and i was not able to figure anything out even after spending around 8 minutes. So i had to guess and move on. Other IR questions were easy. So i am still hopeful of getting a 5 in IR. Quant went very easy and at the end of the session i was sure of getting atleast a 50. There were a few tricky questions, but i was well on time throughout and i felt very comfortable compared to the mgmat tests which used to make me feel exhausted by the end of 75 minutes. :-D

Since i was happy with my performance in quant, i was very confident when i started my verbal session. But it did not last long, the first few questions were SC and they just blew me away. Seriously, the verbal part in the real exam was tougher than the mgmat or gmatprep tests. After around 20 questions i understood that i was well behind my timing plan. So i was nervous and this put me in real trouble. I had around one minute each for the last 13 questions, so it was really getting tougher towards the end. Somehow i managed to finish the exam and i was really really disappointed with my performance. Final score : 690 (Q46, v38) :shock:

When i clicked the calculate score button, i was expecting a score of q50, v35(or may be even less) to come up. But to my big surprise, it was the other way around. The score showed that i did a decent job in verbal, whereas something had terribly gone wrong in quant. Even after 10 days from the test, i still do not know where i went wrong in quant. I was particularly careful in DS questions and spent some time to recheck my answers before i pressed next button. Anyway, i have decided to retake Gmat within a month. I clearly know what i have to do for verbal-concentrate more on timing, especially in CR. But i am still pondering on how to improve my quant. Though i am an engineer, i am not a math whiz. But i am not too bad either. In almost all the practice tests, i had scored around 48-49. I never neglected quant. Infact, i was more confident in verbal while going for the final exam. I am really looking for some advice on how to improve my quant, especially from people who have faced similar situation. :roll:

Argon · Answer

Official score: 690(Q46, V38), AWA:5, IR: 8

shreerajp99 · Answer

Congrats on the score! IR 8 is too good!
When ru planning to retake?As u said,quant din't seem much difficult to u;which topics u believe 1 should
stress more upon and questions from which topic in quant seemed tricky to u?

Thanks,
Shreeraj

Argon · Answer

IR score was indeed surprising. I guess the difficult questions are all experimental, at least for the time being. I am looking for a date around mid-November. I am randomly practicing quant questions at the moment. Not sure if this is going to work

There were a couple of tricky DS questions- tricky in the sense that it was tempting to choose the wrong one. But that is what DS is, after all!! In PS,the questions didn't trouble me at all. I think 2 questions on exponents were the only ones which merit more than 2 mins. But, to my big surprise, i could score only 46. When are you taking gmat?

shreerajp99 · Answer

Have u taken leave for GMAT? how many quant practice questions u do in a day and what is the source?
I also practice/review around 10 quant questions per day after office and i know studying exclusively for quant will have a negative effect on verbal but i just
cant seem to get time to manage both of them.
I am planning for a november end date(hopefully).Gave gmatprep2 last week and scored just 680(Q48,V35) so quant and verbal both need improvement.

Thanks,
Shreeraj

Viking81 · Answer

GmatClub Quant CATs (14 of them) and Jeff Sackman's challenge sets are , in my opinion, the most useful resources available to push your Quant scores to the 49-50 level. Make sure that you review each test thoroughly. Your verbal score is already at a decent level, so I do not see major hiccups there. Keep practicing verbal questions and focus on these tests. One month is good enough to boost your scores.

Argon · Answer

thanks viking. I have heard a lot about jeff's books and will surely try them. In gmat prep tests i am scoring 49 in quant, while in mgmat i am hovering around 45-46. But i want to hit 50 in quant as i think i have reached a saturation level in verbal. I am now consistently scoring 40 in verbal and it doesn't seem like improving any further.

Argon · Answer

@ shreeraj, yes. You have to work on both quant and verbal. In verbal, try to do gmatprep collection which is there in gmatclub. 
I am also facing issues with managing work and study. Anyway we have to get around it somehow. The key is to practice at least few questions everyday.

hedgedfund · Answer

Great job man! You can definitely improve on that Quant and verbal score!

gurpreetsingh · Answer

GMAT quant is indeed tricky. I score 49 in my first attempt 2 years back but I had scored Q51 on all of my gprep and even on MGMAT quant I scored Q51 Q50.... :-D

but 49 on real gmat. It hurted my ego and I even called gmat customer care to check whether something went wrong. But now 2 years have passed and I m again giving my gmat , keeping aside the quant ego and respecting the tricky questions of gmat. MGMAT advance quant book is quite helpful. So you must give it a try along with the gprep question pack 1 of mba.com

Argon · Answer

thanks gurpreet and hedgefund. I am giving my best this time

It is now a race between me and work, GMAT and essays.

	Manhattan Prep: $99 Bonus Score Higher on Your GMAT Exam. Guaranteed.
	Target Test Prep - Save up to $599 $400 Discount + $99 Bonus GMAT Club Tests
	e-GMAT: 60% Off on GMAT Focus Get to 735+ from any starting point
	Magoosh increases your score, guaranteed - 15% off ALL Magoosh GMAT plans with code GMATCLUB15 + Free GMAT Club Tests.
	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

The ordeals of an oil man!!!

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