How to improve timing after doing well on untimed Quant Tests

Question

I have been taking the GMAT Club Tests in Quant to get in the 49-51 range. I have spent a lot of time understanding each topic and I am pretty confident of my grasp of concepts in all the different sections (NP, Algebra, Word Problems, Geometry, Probability). The main issue I have is timing- I have taken untimed tests and scored 49 or 50 consistently on it. I have even scored a 49 on the timed test but for the most part, I am pretty inconsistent - usually falling in the 43-47 range. Any advice here would be great!

Bunuel · Answer

We have several topics dedicated to this issue.

5. Strategies and Tactics To Increase Your Score 
  3 Tips for Handling a Low GMAT Quant Score 
 Improving from 30-35 to 40-44 
 Improving from 44 to 50 
 Improving from 48 to 51  (7 chapters)
 The Final Climb: Quest for Q 50+ from Q47/48 
 3 WAYS TO INCREASE YOUR GMAT SCORE TO A 760 
 GMAT TIP OF THE WEEK: YOUR 3 STEP PACING PLAN 
 How to Understand Your GMAT Practice Test Results and Score Higher Next Time  
 Why Isn’t My GMAT Score Going Up?"

6. Strategies and Tactics To Speedd-Up 
 Want to speed up? Check this:  Timing Strategies on the GMAT 
 Follow This Strategy to Save Time on the GMAT 
 How to Improve Your Timing on the GMAT 
 HOW TO MANAGE YOUR TIME ON THE GMAT 
 Pacing - No one question matters unless you let it 
 The Importance of Timing on the GMAT 
 The Difference Between a 1-Minute Solution and a 4-Minute Solution 
 Determining How Much Time to Spend on GMAT Quant Questions 
 Timing is Everything on the GMAT: One Strategy to Help You Succeed 
 3 Ways to Improve Your Timing on the GMAT

Hope it helps.

MathRevolution · Answer

Hello rikinmathur,

The official GMAT exam tests the candidate’s ability to manage time, handle pressure, apply the learned concept, and score better.

Your current quant scores are decent. You can schedule a Free counseling session for 20 mins with one of our experts:https://calendly.com/mathrevolution/1-on-1-session for detailed advice on your current study plans.

We would recommend you learn and command the Variable Approach for DS questions and IVY Approach for PS questions. These approaches are the robust self-designed time-saving techniques that will help you learn efficiently, thus raising your score in the quick nick of time.

Register with MathRevolution https://www.mathrevolution.com/member/signup to get access to our 7-day on-demand course for free trial lessons.

Adding to the same, mastery of the Variable Approach to solve DS questions and the IVY approach to solve PS questions would add a feather to the cap. Since we are a math expert, we will recommend you go through our post on the GMAT club: Breakdown of GMAT math questions and types: https://gmatclub.com/forum/overview-of- ... l#p1641411

Regular tests will reflect the positive change in the score, and hence, your confidence will boost up. Gradually, with the help of mock tests, you will be able to compete with time and hence will be able to learn time management.

We appreciate your time and patience in reading this reply.

Should you need any further information, please do not hesitate to contact us at info@mathrevolution.com

Success is within your reach.
Good luck!

Math Revolution Team

IanStewart · Answer

If you want to evaluate how well you're pacing yourself, it's important to use questions that are realistically time-consuming. You can only be certain of that if you use real questions. Since you feel you have a strong conceptual foundation, you're at a point in your prep where you could consider taking official diagnostic tests. That's how you'll get the best indication of your current level, and the best indication of how strong your pacing is. In general, on adaptive tests like the GMAT, it hurts a lot to get easier questions wrong, and it doesn't hurt much at all to get very hard questions wrong. So when you do take your first real diagnostic, you should be willing to move on from questions quite quickly if you don't see any path to a solution. Often when people have pacing issues, it's because they aren't disciplined enough about moving on from questions they won't be able to answer even given a day to work on them. Pacing issues can also arise when people use slower methods than necessary. If that's the case for you, you might want to learn some subjects in a new, more conceptual way. Occasionally if someone is very slow at algebra or arithmetic, that can also lead to pacing issues, but the real test isn't normally very computationally intensive, so that's not usually a determining factor.

Until you take an official diagnostic, I don't think you'll have any way to know if you have pacing issues at all, let alone what might be causing them. If you take a diagnostic, and if you do discover your pacing was not optimal, then you should be able to identify the cause when you review the test, and that will indicate what you should to to improve (if it's lack of discipline, you'll want to practice becoming more disciplined by taking additional tests, and if you need to learn better methods, you might need to consult materials like my books that teach faster methods than those taught in most prep books). I've worked with lots of students though who have pacing difficulties on prep company tests, and no such problems on real tests, so you might be pleasantly surprised by what happens on your real test. And if, for some reason, you don't want to use an official test yet, you could instead just take a batch of official questions from any official source, and solve a set of 31 of them (you'd probably want a good mix of medium and hard questions, and not many easy questions) to see how long that takes you, where you try to simulate a test (move on from questions you can't see how to solve). But it's definitely easier to evaluate pacing by using a test. Regardless, if you can score in the Q49-Q51 range untimed on many tests, you're near the top of the scale, so you shouldn't have too much difficulty addressing any minor pacing issues you might encounter. Good luck!

How to improve timing after doing well on untimed Quant Tests

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