The U.S. hockey team won the Olympic gold medal

Question

New problem for everyone!

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The U.S. hockey  team won the Olympic gold medal in 1980, against which the odds had been a thousand to one, providing inspiration to Americans in  a time of economic difficulty and geopolitical tension.

(A) team won the Olympic gold medal in 1980, against which the odds had been a thousand to one, providing inspiration to Americans in

(B) team’s 1980 Olympic gold-medal victory, against odds of a thousand to one, served to inspire Americans in

(C) team’s win of the 1980 Olympic gold medal was against odds of a thousand to one, which served to inspire Americans during

(D) team’s victory of the 1980 Olympic gold medal, against thousand-to-one odds, serving to provide inspiration to Americans during

(E) team won the 1980 Olympic gold-medal victory against thousand-to-one odds, providing inspiration to Americans in

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OA is deferred for 24 hours.

RonPurewal · Accepted Answer

Hello all,

I've written up an exhaustive key for this problem. I'm uploading it in graphical form — please check it out.

If there are further questions from anyone who's gone through this key, please ask away!

--R

daagh · Answer

The critical factor is that a team may or may not inspire after all. However, a team's performance can certainly. Teams with their participants may come and go but their momentous performances sometimes remain evergreen, boosting or burying spirits. That said, wherever the team appears to be inspiring is not as correct as a team's win inspiring. We should rather leave choices A and E for this reason alone.

Among B, C, and D: Fortunately D is a fragment to make things easy. 
Between B and C: In C, the reference of 'which', referring to the 'win', jumping over several nouns such as one, odds, and then a gold medal and interestingly a verb 'was', is indeed far-fetched.

Another fact of difference between ' in' as in B and 'during' as in C is that, 'during' is a range of period with a start and an 'end' that is fairly larger than a shorter stint of 'in'. Considering that the economic recession of 1980 lasted longer than the spell of the Olympics, during as in C seems to be inappropriate vis-a-vis 'in' as in B.

B seems to be a decisive winner.

The takeaways:
1. Understand the difference between the use of 'in' and 'during' 
2. The reference of the relative pronoun 'which' 
3. The logic of the adverbial comma+verbing modification.

Great learning

stne · Answer

Thanks for the question Ron!

Would like to go with B.

gmatexam439 · Answer

Hello  RonPurewal , A tough question again.  It's definitely between A and B (I don't know if I am over thinking on this one)(Awaiting the OA).

1. However, could you please throw some light on the usage of "during" in options C and D. I think the usage is wrong. 
2. Can you also throw some light on "in time of" vs "during time of".
I am a non-native speaker so pardon me if I have asked a foolish question.

The U.S. hockey  team won the Olympic gold medal in 1980, against which the odds had been a thousand to one, providing inspiration to Americans in  a time of economic difficulty and geopolitical tension.

(A) team won the Olympic gold medal in 1980, against which the odds had been a thousand to one, providing inspiration to Americans in
 --Correct. "which" correctly refers back to the US Hockey team.
--"had been" is correctly used, since the odds are presented at the starting of the match. So basically we have 2 things happening in past so we need to specify the order of events.

(B) team’s  1980 Olympic gold-medal  victory, against odds of a thousand to one,  served to inspire  Americans in
 --1.We can directly say that the victory inspired the Americans in dire times.
--2. "1980 Olympic gold medal" doesn't mean that the medal was son in 1980. It is possible that the medal was won at some other event, in which that medal was given to the team.

(C) team’s win of the  1980 Olympic gold medal  was against odds of a thousand to one,  which  served to inspire Americans during
 --1. This option doesn't state the year in which medal was won. "1980 Olympic gold medal" doesn't mean that the medal was won in 1980.
--2. "which" highlighted in red incorrectly refers back to "odds" because the odds didn't inspire the Americans.

(D) team’s victory of the  1980 Olympic gold medal , against thousand-to-one odds, serving to provide inspiration to Americans during
 --1. This is not a sentence.
--2. "1980 Olympic gold medal "repeats the same mistake like the one in option C.

(E) team  won  the 1980 Olympic gold-medal  victory  against thousand-to-one odds, providing inspiration to Americans in
 --1. Redundant "won" and "victory".

hwgmat2015 · Answer

I think its B

(B) team’s 1980 Olympic gold-medal victory,  against odds of a thousand to one , served to inspire Americans in

dhardubey · Answer

I will go with B
A) Which modifies the medal instead of team
c) win, which
d)serving to provide
e) won victory

atulindia · Answer

New problem for everyone!

__

The U.S. hockey  team won the Olympic gold medal in 1980, against which the odds had been a thousand to one, providing inspiration to Americans in  a time of economic difficulty and geopolitical tension.

(A) team won the Olympic gold medal in 1980,  against which  the odds had been a thousand to one, providing inspiration to Americans in- which refers team or winning the gold?? not clear

(B) team’s 1980 Olympic gold-medal  victory,  against odds of a thousand to one,  served  to inspire Americans in-correct answer

(C) team’s win of the 1980 Olympic gold medal was against odds of a thousand to one,  which served  to inspire Americans during- Which modifies odd-wrong ref

(D)  team’s victory  of the 1980 Olympic gold medal, against thousand-to-one odds , serving  to provide inspiration to Americans during- verb missing for Am. teams victory-wrong
 
(E) team won  the 1980 Olympic gold-medal victory  against thousand-to-one  odds, providing inspiration to Americans in- changes meaning victory against thousand odd. original victory inspired people- wrong

gmatexam439 · Answer

Hi  daagh ,

Thank you for the wonderful insight. But, I have a few doubts after going through aforesaid explanation.

1. comma+verb+ing modifier modifies the action of the preceding clause and not the subject. So as per the option A given below, providing is modifying "win". So as per your explanation shouldn't A be the correct option as far as meaning is concerned?
2. Does "which" correctly refer back to the team?
3. I think that "had been" is correctly used, since the odds are decided before any match begins, and that we need a perfect tense here since 2 events are happening in the past.

Please throw some light on my above doubts. (I understand that B is crispier and less wordier than A, but my above doubts are just to get a better understanding of the language)

Regards

daagh · Answer

gmatexam  
 
True, the adverbial modifier does modify the team's win. However, the more serious fault of A is that the modifier relegates the inspiration to an auxiliary status while unduly considering the win itself as the core; On the contrary, the verb 'served to inspire' is more forthright and therefore is crispier as you have rightly made out. One can see the V-A-N rule in full swing.

Thanks for the nice point.

AdityaHongunti · Answer

I would go with B

Explanation- 
A seems almost right but the main part from the sentence is to talk about the economic tension .

B . Option describes more about the main issue that is of inspiration to the American in hard times.

Sent from my XT1562 using  GMAT Club Forum mobile app

gmatexam439 · Answer

Thank you daagh . Such words coming from you motivates me a lot and help me to concentrate better.

Also, can you please throw some light on point number 2 and 3 below with respect to option A. 2. Does "which" correctly refer back to the team? 3. I think that "had been" is correctly used, since the odds are decided before any match begins, and that we need a perfect tense here since 2 events are happening in the past. Regards

daagh · Answer

gmatexam

IMO, 'in A, 'which' rightly or wrongly can only refer to the team since there is no other noun for the pronoun to refer to. Therefore, there is no issue about it and logically too, 'which' can refer to the team without a hitch as the odds are fixed against a team and not on its attributes. However, in the case of C, the same pronoun refers to the 'win' (a noun here) as there is no other noun that the relative pronoun can fall back on. Therefore, the reference of 'which' is a non-issue, I suppose. 
With reference to the use of the perfect tense, it does not matter much whether the said odds were there before the tournament started or during the tournament since it does not critically affect the intent. 
Although the two events occurred in the past, the odds were also there simultaneously during the course of the tourney. Probably a simple past would have been ample enough in such a case. You may see that the supposedly correct choice does not use a past perfect.

gmatexam439 · Answer

Hi  RonPurewal ,

Thanks for the analysis of the question. However I have 2 doubts after going through the explanation.

1. In choice A, isn't "providing" modifying "The U.S. hockey team won the Olympic gold medal in 1980". The " against which the odds had been a thousand to one " part of the sentence is just an additional information that can be removed while reading the sentence. Doesn't verb+ing modifier jump past such "additional information"?

For example:   Cristiano Ronaldo, who is considered the god of football, passing the mid-field at a lightening pace scored the first goal in under 10 minutes. 
Here, "passing" doesn't modify "considered the god of football", instead it modifies "Ronaldo" - doesn't it?

2. Why isn't there any noun for "victory" in option A. Isn't "hockey team" the subject and noun of "victory"? If it is not the noun then I am seriously confused as to how to approach such a question?

Awaiting your reply on both the doubts.

Regards

RonPurewal · Answer

Hi, thanks for your responses.

^^   Comma + __ing   modifiers should describe the  NEAREST  action.
A sentence that  requires  comma + __ing  to "jump over"  an entire action, in order to modify an action that's farther away, is a   BADLY WRITTEN SENTENCE   — and the correct answers will NOT be badly written.

YOU don't need to think about "good writing" versus "bad writing" here — you can just remember that   comma + __ing  will modify the NEAREST preceding action , if the sentence is correctly written.

(If you have any OFFICIAL counterexamples — from materials created by GMAC — that contradict what I'm saying here, then please post citations of those examples!
That sentence about Cristiano Ronaldo is VERY badly written. If that's the (supposedly) correct answer from a GMAT-related source, then, you should regard that source with extreme skepticism from now on.

^^ Unnecessary because "win" is there.
If the sentence contained BOTH "win" AND "victory", it'd be redundant.

gmatexam439 · Answer

Thank you Ron. I think I had studied the kind of structure I mentioned in my first point somewhere long time back. Maybe the source wasn't genuine. But thanks a lot for pointing that out. I went through a couple of OG 12 questions targeted at verb+ing modifiers and as pointed by you the verb+ing modifiers modify the nearest action.

Thanks again for the quick and generous reply - I am trying to learn the SC rules from your "Thursdays with Ron" videos. I have made considerable progress after going through them, since I am able to pin pint the errors with greater confidence now. I am hoping to improve even more once I revisit your videos again.

Regards

RonPurewal · Answer

You're welcome ... but ... OG 12 is four editions ago! It's almost 9 years old...

Do you mind if I ask why you aren't using a more recent edition of the book?
(The problems that are purged from the OG — especially from the sentence correction section, which is the only section that's really evolved much over the last 10-15 years — have been purged for very specific reasons.)

gmatexam439 · Answer

I have already finished reading OG17, so I am going through old OGs - just in case. I hope it's not a bad thing to do? If yes, I will refrain myself from using the same in future.

chesstitans · Answer

this is a self-made question, I always welcome, but the question definitely never appears in the actual test.

Rickyrocks · Answer

A) team won the Olympic gold medal in 1980, against which the odds had been a thousand to one, providing inspiration to Americans in — which should proceed with comma.

(B) team’s 1980 Olympic gold-medal victory, against odds of a thousand to one, served to inspire Americans in - correct

(C) team’s win of the 1980 Olympic gold medal was against odds of a thousand to one, which served to inspire Americans during - which is incorrectly modified one or odds...

(D) team’s victory of the 1980 Olympic gold medal, against thousand-to-one odds, serving to provide inspiration to Americans during - agains thousand to one odds should modify victory not the gold medal.

(E) team won the 1980 Olympic gold-medal victory against thousand-to-one odds, providing inspiration to Americans in - incorrectly modifying and awkward sentence.

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The U.S. hockey team won the Olympic gold medal

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GMAT Sentence Correction (SC - EA only) Questions

The U.S. hockey team won the Olympic gold medal

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