GMAT 635 (V80, Q88, DI76). Roadmap for retake? (Target: 725+)

Question

Hello everyone,

I'm posting this after a torrid day where I severely underperformed on the GMAT FE due to various reasons. I feel terrible overall since I'd done fairly well in the mocks leading up to the exam. I'm definitely planning a retake, and I'm in dire need of some advice on how to go about prep. I'll try and delve into everything below, from the weeks leading up to day 0 and the actual test day itself.

Background:

I've got an Engineering degree, and come from a tech and finance background (3.5 years ex). I'd given the GMAT (the older 800 point version) a go about 5 years ago, when I was in my final year of college. Prepped for a week, got 750 in an official mock with perfect quant, and ended up bettering it by 10 points in the actual test with a good Verbal section. This led me to believe that I could pull off something like that this time too. Although, it must be noted that Sentence Correction was my forte, which is sadly no longer a thing.

Prep (two weeks before D-Day):

I picked up the Official GMAT guide along with the three other section specific Official guides for Quant, Verbal, and DI respectively. I was able to get through all the Quant questions across both books, and also took some timed practice sessions for the same on the online interface. I was also able to list down recurring errors and try and avoid them in subsequent sessions/mocks. Finished a fair amount of questions from each question type in DI, but I wasn't able to complete all the questions in the books. Similarly, I couldn't get a lot of Verbal practice in either since I'd underestimated the time it would take to complete them.

While doing a bit of Verbal practice, I noticed that I was quickly able to digest large passages when the topics skewed STEM, culture, history, art - things I'd normally find interesting and was fascinated about. On the other hand, I was struggling trying to make sense of paragraph blocks when they dealt with things like economic theories, market trends, corporate strategies, the works. This part is especially relevant vis-a-vis my test day experience. Nonetheless, I banked on my previous GMAT experience to do reasonably well here (famous last words). Which takes me to the mocks...

Mocks:

I attempted 3 Mocks in total: the free one on GMAT Club first (before prep) and both the Official Mocks on the GMAT website (Practice Exam 1 and 2). This is how they went:

GMAT Club - 685 (Q84, V86, DI82)
 
Too many silly mistakes in quant here, some calculation based, some RTFQ. Verbal went fine, DI was okay with a couple of mistakes. Felt rushed through all three sections here.
 
  Official Practice Test 1 - 735 (Q89, V90, DI80)

Verbal went miraculously well, with only one incorrect answer. Quant had a silly mistake in reading the options which led to one incorrect answer. DI started off well, till I ran into clock issues for taking a while with some of the earlier questions, and eventually had to mark 3 answers blindly (which turned out incorrect) and leave the last one unanswered (which probably brought down the score by a point or two more). 
 
  Official Practice Test 2 - 745 (Q89, V88, DI84)
 
Yet another silly mistake in Quant. Verbal was good with 3 incorrect answers. DI was much better in terms of time management, with 5 incorrect answers but more spread out, and all questions attempted.

Essentially, my time management in Quant and DI got better till a point where I'd be done with 4+ minutes to go in the former, and just about wrap up the latter in time.

Test Day:

I decided by order would be Verbal, Quant, Break, DI. I'll try to detail my experience to the best of my memory. Verbal started off well with a couple of CR questions, followed by a short passage with 3 questions, followed by another 3-4 CR questions. I'd finished the first 8 questions in relatively quick time, averaging less than 2 minutes, and had also gotten almost all of them right. After processing the 9th question (CR) for a minute, I'd decided on an option to mark and move on...which is exactly when I started second-guessing myself, and found that I was torn between another option which seemed to make more sense the more I thought about it. And this way, I ended up spending another ~4 minutes on it, before deciding to stick to my initial answer (which was correct, in hindsight). This, I felt, was the turning point in the entire test.

At this point, I'd like to bring up a few stimuli that I had to fend with for the first time in such a test environment:

Multiple people attempting different kinds of tests in the same room, entering and leaving at different times. So the door was frequently opened and closed. There was constant clacking of keys going on (in some of the more essay-oriented tests, I presume). Oftentimes, chatter between the proctor and newly arrived test-takers  inside  the venue.  
 
 There was constant clacking of keys going on (in some of the more essay-oriented tests, I presume). We were presented with earbuds to help, but when I put them on, they completely drowned out any noise and created a weird echo chamber where I could also hear my heart beating fast. 
 Something about the blown up characters on screen made following sentences difficult, often leading to me rereading sentences. 
 The scribble pad and marker combination was new, and sometimes led to illegible writing (though this was mostly a Quant/DI issue)

Question 9 was followed by 10 questions back-to-back from two big RC passages, none of which I could follow at all. The passages were heavy on econ/corporate strategy, and I couldn't even will myself to begin comprehending the flow of logic. Moreover, all of the aforementioned factors intensified and it just became of vicious cycle where I wasn't able to make sense of anything. As a result, I also lost track of the amount of time I'd lost, and eventually had to mark a bunch of answers randomly and move on in order to tackle the last few CR questions. As it turns out, I got 7/10 wrong in that spell of RC questions.

I was so flustered and dejected with my performance that I forgot to select the option to defer the break, and the 10 minutes automatically began. This meant I had to go Quant and DI back to back. After the 10 minute break, Quant went pretty well and I had 2+ minutes to check my answers. Unfortunately, I could only go through the first 10, and my only incorrect answer of the set was the 18th question (I don't recall the question, but ought to have been a calculation mistake again). Because Quant was more involved than usual, heading straight into DI with that lethargy probably didn't do me much good as I made a few errors in MSR and TPA questions. To make matters worse, I ate up a lot of time in MSR which meant I had a minute to randomly mark the last three questions. Unfortunately, time ran out just as I marked the last Graph/Table question, which resulted in my answer not being taken as I didn't "Confirm" it. The unanswered question probably dented by already lacklustre DI heavily. Murphy's law really.

What Next?

I'm really looking to fast-track my prep and get enough practice before my next attempt (I haven't penciled it in yet) so I feel confident across all sections, both in terms of conceptual clarity and time-preparedness. Here's a few focus areas that I feel I should target:

Get used to reading tough passages. Improve reading speed. Employ strategies that help tackle questions. Needs a lot of investment 
 CR, while the better of the two thus far, could still do with some polishing. Hopefully cut down time here so there's more for RCs 
 Brush up on Quant and practice enough to avoid silly mistakes 
 DI: Speed up, with lots of practice and newer strategies 
 Practise with the scribble pad and marker (a model of which I think is available to purchase online?)

I apologise for the length of this post, and I look forward to hear everyone's feedback and suggestions on what study plan to adopt or programs/test series to take up in the upcoming days. I'd also love to hear from folks if this resonates with their own test-taking experiences, what changed between subsequent attempts, what worked and what didn't. This would be of massive help to me!

Thank you, and have a lovely day!

Archit3110 · Answer

You need to practice tests in actual exam environment.. evaluate & work on sections you lack confidence...
All the best

axeofflane · Answer

Why do the test again if you already have a 760?

pintukr · Answer

You may attempt questions using the Forum Quiz. All the Best.

eccehomo · Answer

Unfortunately that score expired last month since it was from 2021 :/

GMAT 635 (V80, Q88, DI76). Roadmap for retake? (Target: 725+)

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