Well, so I took the GMAT today after a bit more than 2 weeks of part time preparation and got 690. I feel it accurately reflects where I am at. After 5 years of not doing much mental calculations etc… catching up in less than 3 weeks to a 690 level feels pretty good :)!
To take the result to the 700+ level I feel will not be extremely hard. Actually I could have easily scored anything between 680-720 depending on luck and mental state on test day. I had a terrible day in terms of mental state today… so 690-680 is as low as its gonna get. In any case I won’t aim for 700. With this extra time on my pocket I will aim much higher.
The first stage of this series of posts ends here. 🙂 Next series will be regarding taking the score to that 700+ and retaking the test probably one month from now.
I have identified some issues that blocked me a bit on the exam:
- Integrated Reasoning I’d better dedicate some time to do some examples. Can’t just show up like that. Having done some of the exercises before surely helps perform better in that section and to not reach the other parts of the test too mentally taxed.
- Quant is the key mainly… must focus on structure and of having a very clear strategy to tackle certain kinds of problems. The key is gonna be to sterngthen a lot my fundamentals and to devise specific strategies for each kind of question. I must devise a very consistent number plugging strategy for DS questions.
- Verbal – Need to strengthen sentence correction mainly.
- Had time issues in Quant, due to poor start and bad state of mind. Time is so important to mantain a clear mindset. Need to always keep time in mind when working on problems.
I am taking this as a chance to get a really high score now. Having 30 days of part time preparation can now be a great opportunity to take things to the next level. For fun, as a hobby and because it will help me in the future.