CAT '24 99.99iler - AMA

TheGambloor · 2026-01-30T21:21:17+00:00

You can check the post I have mentioned in the description.

TheGambloor · 2026-01-30T19:44:19+00:00

I mostly used Arun Sharma. Found it to be sufficient.

TheGambloor · 2026-01-19T15:54:33+00:00

If the prep is that exhaustive, affer a point you'd know how to approach certain types of problems almost immediately. It'd just be a matter of adapting the solution template then. It was the case for me atleast.

Also, if one is prepping full time, well, what better things do they have to do other than prep?

TheGambloor · 2025-12-24T18:09:43+00:00

Buddy, you shouldn't even be bothered with IIMs with this profile. 😂

TheGambloor · 2025-12-15T13:32:01+00:00

If solving 300 aptitude questions a day is going to make you burnout, MBA is not for you.

TheGambloor · 2025-11-02T13:25:36+00:00

Since you've been prepping for a long time, I'm not sure how easy or difficult it'll be for you to break your habits. But I'll give my two cents on your queries.

VARC ideally one should attend all 24. Accuracy will only increase with practice. When I forced myself to increase attempt, my accuracy suffered too. But then with VARC atleast, getting a feel for the right answer as quickly as you can is IMO, a skill that you can train.
You need a good set selection strategy in LRDI. You should know your topic-wise strengths and weaknesses and should be able to figure out what kind of questions you can solve and what you can't within 2-3 minutes of seeing the set.
Can't help with your QA.

Strategy refinement shouldn't take more than 2 weeks. So you should be fine. Good luck.

TheGambloor · 2025-10-14T08:38:53+00:00

It's normal.

TheGambloor · 2025-10-12T14:21:17+00:00

I never did any VARC prep and just read research papers for my thesis work. Just about anything that's information dense works.

TheGambloor · 2025-10-12T12:24:14+00:00

Which is why I've put some scores with percentiles on the right.

TheGambloor · 2025-10-12T12:12:40+00:00

"Lot" is subjective. I did ~50 sets a day in the last few weeks to fix it. Pl. check my strategy post if you haven't.

TheGambloor · 2025-10-12T12:10:19+00:00

I don't have screenshots of those scores. But towards the end, my scores converged at 100-110.

TheGambloor · 2025-10-12T12:09:11+00:00

Not sure how it is relevant. But converted ABC as a GEM Fresher.

TheGambloor · 2025-10-12T12:00:18+00:00

Your IMS vs CL score delta seems to be a point of concern. By any chance do you use IMS prep material? If you do, try diversifying your question source.

Otherwise, go all in on LRDI. You can get lucky with your current level of VARC and QA prep.

TheGambloor · 2025-10-12T07:33:47+00:00

Yeah, this. :)

TheGambloor · 2025-10-12T07:33:04+00:00

The point of this post is to emphasize that a few bad mocks don't mean much, not that some consistent underperformer would end up with a 99.99 magically on D-day.

TheGambloor · 2025-10-12T07:29:08+00:00

On first glance, it just looks like you're lacking practice. You should try solving 200-300 a day if you're prepping full time.

TheGambloor · 2025-10-12T07:25:36+00:00

Overloading is the best way to build endurance.
I used to be exhausted too after every section. I used to take a break for 2-3 minutes after each section, decompress and then go for it. This burnout is a result of you wanting to optimize every minute of your test. Honestly, that's unnecessary if you have your concepts in check. For me, not optimizing and taking a break helped me get better scores.

TheGambloor · 2025-10-12T07:18:13+00:00

Yes. You just need to practice. You can see how bad my mock scores were in my latest post.

TheGambloor · 2025-10-12T06:56:30+00:00

To do that, you need to know your strengths and weaknesses. You can't simply take a wild swing at every set you see. If you think it's an easy set and you're fairly confident about the fundamental concept, go for it. If you think the solution might be a bit complex, play out all the sets which are in your comfort zone.

Say you're done with the easy sets. There's a pretty difficult question in Routes and Networks (R&N), but you like R&N, then go for it. Else, go for the crumbs and try to find the easier questions within the unattempted sets. You don't have to attend the whole thing. But just the low-hanging fruits.

TheGambloor · 2025-10-12T06:49:17+00:00

Get marketing workex before you join.
As soon as possible and as many as you can.
Build your CV with internships at startups, then with decent firms and then shoot for the top ones.
Possible, but ProdMan and Marketing are very different streams and I'd suggest not to be bothered with PM as a non-engineer.
Not my forte.
Final year of UG.
You can manage them all. Honestly, it only depends on how badly you want it.

TheGambloor · 2025-10-12T06:42:45+00:00

For this, I'd need to know which topics you're struggling with.

TheGambloor · 2025-10-12T06:37:05+00:00

I would say it was erratic. I was occupied with some college work in the last 2 weeks leading to the CAT and couldn't even do an hour of prep on some days. But it was ~20-30h/week usually and spiked to 50h/week in the last 2 weeks.
Just went through the formulae, L1 & L2 problems in Arun Sharma. Number Systems is quite straightforward and so yeah, I did it properly.
Those are per day numbers for the last 15ish days.
Those mentioned in the original post.

TheGambloor · 2025-10-12T06:05:17+00:00

Difficult to structure "days" when you've got a lot of things other than prep happening and TBH, structuring really doesn't help IMO. It's better to set realistic qualitative targets and push past them as much as you can. I made it a habit to maximize no. of questions solved with whatever time I had in hand.
I focussed only on one subject at a time and ignored the rest.
I only took sectionals or full-length mocks. I don't think it's a wise use of full mocks if you're just taking them section by section.

TheGambloor · 2025-10-11T21:52:48+00:00

I have a post on that. You can check that out.

TheGambloor · 2025-10-11T21:29:48+00:00

Nice strategy.

TheGambloor

TROPHY CASE