Anyone else do worse than their COLD diagnostic Forum

[JoeFrosty]

This sucks

I scored 3 points worse than my cold diagnostic....before I even knew what the LSAT questions were about (about 10 points worse than PT avg)

Anyone else had this experience?

Do I have any hope

I'm taking blueprint (signed up after June) now...I hope it does miracles....

[Audio Technica Guy]

It happens.

Like I said in another thread, the main difference between practice tests and the real thing is that on the real thing, for many people, the only thing that comes out are habits. On practice tests, you can often think your way through a problem, people rarely do this on a real test. It doesn't matter if you abstractly know how to do a problem, if you haven't made doing it the right way a habit, you won't do that on the test. You've got to practice so much, that that just becomes the way you do it, even if you aren't really even thinking about the problem.

[Cornelius]

Yup, by 1 point. Although that's a 167, so I shouldn't complain too much, but it still blows.

[BrightLine]

Maybe this will be encouraging to you....

I scored exactly the same as my cold diagnostic and did much better on the 2nd shot. I wrote an addendum explaining my 1st score and my cycle played out as though I only had 1 score (I think)

[JoeFrosty]

Urgh I feel like $--t.........

Can't believe it....urgh

[rgndvo]

Went from 169 (cold diagnostic) to 167. But to be fair, the former was a December Curve....

[LSATPREPPER]

It happens.

Like I said in another thread, the main difference between practice tests and the real thing is that on the real thing, for many people, the only thing that comes out are habits. On practice tests, you can often think your way through a problem, people rarely do this on a real test. It doesn't matter if you abstractly know how to do a problem, if you haven't made doing it the right way a habit, you won't do that on the test. You've got to practice so much, that that just becomes the way you do it, even if you aren't really even thinking about the problem.

I'll second this (Diagnostic 155, Actual 166, PT AVERAGE 169 with many later PT 170+s)

The real thing is like a PT but its much blurrier. I remember so many of the questions I did from the PT but going through my disclosure from today I really don't remember most of the questions.

[JoeFrosty]

I'm currently working through Blueprint's course.... .Did anyone take BP along with Manhattan? I'm considering getting the games intensive self study for Manhattan since I totally blew the games for the LSAT (Games is typically my best or worst section depending on the PT...I haven't figured out a pattern yet)

[Ssushi]

165 Diagnostic
163 Actual.

Never scored below my diagnostic on like 20 practice tests and then i get this shit on test day.

[JoeFrosty]

165 Diagnostic
163 Actual.

Never scored below my diagnostic on like 20 practice tests and then i get this shit on test day.

I feel your pain SSushi... I suppose we have October to look forward to. Are you taking any prep course?

[Cornelius]

I don't know about everyone else, but I walked out not expecting to do much better than I did. Missed a few LR questions in my 2nd section that I should have gotten, but was otherwise cruising. Got to logic games, finished 1 & 2 pretty quick, saw cars and blanked. Wasted a few minutes, moved on to balls and finished that pretty easily, went back to cars and still just not processing it.

Then my focus just utterly fell apart, I never figured out the game and guessed on 4 (got 1 of them right) and wound up with -3 in LG from those 3 questions. Not devastating, but I was completely thrown off, exhausted, and never regained focus. I felt like I was rushing through the entire RC because of that, and wound up with a whopping -7, with -4 on Chopin.

My nerves were such that I wound up not really sleeping much the night before, eating much the day of, and I had a long, long drive to the test center. My advice to everyone else: control every other variable you can, which I failed to do, and realize that, sometimes, you really can chalk it up to just an awful day where everything seems to go the wrong way.

For my prep I was doing the earlier Prep Tests from the first couple LSAC books (mistake), but I had about ten straight 180's in the weeks leading up to test day. *Shrug*

[baconpuffs]

I'll echo the above. 165 cold diagnostic, 164 actual in June 2010. But I put in more effort and pulled a 171 this time around, so don't let it discourage you.

[KRog]

Deleted

[paulinaporizkova]

this thread makes me sad and this didn't even happen to me

[KevinP]

Hopefully this makes someone feel better.

Diagnostic 168.
Took Powerscore Virtual Course.
20 PT Average 170.
Final 12 PT Average 172.
Test Day 165.

Definitely not better. Worse, if anything. At least look at the bright side, you have another shot in October to kill it!

[Klinklang]

Not worse, but close! 162 cold, PT'd at 168, and had a 163 in June. May have another go at it in October.

[seancris]

I would think that you could attribute that kind of occurance to nerves, mostly. I took a Kaplan administration of PT 62 exactly two weeks before the real deal in June. It was my first test experience in a real testing situation (lecture hall, proctor, other test takers, etc.) and I knew that my family and friends would ask me about my score to gauge how well I was likely to do. For me it was a pressure packed situation similar to the real thing, and I was extremely nervous. I ended up scoring +3 from where I would imagine my CD would have been (never took anything truly cold), but the test was a disaster and I learned to address the nerves and other issues (timing, primarily) in the next two weeks. I scored +8 from my estimated CD on gameday which was an acceptable score for me.

Nerves and timing are issues that would've impacted me on gameday and dropped me down siginificantly if I hadn't identified them as problem areas two weeks prior. If you think that's your issue I think you can easily fix the problem.

[Ssushi]

165 Diagnostic
163 Actual.

Never scored below my diagnostic on like 20 practice tests and then i get this shit on test day.

I feel your pain SSushi... I suppose we have October to look forward to. Are you taking any prep course?

Yea it kinda sucks. I think im taking a testmasters course and redoing in october.

[crumpetsandtea]

lol, try cold 168, actual 168, retake 169. PT average 173. @ self.

[john1990]

Not quite, but i took my diagnostic when i was only 18
diagnostic-150
average-165
test day-158

i had RC last and decided to go all in and complete all 4 passages since i knew it was a bad test anyway (and SOMETIMES i can do it). Not on test day- 14/27
LR 38/51 and 20/23 LG is hardly acceptable
just a horrible result, and not the best curve either

ill be retaking in october

clerify- 20/23 is hardly acceptable, 38/51 is not

[bport hopeful]

Yup, by 1 point. Although that's a 167, so I shouldn't complain too much, but it still blows.

If a 168 is your cold diagnostic, please please please dont settle for a 167.

[berkeleykel06]

Cold diag--167
Actual--166
Retake, after PT average of 175...166

I win?

[JoeFrosty]

Cold diag--167
Actual--166
Retake, after PT average of 175...166

I win?

Damn berkely :\ Did you take a prep class between the two tests?

[berkeleykel06]

No, just read the Bibles and did prep tests. For some reason RC f'd me over on both exams, even though in PTs I was consistently -0 or -1.

[joebloe]

I went 1 point below my cold diag in Dec. '10. In retrospect I should have known by then to just cancel and delay a cycle. The sort of good part about it was I got my money back for the prep course I took.