building base mileage & confession

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Before I could start training for marathon I should build a mileage base. Base assures you’ve enough stamina to try such heavy and long term training. In simple words, ‘building base‘ is your ability to jog/run for certain distance, say 3-4 kms at a stretch any given time.
Now let me tell you my background: I’m a regular guy; I’m not an athlete. I wished to and used to take part in sports in my school and college only when I could get through, which happened rarely. I grew up in rural area of the country which has more Adivasi population, Adivasi people are natural athlete hence used to represent our school in inter-school sports competitions. During 8, 9, 10th grade, I was a cadet at NCC (National Cadet Corps) which helped me increase/build my stamina. Later in under-grad college, the only sports I could get through was football (soccer). In junior year I managed to become the captain of the class’ football team as well. I also did some heavy long treks and hikings during that period. Guess I was at my peak in terms of stamina. But it was before I crossed 20 😛 some 6-8 years ago!!
THINGS HAVE CHANGED, now. My current status is not at all impressive, in fact it’s pathetic to core. I’m sure I’ll get cramps even if I throw a ball today. The other day my legs are paining as I slept awkwardly… that must be due to lack of blood supply that night, but surely I’ve lost it. I dont remember the last time I played any sports, I played badminton & table tennis last year in October for a week for local annual competition. As I mentioned in my profile, I’m living like a zombie these days. I’ve home-office setup and my system is placed in dining room itself; I use same chair for dining table just move it 180 degrees (ouch! am I that bad?…. I confessed 🙁 ) So that’s my story!! But on positive note: I run occasionally; I’m not that fat & my friends say I look fit, always.
And what matters most is I’ve decided to change things and change things fast. Body building is in cards but I’d build the base first. I’ve already started my base-building and jogging thing. Also doing dumbbells.
You guys support me; I’ll update this place on regular basis; stay tuned and comment whenever possible.

Marathon training begins

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I’ve been thinking seriously to participate in next marathon run, happening in 2010 January at Mumbai. In past I promoted StanChart Mumbai Marathon and encourage my friends to participate since its first year. But I never could run in the event, although I trained myself for the day and registered myself in couple of ocassions.
This time I’ve thought to train for marathon systematically. So I’m seeking help (from internet obviously.) The Mumbai Marathon has some training schedule. But I’m gonna follow some other websites schedule and make some changes suitable for me. (still surfing and seeking, if you know any informative and worth recommending site please drop a line; I know there are plenty of them…)
I’d ocassionally write my schedule and updates. I might add marathon as a new category in the blog as well where all posts related to my marathon updates would be sorted.
Stay tuned. 8)

Introducing Sales evagelist Karl Goldfield

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I recently been introduced to (or been accidentally bumped to) Karl Goldfield’s blog and his video lessons about sales.
To confess I’ve been thinking of hiring some engineers and giving them sales training; while surfing around I encounter this wonderful blogs and videos which are specifically created for startup entrepreneurs. (perfect for me!)
And then, I’ve started following his lessons, but it was bit tedeous to keep the videos align and in series. so I’m embedding these three videos (which I’m gonna need ?) For my convenience yeah, so that I can have them on one page…
Part I Messaging: Magical 12 words
Part II Messaging: Converting words into Sentences
Part III Messaging: from sentences to stories

word of mouth ebook for grabs

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What I’m reading currently?
Well it’s not a regular book, it’s an e-book, yeah this is the first time I’m getting some success in reading an e-book.
Thats why they say “easy read”, I think the book is an easy read as I could read it; otherwise I’d made thousands of attempts reading several ebooks but I somehow never read more than 10 pages of any ebook.
Word of mouth Manual

As you can guess from its title the book is about viral marketing or below the line marketing/advertising The book is easy read, written is plain English (avoided jargons). I liked the tone of this book it has subtle humor which you’d enjoy if you know what exactly author wants to convey.

This is offset to my blog title & not at all related to GMAT, but as I hinted some time back I want to make this blog more general and want to write about other topics I like… (so I would gradually reduce the font size of GMAT phrases in tag cloud 😀 ) haha, that doesn’t mean I’m going to stop or reduce writing GMAT related articles, matter of fact it’s not going to get affected since I’ll still be using the proofread my essay services whenever I I am in a rush. I’d rather fill the gap between my articles and increase my posting frequency. Thats the point. … anyways enough of personal comments. I think I should add a ‘now reading’ category or tags now.

Actually I wanted to share it using Scribd, it’s ready preview feature so wouldn’t have to acutally download it. But they thought it to be inappropriate to upload such document so I had to upload it on my website server. It’s a shareware so feel free to distribute it to your network if you liked it.

gmat books reviews available now

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This blog post about recommended books was long overdue, I have been asked about books and material several times by GMAT students, so I thought, I should write a special article exclusively for it.

That page, for GMAT books recommendations and review is finally up; (yep, the same page you can access through nav bar above!!) Still there’re some more books I should review. I will do it once I get more time for this. Thanks for the patience.

I’d also write review for beyong GMAT phase (that is MBA admission, b-school research & life at b schools phase) There’re plenty of books out there which are worth reading even if you’re still at GMAT prep phase.

Stay tuned for more reviews 😉

Why to buy GMAT OG12? & how GMAT works?

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This is second part of the article. Part-I can be viewed here: When is the right time to take GMAT.

Before I explain the importance of OG12 I need to tell you how GMAT test works.

How GMAT adds new questions to their question bank & removes old questions, periodically.

Have you heard of experimental questions in GMAT? Around one quarter of GMAT questions you tackle in the test are experimental & they never get counted in your real GMAT score. They are present in both sections, verbal & quantitative and are placed randomly throughout the test. Yeah, but this is not important to us right now; our main concern is “why GMAC have them in the test when they are irreverent to the final score?”

Well! As they call it, they are experimental questions; they are untested and are brand new. To figure out the difficulty level of each of these questions, they experiment with them by adding them in current GMAT question pool. Based on response collected from GMAT test takers all across the world, questions are “tagged” with certain difficulty level. Once the difficulty level is identified these questions come in test as ‘real’ questions. (which then no more remain ‘experimental’).

The point is, questions in GMAT keep on changing but majority of questions remain in question bank for certain period. (In our checmical engineering terminology we call it space time 😉 ) Now you might realise the reason why you’re not allowed to retake the test immediately after your first (former) attempt. [hint! get the hint!!] (FYI, You need to wait for at least 30/31 days or something to retake it.)

In past when 11th edition just launched, I learned, test takers found quite a few questions from OG 11 in their real GMAT test …. same or similar set of questions. Although GMAT students can’t reveal the live questions they were certainly forunate to take the test during the period when OG was fresh and new. As time passed, test takers reported less questions or less similar questions in their real GMAT to official guide. It is therefore obvious to expect more similar questions in real GMAT these days when OG-12th edition is fresh-n-new.

So, what are you waiting for? Get the Official Guide 12th Edition now!

I must confess, this is series article & I drafted it in April 2009. But due to my erratic blogging frequency I didn’t publish it. I am fully aware that I should have posted it on OG-12th launch period but :sigh!: … anyways.

One more update is, official guide for verbal review & math review the two supplimentary books are about to be on stores in couple of months. Though I dont take them seriously, I just thought to inform you about it.

More about OG-12 & its review in next article <maybe> 😀

bbye!!

art of the start

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I think you all know Guy Kawasaki, if your interest lies in tech-startups. Guy Kawasaki is renowned VC and startup specialist in silicon valley, who had kept a blog called How to change the world & published the book The Art of the Start: The Time-Tested, Battle-Hardened Guide for Anyone Starting Anything
Following is the presentation he’d given at TiECon in 2006 about the book, being entrepreneur and startups in VC’s perspective.
I know it’s bit old video but I’m re-watching it for some inspiration!

GMAT promo codes, voucher. Whats the fuss?

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There’s been a lot of discussion going on about GMAT vouchers & promotional codes. And everyone seems to be clueless as no one exactly knows what’s this all about, neither they’re getting proper information from internet. But if it’s on official GMAT website then codes has to be there (somewhere floating around or only for some exclusive bunch of people). The reason for lack of information around the world wide web is this is a recent phenomena. It was not present earlier. Hence the post. 🙂

What is GMAT promotional & voucher code? where can I get it? How can I get it?

While registering a GMAT date at MBA.com when you check payment options you’d find two boxes at the bottom of the screen appear for GMAT promotional code & GMAT voucher.
1.] GMAT voucher can be obtained from your university’s financial aid office. You need to express your financial need & provide relevant documents to support what you claim. It’s your finacial aid office decides whether to avail the voucher to you or not.
GMAT voucher code is available & valid for selected nations or regions. (I’m not sure whether it’s available outside United States…)
2.] Secondly about GMAT promo code (promotional codes) these are nowhere to be seen. In my theory, if a certain company has partnered with GMAC to offer GMAT promotional code or discount, it should promote the promotional codes well; it should advertise the promotional codes in order to leverage the benefits of the partnership (or whatever.) So, to conclude I dont think there are any promotional codes out there (you do study Critical reasoning, dont you 😉 ). It’s may be the feature added (by web designer) they never used. (I vaguely remember that Kaplan might have such promo codes for their GMAT classes.)
But it’s a great feature to introduce. If GMAC hasn’t thought of use it yet, they should seriously think about it.

We, at Beat The GMAT, perhaps can use this promo codes for GMAT scholarship winners. I think it’s lot more safer, convenient and direct option to offer GMAT exam fees to winners than giving them ‘e-cash’ through paypal.

PS: I’ve figured out way to avail the GMAT voucher!