It's not unusual for people to find themselves 4-6 minutes behind about 10 questions in. In fact, I'd say most people are in this position...so the question is really just: what can you do about it? Love your chart. Here's what I think (some of which you already said).
On quant, 4 to 6 minutes is about 2 to 3 questions. First, I don't consider 2 minutes behind to be truly "behind"—you should have some variability throughout the test. (One key point though: it shouldn't always be 1-2 minutes behind. You should sometimes be 1-2 minutes ahead.)
So let's say that you're really 2 to 4 minutes behind, or about 1 to 2 questions.
The best way to minimize your losses is to save as much time as possible on as few questions as possible. So pick out the next 2 really hard* questions you see, and guess immediately. Don't even try to make an educated guess—just pick your favorite letter and move on.
*"Really hard" means really hard
for you. What drives you crazy? What are you likely to get wrong no matter what you do? Know this before you go in so that you can make these decisions.
Now, let's go back to this comment that I made earlier:
"One key point though: it shouldn't always be 1-2 minutes behind. You should sometimes be 1-2 minutes ahead."
Don't wait until you're already behind on time to take action. When you see something that you know drives you crazy, guess, even if you are already on time (or even a little ahead).
This has two positive benefits. First, you really are guessing on the ones that you're most likely to get wrong anyway, regardless of where they show up. And second, you aren't spending 3/4 of the section always feeling behind. That's super stress-inducing and it will affect your performance as you get later in the section (and the next section, verbal).
Re: your comment "keep trying unsuccessfully." You basically get one shot at a question. You come up with a plan. You try to execute that plan. If that plan doesn't work, do not go back to the beginning and try a different plan. Move on. See this:
https://www.manhattanprep.com/gmat/blog ... -the-gmat/Yes, you might not actually be "worse" at DS. It might just be because you're sacrificing DS to spend extra time on PS. That balance definitely has to be fixed. Half the battle is just recognizing what you're doing so that you can make better decisions next time. The other half is training yourself to make those better decisions—which the article up above will help you with.
Re: Geo, it's not a super common area on the test. You may want to study only things that are likely to show up on easier questions and then automatically bail on weird / unusual ones—3D, shapes within shapes, unusual shapes like trapezoids or hexagons, etc. Don't even study them—just know that you're not going to do them in the first place.
Re: verbal, when you make mistakes (or narrow to 2 and then have to guess / aren't totally sure), do this analysis:
1) why was the wrong answer so tempting? why did it look like it might be right? (be as explicit as possible; also, now you know this is not a good reason to pick an answer)
2) why was it actually wrong? what specific words indicate that it is wrong and how did I overlook those clues the first time?
3) why did the right answer seem wrong? what made it so tempting to cross off the right answer? why were those things actually okay; what was my error in thinking that they were wrong? (also, now you know that this is not a good reason to eliminate an answer)
4) why was it actually right?
Re: your buckets. Exponents, roots, and ratios are common. They're worth concerted study time.
Consecutive integers, sets, and geometry in general are less common. Decide what you can reasonably learn how to do with these, but some forms of these should be in bucket 3—If I see something like this, I'm just going to guess fast (as you've already listed with a couple of geometry areas).
RC: I've made the same kinds of mistakes you're making. My rule for specific questions is that I have to physically touch the "proof" sentence in the passage before I pick my answer. That forces me to check it and to be careful that I'm not reading more into it than is actually there.
Your final questions:
— See the ROI article above re: a better understanding of when to skip (and when to try for a while, then bail)—basically, how to make decisions as you work your way through problems. This same article will also help you with quant timing in general.
— SC it sounds like you don't feel super comfortable with the general approach we describe in our book. If that's because you feel you haven't really tried to get good at all of the individual steps of that approach, then that's your next task. If, on the other hand, you've tried but that approach just isn't working for you, can you tell me whether it works for you sometimes but not others? Or whether it never works for you?
If the former is the case, then dig in and really start to try this process on easy questions—low-numbered OGs that you've already done before, that kind of thing. Just drill the actual process. Here's an article that talks more about the First Glance:
https://www.manhattanprep.com/gmat/blog ... st-glance/If the latter is the case, it might be that the process is okay for you when the question is relatively straightforward, but it breaks down when the question gets a lot harder, there's a really long underline, the answer choices change a lot, etc. In that case, try this:
https://www.manhattanprep.com/gmat/blog ... ce-part-1/Note: what's described in that article takes time to learn and time to implement during the test. You wouldn't use it on every SC; you'd use it only on the SCs that are harder / giving you more trouble. You'd use the basic process / approach when the question isn't as hard for you.
Let me know if you have any questions on the above—and let me know how all of this works once you've tried it out.
