An Olympics-Inspired GMAT Data Sufficiency Question
In honor of Gabby Douglas’ gold medal win, as well as the U.S. women’s gymnastics team’s all-around gold medal win, here is an Olympics-inspired Data Sufficiency problem.
A particular gymnastics tournament awards a gold, a silver, and a bronze medal in each of four events: Floor, Beam, Bars, and Vault. A platinum Best All-Around medal is awarded to the competitor who gains the most points from winning the other medals: 3 points for gold, 2 points for silver, 1 point for bronze. If McKenzie won the Best All-Around medal, and no one can win more than one medal in any of the four events, did she win at least one gold medal?
- All of the gold, silver, and bronze medals were won by fewer than six competitors, including McKenzie
- Another competitor in the tournament has 8 points.
(A) Statement (1) ALONE is sufficient, but statement (2) alone is not sufficient.
(B) Statement (2) ALONE is sufficient, but statement (1) alone is not sufficient.
(C) BOTH statements TOGETHER are sufficient, but NEITHER statement ALONE is sufficient.
(D) EACH statement ALONE is sufficient.
(E) Statements (1) and (2) TOGETHER are NOT sufficient.
Choose your answer before proceeding!
First, you may ask, How could someone win the All-Around without winning a single gold medal?
Easy “ just imagine that McKenzie won ALL of the silver medals (8 points), and that no one else won more than one medal (the other medals are won by 8 separate people), so each person who has a gold has just 3 points, and each person who has a bronze has just 1 point.
GMAT Grammar in Real Life: No Hawking, No Loitering, No Keep Fit
My friend Zev Lowe (ESADE MBA ’09) took this photo in Kumasi, Ghana.
Did the sign make you laugh? Why would many speakers of English find it amusing?
Probably because it violates the principle of grammatical parallelism, thus creating unintentional hilarity.
We learn about parallelism in class 3 of our 9-session GMAT class. In short, parallelism is (or should be) present in any construction that puts two or more things the same way.
CORRECT: The company balanced its budget, hired a new janitor, and laid off two executives who wouldn’t stop stealing staplers.
In this sentence, balanced, hired, and laid off are all past tense verbs, nicely arranged in a list with an “and” before the last item. (Note that the comma before the “and” is somewhat controversial in American English. The GMAT tends to use a comma before the last item in a list, but you are not tested on this issue.)
GMAT Grammar in Real Life: Misplaced Modifiers
As a GMAT instructor, I’m always in the right frame of mind to notice grammatical errors in the world around us.
(One might also say that, as a GMAT instructor, I’m also the sort of nerd who takes iPhone pictures of these grammatical errors.)
What’s wrong with this sign?
If you don’t see the problem, take a step back and imagine that you are a Martian with little knowledge of human culture. Might you misunderstand this sign?
The problem is related to the modifier “that endangers workers.” (We cover Modifiers extensively in session 6 of our nine-week course.)
What noun is “that endangers workers” supposed to be modifying? Unsafe conditions. What noun is it actually modifying? Work site.