is there a mistake in one of the explanations? for (A), last sentence says: But does (A) tell us why the new rush-hour speed is faster than the old one? No, it doesn’t explain the phenomenon at all.

Should it say "why the new rush-hour speed is slower than the old one"?

idk maybe my brain is a little squashed and i'm not processing the words right, but re-read the stim a few times to be sure

emma first of all you got this!! second of all, the overarching suggestion is (and this is gonna sound counter-intuitive given the time crunch you're feeling) to slow down. getting right answers is less about reading fast but about reading comprehensively and getting better at understanding + identifying patterns. doing too much / focusing on going too fast means you're likely bulldozing over building foundational skills. i was in a similar boat and started doing a slower/more methodical approach and jumped 10-14 points.

first thing is, if you haven't already, finish foundations.

second, don't worry just yet about timed drills. instead, do untimed drills and select the "show answer after each question" option. honestly an untimed drill of 10 questions just as (if not more) beneficial than 10 timed drills if you don't understand the patterns. here's what i've been doing (just a suggested approach, if you need structure inspo):

friday morning (same time every time): timed practice test. [and don't stress too much about not getting wrong answers as you do it -- let them come out in the wash. you want to see your mistakes so you can work on them].

saturday: day off, don't touch anything, don't think anything lsat related. go find a body of water and float around.

sunday: blind review friday's test. taking time to read every word. this is gonna sound time consuming, and it is, but it's good for you, this is the seat of improvements.

sunday - monday: review every wrong question, flagged question (even if i got them right), and wrong timed/right BR question, and honestly you could give yourself all day sunday on this. i will spend 15-20 minutes on a single question. here's how to structure this review: click the clean response, so you don't see your timed/BR answer[s]. you're going to try and answer this question again but at a snail's pace, and also try to suspend any pre-conceived ideas of what your initial answers were (this will help you too -- confirmation bias on the test will fuck you up. if you pick answer too quickly, you will convince yourself it's right). read the question stem, write down the question type. read the stim, underline the conclusion. ask yourself: are there gaps between the premises and conclusion? [if MSS] are there any notable inferences? write that shit down, doesn't matter if it's gonna serve you in the question hunting, this will just build instincts. if there are any conditionals, diagram. also doesn't matter if you need to or not, take it as an opp to practice diagraming (eventually it will become second nature). then, go to the answer choices one by one and write down in your journal why each is wrong. question every word!! show the right answer and answer to yourself/your journal why is it right (or why is it the best choice). this will feel like a lot of work and ya it is, but is so fruitful. a blind review/test review of the wrong questions is as much an opportunity to practice that question specifically and every single type of question! each question shares qualities with others, and practicing one SA question will also build skills for PSA, or MSS. underlining the conclusions of every question will build skills for MC. questioning if there are any crucial gaps between premises and conclusions will build skills for NA, PSA, RRE, SA etc. it's like walking through thigh-deep mud but your quads are gonna be rock solid when you come out the other side.

tuesday - thursday: drills, untimed. just build your base here. follow a similar structure as the blind review.

once you're getting 90-100% on these drills, add a few more questions, or an RC passage, or make them only 4-5 stars. start to hone in on one question type that you're struggling with at a time. if you're having a hard time with Strengthen/Weaken, then do drills of just those question types on tuesday/wednesday, and spend the day understanding the patterns and structure of these question types. then, bake them in to your thursday drills. the following week, focus on a different question type for that week, and intermittently add in S/W question types to your drills so you don't lose those skills. your time will improve because you will get better at identifying patterns.

rinse and repeat. <3

for questions like this, in terms of timing strategy, would you recommend that once we get the right answer we select it and move on? or is it worth checking all the others?

for question 4, couldn't we also take "must" as indicating a necessary condition? the lawgic breaks down the same as when we take "in order to" as a sufficient condition, but curious when one indicator trumps another.