The bar exam is a marathon, not a sprint!

This sounds trite and you may have heard this before, but it is very true. Bar preparation is a cumulative, steady exercise. In addition, the marathon analogy is especially appropriate and dear to our hearts here in Boston.

All marathoners pace themselves to complete the great distance required. Just as some runners are better starters than finishers, or have more difficulty with hilly stretches than others, you must plan and pace your bar preparation, and anticipate the topics and subjects that don't know as well, or perhaps never quite completely mastered during law school. You will need to budget extra time for these topics, just as marathoners dedicate more training time to their trouble areas.

Marathoners often hit plateaus of distance or time during their training. They must work hard and practice to overcome these. While you generally need to master one subject before beginning the next, you will hit plateaus associated with difficult topics in each subject. One way to overcome these is to perform a morning daily review of the prior concepts that give you trouble before beginning any new material.

Marathoners typically run their own race without following the crowd, and eliminate distractions to achieve their goal. You must do the same, whether in your bar exam study, or in life, for that matter. While locking yourself in a room for 6-8 weeks without contact from friends and family is an unnecessary extreme, setting limits and boundaries that minimize interruptions and outside commitments help you focus. It is far better to have three or four hours of uninterrupted, focused study than to have eight or nine hours of on-again, off-again, distracted study. Think quality, not quantity.

Just as marathoners accept water at watering stations, you must refresh yourself through exercise, proper sleep, and planned downtime with friends. Just as marathoners stick to water or juice for refreshment, you need to limit or avoid alcohol intake during your study. You can party after the exam.

And, the vast majority of marathoners are grateful to just cross the finish line. The analogy for the bar exam is that you do not need a perfect score to cross the finish line. Most jurisdictions use a combined score between the MBE/MPT/UBE and essay performance, where excellence in the MBE, for example, can offset a weaker essay performance, and vice versa. Moreover; in many jurisdictions, the equivalent of a C or even a D passing grade is enough to make it to the finish line.