You've been sitting between 165 and 167 for six weeks. Your blind- review score is 172. Under time, you keep picking the trap answer on the last three LR questions, the ones you'd get right with another ninety seconds. You already know the rules. You've read the explanations. Another flashcard deck isn't going to move the number. What's costing you the last five points on the way to a 170 on the LSAT isn't content, it's a small set of habits, and they're the same ones every high scorer built on the way up. Here's what they are and how to build them.
Under 160, more content solves the problem. Between 165 and 170, more content does almost nothing, you already know the rules. What's costing you the last five points is a small number of very repeatable mistakes, and time you don't have on the last ten questions of each section.
Break down your last three PrepTests by question type. You will find that your misses cluster in two or three specific patterns, for many students, that's some combination of Assumption, Parallel Reasoning, and the hardest inference questions in RC. That cluster is your whole game.
The Five Habits are what separate a 165 from a 172. They are not content. They are execution, mechanical, coachable, and repeatable under time.
Before you look at the choices, say, in your own words, what the right answer needs to do. On assumption and flaw questions, this habit alone collapses "trap answer that sounds right" from a real threat into a distraction you glance at and eliminate.
Before you check the answer key, go back to every question you were less than 100% certain about and re-do it untimed. Then compare your timed answer, your blind-review answer, and the credited answer. The three-way gap is a map of your remaining weaknesses. Students who skip blind review plateau, every single time.
On LR, the first 10 questions should take about 10 minutes. The last 15 take 25. If you're spending 90 seconds on question 3 because you want to be sure, you're giving away points on question 24. Time is the resource, not the enemy, spend it where the hard questions live.
Keep a running document of the specific traps you keep falling for , "mistook necessary for sufficient," "picked the answer that summarized the premise instead of the conclusion," "chose the extreme-language answer under time pressure." Two months of that journal will surface three or four patterns that explain most of your misses. Fix those, break 170.
Top scorers don't try to memorize the passage. They read for what the author is doing in each paragraph, setting up, contrasting, qualifying, concluding, and let the details live in the passage until a question sends them back. Reading for structure is what makes RC feel slower and score higher.
Notice what's not on that list: new content, new books, another prep company's course. At this level, the answer is never another resource. It's tighter execution of the ones you already have.
Roughly 71, 73 out of ~75 scored questions, depending on the form. That's 2, 4 misses across the entire test. The scale is compressed at the top on purpose.
Fewer than you'd think, typically 12, 20, all reviewed to the point where they can defend the credited answer AND explain why each wrong answer is wrong. Volume without that depth stalls the score.
If you can reach 165 with honest effort, 170 is a matter of pattern recognition and pacing, mechanical, coachable. If you're below 155 after two months, close the fundamentals gap first; 170 talk is premature.
No. Many high scorers self-study. A tutor's job at this level isn't teaching content, it's finding the two or three habits invisible to you that cost you the last five points. If you can diagnose your own misses honestly, you don't need one.
A free 15-minute call with a 170+ scorer. No pitch, a real diagnosis of what's costing you the last five points.
Diagnose the last five points →Last updated July 10, 2026 · by the theLSATguru team