My experience is not typical at all and I am not sure how useful it is gonna be, but just to say please persevere and never give up, it is so doable!!
I am an old IMG grad with previous home residency and experience, I have been doing research in the US for 3-4 years now.
Total preparation time : 1 month with a full time job, living with a wife (also doing the test) and 2 kids, I didn't take any time off from work, just the first day of exam as the second day was on a weekend.
Resources used : Uworld step 3 only, one round of 54% correct answers mostly subject wise and timed, the last 3rd was mixed, first aid one night before day 1, just refreshed antibiotics and some tables in micro. For Biostats, I relied on what is in uworld I even didn't launch the uworld biostats.
Gap between my step 2 ck and step 3: 9 months
Gap between day 1 and 2: 1 day
CCS resources: Uworld (only)
UWSA 2 (only): 188, 5 days before the exam (Imagine!), I still went to the exam because the first 3 blocks were good on this assessment only last block was bad so I knew it was just because I was tired that day, and I knew I could pass, and all what I needed was to pass.
Final score: 207 (more than I expected)
I literally Jumped 19 points up from UWSA 2, so it wasn't predictive for me at all!
First day was like step 1, a lot of biostats (6-8 questions per block), mechanisms of action, etc.. my feeling was acceptable.
Second day, the questions were so tricky, some you will recognize straight away and most you will be narrowing your choices between 2 uneasy choices. But in the CCS, I thought I was gonna fail, because 2 cases I could never solve, and I had some technical problems happening in other 3-4 cases, like suddenly patient is at home and I wanna return him back to clinic I click on ER instead loool etc, and some stuff like that. When I went out I wasn't too positive and I said to myself if I would fail I would be so close to pass, but thank God I passed and the trick worked for me.
Best of luck for every one.
