I don't mean to make too much of this, but for a real lawyer, one strives to do (and be) the best. Really. The very, very best. Not just "good enough," or "that's silly," or "golly isn't this over yet?"
Ya know, I agree with this as a general statement. If the O/P really is trying to nail down a 180, then he is a fool to do anything other than EVERYTHING he can possibly do to nail down that 180. Good for him. I applaud everything about that.
However, a "real" lawyer? I'm struck by a quote by Mark Lanier who said that when he took the bar exam, if he passed by 1 point more than the minimum required, then he studied too much:
http://www.lanierlawfirm.com/attorneys/w_mark_lanier.htmMaybe he's not a real lawyer, but his verdict ($235 million) in the VIOXX case says otherwise.
I doubt he got a 180 on his LSAT (Or whatever the equivalent was at the time), and he certainly didn't attend HYS. He attended Texas Tech, a law school that I would probably have been admitted to if I had applied.
So, yeah, if your definition of a "real lawyer" is one who has the potential to end up on the Supreme Court or will nail a biglaw salary of $160K upon graduation, then yeah, you need a high LSAT (though nowhere near 180) and admission to an elite school.
However, if your definition of a "real lawyer" is a prosecutor in the DA's office, you can get there with less than perfect LSAT and gpa and a less than stellar law school.
If it matters as far as getting into a top law school, then heck, go for it.
I have a disagreement on the effect of practice and prep on what are essentially reading comprehension portions of the test, and my scores back it up. Those portions of the test were probably consistent with getting in the high 160s maybe low 170s.
I also know that I could have and should have prepped for the logic games, and my score, unfortunately, backs that up, too.
I'm not telling anybody to half-ass this thing. What I'm saying is that if you're not going to take the LSAT (and hence, not attend law school) because you're only doing an hour a day of prep, then I think that's a mistake.
Preparing is clearly preferrable to not-preparing.
However, like anything in life, there comes a point of diminishing returns. I think that point comes pretty quickly on reading comprehension. If, after four years of college, you need somebody to coach you on reading comprehension, then I sincerely doubt that an elite law school is in your future.
I think the point of diminishing returns comes much later on logic games. It's well worth spending time prepping for that because there are distinct strategies that an intelligent, literate person will not necessarily be aware of without somebody else helping them prepare.
Applying to law school, finishing law school, practicing the law, and basically any other significant endeavor in life will always boil down to managing your finite resources to attain your goal.
So, if you're saying work as hard as you can, do the best that you can, use all the resources at your disposal, I'm right there with you. Right on! Go for it.
However, if you're saying that you can't go to law school and be a real lawyer if you are only studying 1 hour a day for the LSAT, I respectfully disagree. I personally think I, and a whole lot of other people like me can/could get to something approximating their maximum potential if they just prep hard for the logic games portion and familiarize themselves with the format of the test.