<p>I have my intro posted. Would anyone like to comment? Is it focused toward the prompt?</p>
<p>As the heat of the vindictive sun bombards my body while racing through the nebulous dust path, I disregard this irreconcilable force of nature and focus on one objective: to pass the runner in front of me. I am in a state that most people will only feel during severe sickness or in death. During this time, I have the ability to utilize a unique human endowment: choice. In this moment of great challenge, there are two things that can happen: the weak will abandon the endeavor, while the strong will drive themselves and push toward the finish line. Do I back away from the runners in front of me? No; I pass them.</p>
<p>Actually the runner should be in such a state of doped up self produced morphine that the mind has separated from the body and there is no feeling of pain and the mind perservers and drags the body along whether it likes it or not.</p>
<p>"As the heat of the vindictive sun bombards my body while racing through the nebulous dust path, I disregard this irreconcilable force of nature and focus on one objective"</p>
<p>For one, too many 50-dollar words for once sentence. Plus some of them seem a little misused (like "vindictive" in this case).</p>
<p>You shouldn't use passives like "there is/are" unless you have a large number of complex sentences preceding it.</p>
<p>You use too many colons in one paragraph.</p>
<p>There shouldn't be a semicolon after "no." Period, comma, or m-dash.</p>
<p>You might want to change "back away" to something else. That implies fear or intimidation, which isn't something that causes you to fall back in a race. What causes you to fall back is exhaustion.</p>
<p>Last, the last few sentences seem a little arrogant. "The weak" vs. "the strong" -- and how you so offhandedly choose to pass them, like it's a nice tea party you just decided to go to.</p>
<p>keep it simple and sweet... colleges would toss out your essay if you try too hard. frankly, no offense, i felt that you tried too hard to impress your readers. however, i did like how you described the heat. other than that i think that your essay is really good.</p>
<p>it does seem like ur forcing it too much
u dont need to color it up to make it sound good
and seriously, get rid of those thesaurus words. it makes ur paragraph too convoluted</p>
<p>The UC readers are looking for clear and to the point. They don't assign comp review points for big words; they don't especially care about some big creative build-up. In fact, most of the UC readers I've talked to have said they prefer when students cut to the chase and answer the prompt as directly as possible because it's easier for them to determine if the student deserves comprehensive review points. </p>
<p>So, my advice is to spend a bit more time thinking about the prompt -- what EXACTLY is the personal quality, talent, accomplishment, contribution that is most important to you to convey to a UC reader and how does it relate to the person you are? Then write your answer in as direct a manner as possible. Don't waste words on unnecessary scene-setting. Just answer the prompt.</p>
<p>This advice doesn't necessarily hold for essays for other schools, especially privates, who often appreciate a bit of well-done creativity (emphasis should always be on the WELL-DONE -- if you're not sure it's well done, the straight approach is almost always a better choice). Although keep in mind that if you were an admissions officer at a private school reading your 20th essay of the day, you'd probably appreciate clarity, directness, and an easy to understand point just like the UC readers do.</p>
<p>Seriously, it sounds better to use simple words and simple sentence structure in a college essay (or anything, in my opinion.) The way you wrote this does not sound genuine. Let your real voice pass through, that IS the point of college essays- not how many big words and semicolons you can use for dramatic effect.</p>
<p>Take out nebulous, vindictive, irreconciliable and so on, it doesn't create an image, it just sounds unnatural. </p>
<p>You've also used three colons almost right next to each other, which isn't good writing style. Mix up your sentence structure, some short, power sentences, and a few complex, but don't get caught up in it.</p>
<p>Also, I'd change "pass" at the end to something along the lines of keeping you running.</p>