Test taken: Thinking Skills Assessment (TSA) - both sections
Number of interviews: 2
Time between interviews: A couple of hours
Length of interviews: 1 hour
Online interview: No

I stayed overnight (for free) in college because I wanted to be well rested for my interview the next day. It was a student room, and the student who had been in there before going home for Christmas had written a note to say good luck. All interview candidates wait in a room to be called for their interview, so it's a good chance to chat with tea/biscuits etc provided. There are also current Cambridge students there who will take you to your interview, and you can chat with them.

The first interview was conducted in an office. I was sat on a sofa and wrote out my answers on a coffee table in front of me. There were two interviewers. They started with small talk, asking about where I was from and had I come up that morning etc. I was then asked a techical question about energy conservation. I initially mind blanked and said the first thing that came to my head without any proper calculation, which turned out to be a very stupid answer that broke all laws of physics! They helped me through the calculation to reach an end answer, and then asked a few more 'extension' questions to probe how well I understood the topic. One interviewer would ask questions while the other took notes. The second interviewer then asked me a very maths heavy question involving differentiation of logs, and sketching the resulting graphs. It ended up in complex numbers, though I'm still not sure how it got there!

The second interview again had two interviewers, with me doing calculations on a coffee table. The first question was very technical. I had no clue how to go about getting an answer and wasn't really able to apply their answers when the interviewer gave them to me. To this day, it's the worst I've ever performed in a technical interview question. The second question I did much better in. It involved integration. The same interviewer then asked about my '"chosen subject" (you get a few to pick from broadly corresponding to the different engineering disciplines of structural/mechanical etc). I chose renewable energy, and we talked about current affairs in this area. This is the chance for you to really show your interest in the subject, and also have a slightly less stressful chat with the interviewer. Every interviewer would ask you at the end if you have any questions for them. In my second interview, I was the last one of the day and we just ended up having a chat for a few minutes about his past students etc.

I practised questions on iwanttostudyengineering.com, as well as the TSA practice paper. I also had a couple of mock interviews arranged by my school, which were quite good for getting the hang of saying my reasoning as I worked out the answer to a question. This is really important, for the interviewer to be able to help you during the interview, so they can catch you if you get stuck, and it helps them to determine how easy you're finding the question.

The best advice is to use iwanttostudyengineering.com. It helps you to use your physics and maths knowledge in a more practical way than normal exam papers (where you tend to be able to rote learn a method for answering questions). In particular, it showed me how integration wasn't just a mathematical formula that you use to find the area under a graph, but something which can be applied to a huge number of different scenarios. It's also very good for introducing topics that the interviewer may assume has come up in A level but is not taught by your exam board.