**I once got a 9 on an exam and didn't even answer (not even guessed) exactly half the questions!** But the background on this is important!
Many, many years ago on the FM exam, they introduced a new textbook and a new required calculator (only the one calculator allowed). It was also when the SOA exam deducted 0.2 marks for every wrong answer to eliminate pure guessing ... so you didn't guess unless you could narrow it down to a couple of answers.
I remember looking up part way through the exam and seeing half the students literally having steam coming out of their ears -- I found out later that almost NO ONE practiced much with the new calculator and only a few bought the new textbook and so were struggling with almost every question. I had practiced with the new calculator and had used the new textbook.
Also, the very first question was ridiculously hard which killed a few more people who couldn't recover from that. Ended up answering precisely 10 out of 20 questions and thought well I'll try again next time.
Got my grades through the mail (before SOA started publishing stuff on internet). Got a freaking 9. Looked at it several times, turned it upside down to make sure I wasn't misreading it (6 is still a pass I reckoned!)
Moral of story that I learned: if you study hard, make sure to push right to the end of the exam no matter how brutal it feels. And practice like it's the real thing and make sure you know what the real thing really is!