Hi guys!

I am soliciting an opinion on a practice strategy for a low-purple who are aspiring to become a mid-orange. I am pretty sure this kind of questions is very frequent and common among competitive programmer but I would like to just confirm your opinion to be sure. I read "A Way to Practice Competitive Programming" by Masataka Yoneda among other things. So, I know one way of getting there. But, I would like to know if there is a better recipe before I commit to doing something naive.

To get to orange from purple, is it SUFFICIENT to practice problems in rating ranging from 1900 to 2300?

My practice strategy has been focusing on all the problems that are below 1900 mostly, hoping to become a purple through solving problems fast. However, I have a feeling that I would hit a wall pretty quickly if I continue this recipe since the problems in division 1 are much harder.

Now that I finally became purple (after solving some thousands of problems in Codeforces and other platforms), I would like to know if my naive strategy of solving all problems in a particular rating range is enough to get me to the next rating color (from purple to orange, from orange to red, and so on).

I think this question is especially relevant to those who worked hard to get to orange from purple because, if it did not take a long time to get to orange color, I assume that you had a prior exposure to competitive programming in some other shape or form.

Those who had to train hard to earn the color change from purple to orange, what worked especially well for you guys?

I am looking for a genuine advice for me to get to the next level.

Thanks!