Real life has never sprung a random topic on me at 7:30 AM and required me to have a handwritten essay written 25 minutes later. This essay, in a wildly naive attempt to limit the subjective value of writing, was judged largely on "coherency".

We had computers back in 2005, and almost all students typed their school essays out, but the college board hadn't got with it. Since it took me so long to handwrite things, I didn't have a moment to think about the topic. Instead, my strategy was to prepare an extremely formulaic essay, and then furiously write as fast as I could. Hey, it worked, except I was already stressed and tired by the end of the essay with over 3 hours of test to go.

To backtrack a bit, I've always assumed the SAT to be about aptitude for reasoning, not about throwing "real life" challenges at you.