Las Vegas recently hosted an event to decide the Rubik’s Cube world champion – turns out, it’s now a 17 year old kid from Melbourne named Feliks Zemdegs. Watch his crazy fingers at work.
That’s a result of 7.32 seconds. Well done to the new champ!
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Comments
13 responses to “Skills: The New Rubik’s Cube Champ Is Aussie”
Wasn’t this posted already?
It definitely was on Gizmodo
Must’ve seen it there then
Wasn’t the old one an Aussie too? Some 14 year old?
Dayum, his movement looks almost robotic.
Amazing… I wish I could plan ahead that far…
Plan 7.32 seconds ahead?
Hahahahaha
Not sure if you’re serious, here, or just aren’t aware of the context. I’m talking about planning three or four moves ahead during a solve. Keeping track of, say, 6 of those pieces (the other edges and corners during the first two layers), planning their position at every point between every move during those 7 seconds. Knowing, at every moment during the solve, with absolute certainty, what the next move I was going to make would be. Consciously manipulating those moves to get an easy OLL/PLL combo on the last layer. In a speed-solve, 7 seconds is an eternity.
I can get about 40 sec average, but that also includes a quick recheck of the state of some parts of the cube between some major moves. The problem lies in being able to simultaneously see multiple opportunities, choosing the best option and integrating its solution in an optimal manner (ie. setting up the solve of one corner-edge pair as a part of solving the previous pair). Essentially, planning one major move ahead, while solving another part of the cube, and not messing up that plan in the process. I tip my hat to anyone that can do that – it’s what I’d consider the major hurdle to speed-solving.
Feliks makes that kind of lookahead appear very easy. I wish I could do it half as well as he can…
Insane. My best is like 1:30 🙁
nice, mine’s still going, i’ll tell ya when i’m done.
That’s was quicker than taking the stickers off.
I hate the way they judge rubik’s cube speedruns. It should be timed from the moment you see the cube, not from the moment you touch it. Otherwise, it’s just about whose fingers move the quickest and/or who has the best algorithm, not who is the quickest at calculation.