Gilles' Rubik's Cube blog

After a very long delay, I finally uploaded pictures of this wonderful World Championship which took place in Budapest earlier this year (October 2007).

You can find them here : link

Unfortunately this time I will not post an extensive report. I hope pictures are enough.

I had a great time and I hope to meet all of you very soon !!!

Thursday 13 September

Reaching Wadowice overland is quite a big trip. Moreover you need good transportation vehicles. In this case, the travel would be done (once again) with Arnaud van Galen and his wonderful red Seat Ibiza (and of course its special accelerator system :D). This time Lars Vandenbergh and Clément Gallet and I would join him for the trip. First I went to pick Clément at the Brussels Midi train station from which we went to Brussels Airport. We had to wait for 2 hours so we ordered some pizza and started cubing. I showed him my new puzzle which is the “Rubik’s Delta Ball”. It is some sort of Impossiball but without the possibility to turn one layer completely. Later we were joined by Lars and we cubed some more until Arnaud arrived at the airport. We then quickly drove up to Rotterdam were a special task was waiting for us: (speed) building a bed! As his house is nearly empty, he got a new bed from Ikea which we had to build so that everyone had a bed to sleep on. After founding out that I was not a “speedscrewer”, we called Clément and Lars so they could show their skills in this particular domain. After that we ate some food and then went to bed immediately, the big trip was still to come…

Friday 14 September

Rotterdam -> Wadowice: This might seem quite simple but as you will see, many adventures can happen on a basic trip like this. We decided to wake up at 5 in the morning so that we could theoretically reach Wadowice around 7 in the evening and by doing so meeting other cubers in the evening. We left quite quickly at around 5:30 and started driving east. I took the first shift and realized that the lights were not working properly. In the Netherlands this was not a big problem as the roads are quite well lightened but it later we would have problems with that as you will see. We reached the German boarder at around 7 AM, ate breakfast around Hannover at 9 AM, had some lunch in Berlin and then went to the Polish border. The trip in Germany was quite straightforward and besides some traffic jams, it went very well. As Arnaud and I switched from the driving seat to the passenger seat every 2 hours or 200 kilometers, we could both practice cubing or take part in activities with Clément and Lars.
When we reached the Polish border, there was a passport control, as expected. Our map then showed that we would have to drive for around 70 kilometers on a “red road”, meaning not a highway but still quite a big road. Indeed, it was a big road but we quickly found out why it did not qualify for the highway category. The quality of that road was so bad that it was practically impossible to do anything. Drinking a bottle of water was impossible unless half of the water would be spilled all over you. Along the road, there were also some strange shops: people were selling live chickens and statues (not live statues of course ^^). I wonder how their business could survive there. After about 40 minutes of suffer and pain in the back, a proper highway would appear. As with all Eastern European highways, their quality is exceptional. The road is just perfect but more importantly there are very few cars and trucks on it which makes it very comfortable to drive on. I stopped driving before Katowice where Arnaud would take the driving steer for that last 200 kilometers, supposedly in about 2 hours…
The first problem we encountered was that we were running out of gasoline. As usual, when you need it, there are no gas stations around to help you. So we decided to get out of the highway and search for one in one of cities around. We asked for help to local people. Indeed, Polish people are very nice and really try to help you. Unfortunately, they try to help you in Polish. Among other things, this led us to a nearly abandoned gas station. Finally we reached one and could go for the last part of our trip. So we went back on the highway and drove a few more kilometers until we reached our exit. If you are familiar with Michelin maps, you know that yellow roads are already quite small. Now what happens if you want to drive 30 kilometers on “white” Polish roads? The answer is simple: you get lost. And by lost, I mean really lost. Those 30 kilometers not only turned into nearly 200 kilometers but they also provided us with the opportunity to visit a train museum, a very strange road with many S turns and also a bridge which turned out to be a boat system to cross a small river (which was closed at the time we were there otherwise it would have been fun to do it). Finally we decided to get back on the highway and use a longer way to reach Wadowice but with only big roads. Once we reached Wadowice, we thought our adventures would end there but no. We found Ron van Bruchem who was waiting for us at a restaurant (he came out of it to show us where it was), in response we used the bumper and the big lights. This was not counting on the police car which was right at the corner and promptly arrested us for bad driving. This “bad driving” took place in the last 50 meters of our 1400 kilometers trip. Too bad… After eating some Gyros we went to our hotel and Arnaud and I inherited a suite instead of a room (but for the same price) but this is the reward for the drivers.  We then went to bed as it was nearly 1 in the morning and had to wake up again early to be on time at the competition.

Saturday 15 September 2007

The registration was open from 8 to 9 in the morning so we decided to arrive around 8:30 there. Before that we had a very tasteful breakfast at our hotel where we met Ron, Ton, Grada and Peter Ooms and David Jones. They decided to go to the venue before us. When we went there we found David on the way because he could not find the venue. As Lars and I had already been there the year before it was easy for us to lead the group. Otherwise, I have to admit that the venue is quite hard to find especially if you can’t read or speak Polish. When we arrived there we proceeded with the registration and got our special free T-shirt. Quickly after, we went into the competition hall where a proper opening ceremony would take place. That ceremony had already impressed me the year before but this year it was almost comparable to an “Olympic Games opening ceremony”. Among other things, 2 groups of dancers performed a dance in front of us, the Polish national anthem was played by a full orchestra and a very nice flag was carried by 6 different people and was slowly hung (see videos).
Afterwards the competition started. 76 competitors took part in the first event: the 3x3 1st round. As only 24 of them would be allowed to go and compete in the 2nd round, it was important to do a top performance during those 3 attempts that each competitor received. As for me I hit 15.05 which is quite good and gave me the 5th place, well enough to go over to the next round. However, others were less fortunate. I am particularly thinking about Clément Gallet who came all the way from Lyon in the South of France to Wadowice and would only be allowed to solve 3 times in the 3x3. (The time to beat to be in the 2nd round was 18.96 seconds.)
Immediately afterwards all the fewest moves (FM) competitors had to gather and follow the organizers into another part of the school were the competition was held. The FM competition turned out to be very popular with 26 people taking part in it so we were separated in 2 different class rooms. This event really looked as if we were going to sit for an exam as each of us had to sit at one different table and that sheets and pens were already prepared for us. Most surprisingly 21 out of the 26 proposed solutions were successful and 8 of them were sub 40 (moves). Unfortunately I lost the record for the “longest fewest moves solution”: someone reached 76 moves whereas my record was 75. However I do not recommend anyone to try anything longer as it would make judges very upset to verify a 100 or 200 move solution. 77 might be acceptable though.
Then there was the 2x2 event where a completely crazy new world record was set: 3.92 seconds average of 5 by Lukasz Cialon. On a more funny point of view (depending which point of view of course), Arnaud van Galen who had won the Lyon Open in that category 2 weeks before only managed to rank 20th with an average of 5 of nearly 11 seconds. This also means that his times almost doubled during that time. Let’s see if he is still able double his times for the World Championship in Budapest. ^^
Then we come to the 5x5 1st round where every competitor was given the opportunity to solve that cube twice. On the way from the Netherlands, Clément and Arnaud were talking about this puzzle since both of them practiced a little on it and I thought where much faster than me. I was very surprised that I was able to solve it far under 3 minutes even though I had never practiced it in the weeks before. I even improved my best time by 2 seconds (2:33.66) and got to beat Arnaud even with his new edge pairing method (which is very good by the way). I have no idea what went particularly well for me during those solves but now I want to reach sub 2:30 (which I have already done once during the French Championship earlier this year but this was unofficial unfortunately). Clément Gallet was once again excluded from the final by just 1 place (8 competitors could proceed to the final).
After the lunch we received in the school (very good by the way), we went on with the 4x4 1st round. Besides the new world record average done by Mátyás Kuti (58.15 seconds), the most important moment of this competition was certainly Lars Vandenbergh who finally broke 1 minute on a 4x4 solve. But breaking might not be appropriate: exploding it might better. Indeed, 52.41 seconds is quite below 1 minute. ^^ Congratulations Lars!
Then the big event for me took place: the 3x3 one-handed competition. For some reason, I was called among the last cubers to go and solve the cube twice. This gave me the opportunity to see how my main competitors were doing (as you may know, in this competition the results are recorded after each solve and available for everyone who is in the room thanks to a beamer or in the world thanks to the live internet feeds). All I had to do was beat 30 seconds. This thought should have removed any stress from me as I literally never solve the cube in more than 30 seconds one-handed. However the stress overwhelmed me and I got a 26.56 seconds solve. Afterwards, I was feeling a bit better as I was certain to be in the final but this only helped me to get a 24.53 seconds solve. I was not very happy with these results but at least I was in the final.
Afterwards the “quick event”, namely the Magic, Master Magic and the Clock events took place. You don’t get to prepare yourself very well for that kind of events as it goes so quickly. However I managed to practice briefly the Magic and reached a reasonable average. Now looking at the results, I realize than only consistency allowed me to be on the podium (3rd place) because a lot of competitors reached times below 1.30 seconds but had DNF’s, among them the famous Mátyás Kuti. As for the clock, Mátyás did another demonstration of his “powers” and broke another world record.
Then the Square-1 event took place. Everybody knew that it would be a tough competition given the incredible level of some Polish competitors. Indeed, great results took place. However, it must be said that during this event all competitors did not get the same scrambles apparently. Indeed, one of the scrambles I had was a Square-1 which was already in the cube shape. I think the new world record single solve was done on this scramble but after asking Lars if he had had it or not, he said he did not. This shows that the Square-1 is a hard puzzle to scramble. However, it is good that other competitors than the fastest one got these scrambles. I think it must be a mistake of one of the scramblers, nothing else. I hope Lars will get one of these “cube Square-1” someday soon.
The Pyraminx was another event where Polish competitors showed all their skills. Another world record was broken but it happened so fast that I cannot say much about this event unfortunately.
As for the Megaminx, it was the first time that I saw the time limits properly enforced. Indeed, Arnaud for example was stopped during his solve because the time limit was over. Even if this seems a little harsh, I think it is good for the sustainability of the competitions. Otherwise anybody could go and solve the puzzle without respecting the time limits.
Now the time schedule predicted that the 3x3 Blindfolded event should have taken place at 17:45, which already very late. Indeed, everyone would be tired by that time. Unfortunately, this event took place at 19:00! So everybody was completely tired… Nonetheless and surprisingly, good results were obtained by the competitors. As for me, I was in a competition with Clément for the 4th place. Indeed, only 4 competitors were allowed to go in the final. We knew that Mátyás would have made it, that Kai Jiptner was also very fast (around 2 minutes) and that there must some Polish competitors below who could solve the cube blindfolded below 3 minutes. After the 1st solve, I was only 5th so I had to put extra effort for the 2nd solve. Luckily, the scramble was quite easy to memorize (very good for 3 cycles method solvers as a few corners only had to be oriented) but not good for me as I use the regular Pochmann method. Somehow I managed to solve it in 2 minutes and 40 seconds (my average at home being 2 minutes and 30 seconds) and I qualified for the final. I was extremely happy with this result and Clément was also happy as he would have something to do on Sunday because he did not qualify for anything else.
Finally some guys solved cubes with their feet (no comment :D) and we set off for dinner in a nice restaurant where a special room was prepared for our group (Belgian, Dutch, German and Hungarian cubers). We had a very nice evening eating, drinking, sharing tips and competing in various funny events. At nearly midnight we went to our room because the day with all the finals was still to come. ^^

Sunday 16 September 2007

After another nice breakfast at hour hotel we went once again to the venue. Only Arnaud had qualified for the 3x3 Fewest Moves event which was the first one of the day. This time it was held in the main hall at the back of it so it was still quite away from all the other competitors and the spectators. After 30 minutes the 3x3 semi-final started which probably did not make it easy for the FM competitors as it of course made more noise in the room. The level of this semi-final was extremely high and even with an average of 17.06, I was not so sure to be able to enter the final. Fortunately I finished 9th and I promised myself to do better in the final. Afterwards the Fewest Moves competitors finished and Arnaud showed us his incredible “nearly solution” in 20 moves. Indeed, after 20 moves his cube was solved besides 2 twisted corners. In total, his solution had 33 moves, enough to equal the best performance of the 1st round but Zbigniew improved his best solution with a 31-move solution. Arnaud was still very happy with all his solutions and his “block-building skills”. Moreover, I brought him a second national record! Afterwards, an event about which I really have not much to say: the Pyraminx. It was once again so fast. Somehow Arnaud had qualified for the final of this event but everybody else was extremely fast and Grzegorz Luczyna broke the WR with a sub 6 seconds average of 5. Quite fast. ^^
The 2x2 was also a demonstration of fast solves. The limit was quite high in the first round so only really fast competitors were allowed to compete in the final. But I have to say I did not focus a lot on that event so once again I do not have much to say. I was personally practicing some OH cubing.
The 5x5 final was, as expected, a Mátyás Kuti event. Personally we were looking forward seeing Lars breaking the other limit he wants to break: 2 minutes on the 5x5. Unfortunately for him he did not do it. At the same time I was practicing 3x3 OH very hard. I did not want to miss the opportunity to break 20 seconds for one solve during this championship.
Then the very big event for me too place: the 3x3 OH final. As usual, I was extremely stressed. I was shaking so much that not only my hand and my arm were shaking: my entire body was shaking. As you can expect, these are not very good conditions to do good results. The 2 first solves were quite OK given this condition. Then I got a bit lucky on the 3rd solve: while finishing F2L I controlled the orientation of the last layer edges and luckily all corners were oriented. A J-Perm then showed me it was time for to break 20 seconds once again. Even though it was lucky, I was extremely happy with this result. I thought I was now free of stress but the next solve proved the opposite and the very last solve was just awful. It would have been very lucky to win the competition under these circumstances and indeed Mátyás beat me by just 0.21 seconds on average. Since he practices and is also quite fast (indeed very fast when it comes to unofficial times, just like me), he deserved his victory. I will have to make sure that this does not happen again in the near future (at the World Championship for example ;-)).
Then we went for the lunch meal of the day at the school refectory. When we came back the 4x4 event started. I expected this to be another Mátyás Kuti event. In the end it was still true but I was relatively surprised by the “small” difference in average between him and Lars: just 5 seconds. This time there were not many extremely fast times (52.xx for example ^^) but it was still an impressive event. Congratulations Mátyás.
The 3x3 Blindfolded final was once again without any surprise as for its winner. The real competition would be for the other places. Mátyás first solve was extremely impressive. Clément secured a good solve with a time of more than 3 minutes but I and Rafal Guzewicw did not. We were now in a big competition. Unfortunately, the conditions would not turn out to be extremely good. Mátyás decided to do a One-Handed Blindfolded solve. As his time was just over 2 minutes, the public went completely crazy. There was just too much noise. I got really angry and shouted the French equivalent of “Shut up!” but nothing happened. All my memorization was gone and I had to restart everything because of this %£#$[§ audience who did not understand the principle of being quiet for a blindfolded event. As I was still angry, it was impossible for me to have a successful solve. Rafal, I suspect for the same reasons, did not get a good solve either. I was extremely angry and disappointed as I always beat 3 minutes at home with successful solves.
I decided to use all this anger for the 3x3 Final which took place immediately afterwards. My first solve was quite bad (18 seconds). Then I had 2 good solves: 15.61 and 14.77. I knew I could something good this time. Unfortunately my 4th time proved otherwise (another 18.xx) but my last solve showed me that I was on the way to become faster as I hit 14.91. I had never hit twice sub 15 in any previous official average. Moreover, I had just improved my best 3x3 average. So all in all, it was not a so bad experience. Next time, I will try to do it really well without any 18.xx times.
I knew Ron was “on fire”. Indeed he reached the 3rd place which is a good result given the extremely competitive level in Poland. Lars was also good and finished at the 5th place.
Then everything was dismantled and put in place for the ceremony. Last year’s winner’s ceremony was the best I ever had. This year’s ceremony proved also to be a must. First everyone who would not be called for a trophy or a podium later received a certificate. This took quite a bit of time but it certainly is important so that everyone felt that he or she was a real part of the competition and somehow “a winner”. Then came the podiums for all categories. As in very important competitions, there were several officials with whom you had to shake hands, receive gifts and of course a medal. The medals were extremely refined, certainly the nicest I have seen until now. During the ceremony and for each podium there were brought by hostess who carried a pillow on which the pedal was disposed. This made the ceremony look extremely official. The only thing that I regret and that actually happened the year before was a small trumpet-like music that made you feel like a Roman emperor when you stepped on the podium. However, this was replaced by fumes for the 3x3 podium. Every competitor who took part in the final was invited to stand next to the podium and the fumes provided a memorable memory (does this wording makes any sense? anyway :p).
Afterwards we started greeting everyone and saying goodbye. Then Marek Kurcyus gave me as a gift something I had until then only seen on some pictures: a fully functional 2x2x6 “cube” (“tower” may be more appropriate). I was extremely happy with this gift. I promised that I would send him something at least as great as that in the future (if you read this Marek, I already have some ideas ^^). Then he left and I went back to the group of Dutch Cubers (and Clément of course). We started to try to solve the puzzle which looked quite complicated at first sight. We were then invited to eat dinner at the school and we all went again in the kitchen/eating room where we did some team solves and exchanged some more tips and experiences with other cubers. We even tried to team-solve the 2x2x6 but this turned out to be impossible as the puzzle was completely new to everyone sitting around the table.
Then we left the venue and headed back to our hotel where we would spend some time before going back to the center where we would meet the Hungarian team at a bar-restaurant. Before that we went to the car to put all the chocolate we had won that day. In total, the 4 of us had won nearly 20 kilos of chocolate bars! We also tried to fix the lights of the car but unfortunately we could not fix the problem. Later, the evening was once again a great moment as I really enjoy that kind of meetings around a table eating or drinking good stuff and spending the time with fellow cubers.
Later in the evening we said good-bye and I poked Mátyás once again for beating him in the 3x3 event. ^^
We headed off again to our hotel and went quickly to sleep as another 1250 km road-trip was waiting for the next day.

Monday 17 September 2007

Around 7 o’clock in the morning we had our last breakfast and met David Jones once again. We then tried to put everything in the car (which turned out to be quite a challenge given the amount of chocolate we had won ^^). After this “puzzle-like challenge”, we headed off for The Netherlands. We decided to do the safe way (meaning longer but better roads) east to Krakow and then west to Germany and The Netherlands. We faced some traffic jams right at the beginning. Fortunately a car entertained us by trying to overtake the entire traffic jam by driving in the grass in the middle of the highway. Unfortunately there was a hole between the road and the grass so the car nearly fell in it but fortunately managed to get back on the road without any damage. After that we started driving on the highway. We stopped at a gas station where we decided to spend all our remaining Zlotys (Polish currency). The total amount we had left was 50 and without doing any kind of calculation we ended up with a sum of 49.xx zlotys. Another lucky case of life. ^^ We were then surprised to see that the bad road we had experienced on the way to Wadowice had an extremely better quality on the side we were driving on to go back home. This was quite a relief as we had suffered from pain in the back and impossibility to do almost anything on the way there.
In Germany we experienced the same road works and traffic jams that exist there. We also discovered at a gas station that women receive special treatment in parking as the picture shows: (Translation: Park place for women :D :D).
Clément had enough time to make up a method to solve the 2x2x6 tower blindfolded. After a few attempts he succeeded! (See the videos).
All these adventures delayed us in our schedule and we decided to drop at Erik Akkersdijk’s place to visit him and eat something there. It was also a good moment but as it was quite late and that we were quite tired (moreover we did not have lights for the car), we decided to leave 1 hour later and drove back to Rotterdam. Most of us (except Arnaud who was driving) slept during that part of the trip. We arrived at around 1 AM.
The next morning we woke up very early and took a train at 7 AM (meaning roughly 5 hours of sleep after this super week-end) back to Belgium and to France for Clément.

Pictures


All you need for 15-hour car journey. ^^


In case of traffic jams :D.


Somewhere in Poland, we visited this train museum while we were lost. :D :D



Glad to be in our hotel room... :)


The orchestra who played the music for the opening ceremony. Very good !!


The competition area.


The competition is now open... (just like the Olympic Games have the fire, the Polish Open has a speicla flag :))


Lars solving a big cube (I hope :D)


Arnaud...not yet successful :-(


Did I drink too much ??


Lars and Clément team-solving 2-gen scrambles.


At the restaurant on Saturday evening.


It's never too late to practice...even when you are very tired ^^


Nice face Clément ! (me and Lars on the right ;-))


Oliver, me and Istvan


The 3x3 finalists (and Winner: Piotr Kozaka)


The 3x3 finalists getting a lung cancer :D :D


Arnaud the super-star dedicacing posters


Clément trying to solve the 2x2x6 puzzle


Looks nice but...where are we going to put our luggages ?? :D :D


Kacper, Robert, Matyas, Oliver, Gilles, Lars, Clement, Istvan and Bertalan at the pub on Sunday evening


Definitely enough chocolate bars for 4 people :p.


Lars: Where are we ??? :D :D


Bye bye Poland !!


Let's get home quickly !!! (done in Germany ;-))


Welcome to Germany !!


I saw so many of these that I had to take a picture :p


Women have special treatment in some German parkings :p :p

___
I want to thank everyone for this great competition and all the memories I will keep of this event.
Thanks and see you soon !

Report

Friday 31 August

On Friday we were going to drive all the way from Belgium up to Lyon in the south of France. I was first going to meet Lars in Leuven and then go by train to Brussels Airport where Arnaud would meet us and then we would leave. During this quite short trip in comparison with our previous trip to Czech Republic we, as you can guess, solved a lot of cubes and also discovered a great singer: Luther Vandross. In Arnaud's car, we found a CD with the Greatest Hits of Luther Vandross. We started to listen to it but even though these were its greatest hits, we had never heard any of them. :D :D
After some time, Arnaud said "Oh I have already heard this one somewhere". Then Lars said "Yes, that's because the CD is starting again !" :D :D
Finally we reached Lyon and asked Clement to come and help us because we could not find the parking he indicated us.

In the evening we met a lot of other cubes and went to a restaurant where we had some hamburgers (no no, we did not go to the Mc Donalds :D). That was quite a good evening.
Afterwards we went back to Clement's place where we prepared some stuff for the championship until after 1 o'clock and then I headed to my bed which was in the kitchen. :D :D

Saturday 1 September

The competition was being held in luxury hotel in the center of Lyon. As usual in these kind of places, the lighting of the room was extremely good. After the set up of the room, we launched the competition.
For once, there were no tables in the room, only chairs. I usually consider it better when there are tables so that you can set yourself at one place and display all your puzzles. However, the configuration of the day (only chairs) turned out to prove more convenient given the small size of the room. Moreover it allows more contacts as your chair is usually occupied by someone else when you go away form it, even for a short period of time.
Among all the results that happened that day, the 2nd sub10 solve ever done by Edouard was one of the highlights. Fortunately other good results happened, among them:
- 2 sub 19 solve in the OH competition (by Rama and me) - a new ER average in the OH competition - a nice sub2 average by Frédérick Badie - a nice attempt for 9 cubes blindfolded by Clément Gallet.

In the evening, after having brought back all the stuff to Clément's place, we went back in the center to grab some food and more importantly find a place with good lighting. After walking for about 15-20 minutes, we finally decided to go to the Quick as it is usually the only place with enough tables and good light. ^^

I personally find this kind of competition ("cube-only events") quite good because it feels more competitive than a competition with all events. However, I quite like to solve some Magics too. ^^
For now, let's just practice for the Polish Open in 2 weeks !! :D

Pictures


A quite good solve if you ask me. :D


Lyon is a very beautiful city. Especially in the evening !


An interesting way to display 9 cubes ^^


"Cube girls" - There was a strong feminine presence for once.


Ever heard of Rama's "Killer Instinct" ? I think it is pretty clear on this picture of the 3x3 OH podium.


The best guys in the 3x3 in Lyon.


The human timer, very easy to use and very handy when you want to time yourself and walk in a street at the same time ! :D


A group of cubers (Joël, Arnaud, Antoine, Rama, Thibaut, Clément, Jean-Louis, Marya, Ton, Lars)

Thank you everyone !!


EDIT
Here is the video of Edouard's 9.90 second solve: .avi (2 MB)

Last Sunday a cube meeting in Rotterdam was held at Arnaud's place.

To make a long story short, lots of cubers from Belgium and The Netherlands were present.
We held an unofficial competition and the results can be found here.
I recorded some solves from the OH competition and I compiled them into a video which you can download here (50 MB, .wmv).
Below is a group picture with cubers who were there. Unfortunately some were already gone and so everyone is not on this picture. :s
Sorry !

EDIT: Here are the results of this competition.

2x2x2
1. Erik Akkersdijk: 6.31, 4.68, 5.44, 4.47, 5.59 = 5.24
2. Joël van Noort: 7.63, 7.29, 5.83, 7.18, 5.93 = 6.8
3. Lars Vandenbergh: 8.42, 7.61, 8.13, 8.42, 6.12 = 8.05
4. Gilles van den Peereboom: 8.15, 8.46, 8.47, 14.35, 7.16 = 8.36
5. Rama Temmink: 11.25, 10.31, 6.08, 7.43, 10.33 = 9.36
6. Arnaud van Galen: 12.56, 9.3, 11.11, 9.29, 10.23 = 10.21
7. Ron van Bruchem: 11.53, 13.64, 13.5, 9.04, 7.47 = 11.36
8. Jaap Scherphuis: 30.49, 17.88, 15.45, 14.52, 20.48 = 17.94
9. Hans van der Zijden: 36.46, 10.43, 30.38, 18.51, 30.19 = 26.36
10. Daniël Hop: 27.02, 39.9, 22.75, 32.27, 35.27 = 31.52
11. Michael Fung: 24.7, 28.08, DNF, DNS, DNS = DNF

3x3x3
1. Joël van Noort: 15.06, 15.88, 15.49, 15.03, 13.65 = 15.19
2. Erik Akkersdijk: 18.13, 13.06, 14.71, 18, 16.08 = 16.26
3. Ron van Bruchem: 16.66, 15.45, 16.17, 18.01, 17.26 = 16.70
4. Lars Vandenbergh: 16.75, 17.71, 40.97, 16.5, 14.81 = 16.99
5. Rama Temmink: 16.9, 18.61, 20.28, 16.17, 18.45 = 17.99
6. Gilles van den Peereboom: 22.26, 17.28, 18.64, 17.05, 18.27 = 18.06
7. Sander Ooms: 16.93, 21.32, 20.09, 22.58, 21.72 = 21.04
8. Ton Dennenbroek: 25.52, 25.49, 22.78, 16.86, 23.28 = 23.85
9. Michael Fung: 25.75, 20.94, 31.3, 37.59, 23.75 = 26.93
10. Hans van der Zijden: 29.73, 31.21, 37.97, 32.35, 25.86 = 31.10
11. Arnaud van Galen: 25.44, 26.633, 34.25, 42.11, 33.78 = 31.55
12. Jaap Scherphuis: 36.34, 32.53, 36.61, 35.13, 49.36 = 36.03
13. Maria Oey: 46.56, 95.26, 46.05, 49.44, 56.53 = 50.84

3x3x3_oh
1. Rama Temmink: 25.47, 21.94, 19.1, 18.4, 27.31 = 22.17
2. Gilles van den Peereboom: 25.47, 25.15, 24.49, 24.04, 22.69 = 24.56
3. Erik Akkersdijk: 37.52, 26.27, 35.01, 27.65, 35.89 = 32.85
4. Joël van Noort: 32.16, 44.66, 23.97, 35.21, 37.5 = 34.96
5. Arnaud van Galen: 52.69, 48.35, 52.8, 54.61, 52.01 = 52.5
6. Ron van Bruchem: 55.29, 60.83, 48.73, 52.24, 74.62 = 56.12
7. Hans van der Zijden: 210.03, 213.43, 200.28, DNF, 90.02 = 207.91

4x4x4
1. Erik Akkersdijk: 1:13.02, 1:11.22, 1:10.09, 1:17.06, DNF = 1:13.77
2. Ron van Bruchem: 1:20.33, 1:50.25, 1:22.47, 1:09.87, 1:04.65 = 1:17.56
3. Rama Temmink: 1:46.68, 1:20.60, 1:24.49, 1:17.11, 1:14.09 = 1:20.73
4. Michael Fung: 1:17.37, 1:19.88, 1:07.09, 1:25.37, 2:15.47 = 1:20.87
5. Joël van Noort: 1:29.80, 1:17.68, 1:37.47, 1:25.38, 3:03.47 = 1:30.88
6. Lars Vandenbergh: 1:35.84, 1:11.37, 1:29.74, 1:30.01, 2:39.93 = 1:31.86
7. Gilles van den Peereboom: 1:44.76, 1:22.84, 1:19.34, 1:30.46, 1:50.75 = 1:32.69
8. Arnaud van Galen: 1:24.53, 1:59.05, 1:54.55, 1:31.11, 1:39.01 = 1:41.56
9. Sander Ooms: 1:24.64, 1:43.45, 1:38.19, 1:43.58, 1:44.43 = 1:41.74
10. Ton Dennenbroek: 2:14.22, 2:06.83, 2:25.40, 1:56.65, 2:09.22 = 2:10.09

5x5x5
1. Joël van Noort: 2:24.49, 2:27.48, 1:53.34, 1:54.10, 2:51.26 = 2:15.36
2. Michael Fung: 2:57.53, 2:32.35, 2:39.92, 2:26.03, 2:17.25 = 2:32.77
3. Lars Vandenbergh: 3:10.37, 2:29.62, 2:44.48, 2:45.78, 2:40.28 = 2:43.51
4. Sander Ooms: 3:03.25, 2:54.30, 3:07.89, 3:18.98, 3:01.72 = 3:04.29
5. Rama Temmink: 2:23.94, 2:50.07, 2:30.34, DNS, DNS = DNF

3x3x3_bf
1. Hans van der Zijden: 9:10.22
2. Arnaud van Galen: 14:17.99
3. Gilles van den Peereboom: DNF
3. Joël van Noort: DNF
3. Ton Dennenbroek: DNF
3. Erik Akkersdijk: DNF
3. Rama Temmink: DNF

Source: Arnaud - www.speedsolving.com

All you need for 6-hour train journey.


A very efficient Guiding system that plans to make you do a U-Turn nearly 500 kms away ! (Thanks Annie-Annie ! :D)


Enjoying a meal on a German High-Way with Arnaud, Erik and Rama


Welcome to Czech Republic


Poor room # 1 (with Arnaud)


Poor room # 2 (with Erik)


5 cubes, 5 minutes. This is more than enough for Mátyás!


No, Josef can't believe it. :D


Arnaud showing his skills


The cube is solved. Oups, he had his eyes closed. :D


Here is THE winner !


Me and a picture of me being used for Czech Open propaganda
(Thank you Joël for this picture)


This group is too fast to be taken in picture. :D :D
Thanks everyone for this wonderful competition !

PS: For full size pictures, please e-mail me.

Report by Gilles van den Peerebom

Friday 13 July 2007
I had arrived the day before at Erik’s Akkersdijk place by train (a 6-hour journey) in the Netherlands. We had spent the evening cubing and preparing ourselves for what would turn out to be a very good championship.
So on Friday we had to travel 800 kms by car with Arnaud van Galen and Rama Temmink. Travelling by car is usually boring, but travelling by car with 4 cubers in it is totally different. We literally sit an entire day in a car but when we arrived, I felt like we had just left home. During our trip we had enjoyed German Highways and their absence of speed limits (I reassure you, you can’t drive fast for a very long moment as there are always ‘staus’ or works). We also met the largest group of Harley Davidson motorbikes we had ever seen. There were like 300 of them at the minimum and according to Rama the leader was wearing red devil-like horns on his helmet and had blood paint all over his jacket. We also enjoyed the nice advice of the “Annie-Annie� guiding system that had planned 500 kms away to do a U-turn. This was quite funny as it very often advised us to do U-turns or had to recalculate everything if we just stopped on the highway for a small break.
When we arrived at 10 o’clock in the evening we went to the ‘Arena’ which is the location of the championship (and many others including Chess, Bridge and Backgammon). We met Ton, Mátyás Kuti, István Kocza and lots of other cubers. Unfortunately the place was closing and we had to leave quickly.
So we went to pick our room at the hostel. The hostel was very cheap but as it is said ‘you get what you pay for’. So we could not complain about the very poor quality of the room. It turned out that I slept better there than at a Mercure Hotel in Bielefeld (where I stayed for the German Open 2007). And according to Arnaud, the same thing happened to him with comparison to another ‘cube hotel experiment’.
In the evening we remained in the lobby to cube and meet other cubers. In the end, we stayed up quite late showing our skills to 3 German Chess players. This was quite fun as we could consider each other as crazy in our respective fields. At about 2 o’clock in the morning, we decided it was time to get a bit of sleep before the big competition of the week-end.

Saturday 14 July
On Saturday morning we had to register ourselves for the competition. I cannot say this was the worst registration ever since I have been to Czech Open 2006 so I knew what to expect but this times it was very bad because there were queues. Indeed, we had to register first for the general Czech Open competition (which includes other puzzles and games), then to the office number 3 we had do fill in some forms for the accommodation, then number 4 would compute the total amount of money we had to pay and finally at office 5 we would pay. But afterwards we had to register again for the Rubik’s competition but that was much faster since we only had to confirm which event we wanted to compete in.
After all this which lasted easily over 45 minutes, we could prepare ourselves for the first event: the 4x4 combined final. I was happy to be allowed to do an entire average and at the same time improve my best official average by a little less than 1 second. My goal for this is to reach a sub 1:30 average, no more than that. As for the 3x3 First round, I was quite happy with my times but for some reason I was completely certain to make it to the final. It was quite a shock for when I realized that I was the last one allowed to go and compete in the final. But the result was there, so that was not a big problem.
Time slipped by very quickly and after a horrible lunch (including nearly swallowing an horrifyingly big mosquito hidden in my orange juice glass), the main event for was about to happen: 3x3 One-Handed. For the past days I had practiced a mental technique that was supposed to allow me to keep cool and control of myself in stressful situation. I have to say that it was quite a disaster. The more I wanted to keep cool, the more stressed and the worse were my times. As usual in these situations, luck was there to help me not to ruin everything. Indeed, it was the first time that I had 2 PLL-skips in the same average of 5 in a competition. It helped me keep the first time quite good (22.xx seconds) and prevent me from a catastrophe on the last one (26.xx seconds). However, it was not good enough to get to the first place. After long minutes of waiting for the results, Rama was awarded the first place for the One-Handed competition by a small difference of 0.15 seconds in average. I have to say that I find it better that he wins, and that for a couple of reasons. First of all, he did great (usually normal and bad cases) on his solves. And secondly (and more importantly for me), this will push me harder to train more for the next competition (probably Lyon Open 2007 on the 1st of September). Anyway, I was quite happy since I was still on the podium and furthermore ahead of Mátyás who is showing incredible improvements in this category.
Finally I just would like to mention that a special TV crew came all the way from Japan just to film the OH event. That was pretty nice.
A lot less nice was my performance on Czech Television. They wanted to film a race between the 3 best OH cubers at the competition so I, Rama and Mátyás sat behind stackmats and raced each other for just one solve. The scramble was of course the same for each of us. The result was astonishing: 22.58 for Rama, 22.9x for Mátyás and 23.09 for me ! So now I look like a very bad OH cuber to the entire Czech population. :p Afterwards Rama had to do a rehearse of his solve but he admitted that he could not do it because he did not remember it at all (thanks to various mistakes). Even though I lost (once again), this was pretty funny too.
Afterwards there was the 5x5. As I had not practiced much, all I expected was to have around 3 minutes times and I was quite happy (again :p) to hit sub 3 minutes twice. However, these times are not good anymore if you want to do an average.
Then the 3x3 Blindfolded came. I knew I was not as good as I once were but I expected at least to be able to solve one of these 2 cubes. I DNFed both of them though one was pretty close to the solution with just 2 corners twisted and 2 edges flipped.
For the 3x3 Final, all I wanted was not to finish last. It started well with a 13.84 time. The second was also very good in the 14’s but unfortunately I received a 2 seconds penalty. All other solves were average (in the 17 seconds) for me so I had a final average of 17.21 which is still my 4th best official average and moreover I finished 7th.
After the competition we first had the winner’s ceremony (in which Mátyás was called every time if I remember correctly). I received a nice silver medal (the new ones with a cube on the front).
Then we went back to our hotels to pick out bath suits which some of us would use later in the evening at a large swimming-pool party. But first we went to eat in a restaurant in the center and besides learning the Thisselweight method, one of the highlights was when Arnaud asked for some soda to the waiter and then his answer was a wonderful “No!�. We all burst out laugh. That was quite wonderful.
Afterwards and finally we reached the swimming were me, Arnaud, Thomas and Josef had nice swim. We even found a very cool swimming pool that was built above the ground so that there were windows. We all thought about making under water cubing videos but we planned to do it the next evening when we would come back. We also discovered that in Czech, when you enter a swimming pool, you have to have your wallet with you to be able to pay for slide rides.
We finally reached our hostel again and I, Arnaud, Erik and Petra had a beer and a pool game in the bar inside the hostel. At 2o’clock, we hit our beds.

Sunday 15 July
This 2nd and last day of competition started nicely with a good breakfast from a gas station (where most of the people had breakfast). I always find that weird. Anyway, we reached the venue just after 9 o’clock and some people were already there. Indeed, most of the “multiple blindfolded cubers� were already warming up. Watching that, I decided to compete too and to try just 2 cubes to get a time. (I have already solved 2 cubes but my time remains unknown lol.) Before I could compete, Mátyás had a go with 5 cubes and to the amazement of most of the people present; he solved them under 10 minutes on a stack mat. That was very amazing but that would not be the only incredible he would yield today. Arnaud was also competing in this event and for the first time ever, he had a successful solve in a blindfolded event! This means that until now he had always failed all his “one cube blindfolded� attempts but he succeeded with 2 cubes! Moreover, his time turned out to be the Dutch Record and in some way a World Record for an attempt of 2 cubes blindfolded. He was quite happy with it and lot of people (including me) congratulated him warmly.
Directly after this, Mátyás had an attempt at the 4x4 Blindfolded. After just 1 minute and 30 seconds of memorization, he put on his blindfold and started solving. It was incredible to watch it. Immediately (or almost immediately), he had a 5x5 Blindfolded attempt. I was joking with Thomas about after how much time he would put on his blindfold. I had bet on 2 minutes and 30 seconds. I turned out not to be too far away from the reality since he just needed 2 minutes and 40 seconds to memorize his 5x5 and start solving it. I think the only disappointing fact about this is that he did not manage to solve it entirely within the 10 minutes time frame that a stack mat can measure. Indeed, he just took 10 minutes and 5 seconds. How incredible.
After this came the Megaminx for which I had to scramble. So I do not have much to say about this except that I was quite happy every time a score sheet came back without the puzzle because the solver exceeded the time limit. :p
For the Magic, I knew I had no chance of winning. So I just went for the 2nd place but I did not get it. I averaged just above the 1.4x mark and XXX hit 1.37 so I ended up to be 3rd. Anyway, it is not that bad. Afterwards I judged Mátyás attempt. I have to say it is hard to be a judge of him in that discipline because you barely have the time to write down the time on the score sheet that he had already finished another attempt. Crazy.
During the lunch time, we decided to take part in the Fewest Moves competition. Since I had learned that the Thislewaite method can be optimal for solving the cube with a very limited number of moves, I decided to give it a try. After about 30 minutes, I decided to stop and check my solution. I turned out to have just done the worst and longest solution than anyone else in an official Fewest Moves competition. 75 moves!! And I have to confide you something, I was lucky to skip a step which would have easily added at the least 20 moves. :p Now I think I will just stick with Fridrich and insertions.
We then proceeded to the afternoon events. We started with the clock where I was happy to finish 2nd given my very low level of practice. I might want to try and improve the NR record average of 12.32 some day.
As for the other events, I had only one attempt in the Square-1 which turned out to be very bad since it took me more than 1 minute to take it back into a cube shape. Fortunately for me, Arnaud did worse than I did so I did not finish last in this event. :p I did not compete in the Pyraminx, I was merely a judge. I find the fast solvers quite impressive. But I do not think this is an event for me.
Finally there was the 2x2. We had incredible new world records (just guess who did them). Personally I was happy with my results but just a bit sad because I exactly hit my best previous average. I was hoping to get closer to 8 seconds.
To close this competition there was another winner’s ceremony and once again, Mátyás broke the bank. In this competition he received 10 of these new golden medals plus 2 of silver and 2 of bronze. I merely have 1 golden (from a previous championship), 2 silver and 1 bronzen medal. But he is very proud of it. I wish him all the best for his future competitions.
Once again, we left the venue and we went to our respective hotels to pick our bath suits. Afterwards we went to another restaurant where we actually stayed a while. Among great discussions and cube races, a few memories will remain in my head for a long time. Firstly, Erik asked the waiter if his pizza was hand-made. The waiter could not answer better than saying “Ananas !�. So funny again. I think all Czech waiters have to go to a school where they learn how to make clients laugh. :p Finally when Joël came back from the restrooms, he said “Gilles, you are not going to believe this. In the toilet, there is a poster with a picture of you!�. We all rushed in the toilets to see that little wonder. In fact, it turned out that I appeared on one of the promo pictures of this year’s competition because they used pictures of last year’s competition. I hope next year we will all have the chance to appear on posters in Czech’s restaurants toilets!
To finish the evening, we went to the swimming pool but unfortunately it was closed so we all headed to a bar where we player some baby-foot and darts. That was a wonderful way to end this championship.

Monday 16 July
For our final day in Czech Republic, we (I, Arnaud, Erik and Rama) wanted to buy some T-Shirts from the event. So we went back to the venue and to our biggest surprise we met István and Mátyás once again. We also checked again the results together but we did not stay long since we had a long road.
During that long day, we had various challenges such as breaking our record speed (only if the road conditions were safe of course) or trying to get around ‘staus’. We finally arrived late in The Netherlands.
The next day I would take the train back to Belgium.

As a simple conclusion, I just want to say that I had a lot of fun during this championship and that I want to go back there next year. Thanks Arnaud, Erik, Rama, Thomas, Lars, Josef, Mátyás, István and everyone else for making this championship a wonderful experience for me. See you all soon!

Hi guys,

I have recently found the solved state for the Magic Chess sold by cube4you.

Previsously (since last Tuesday actually), I could solve it but it involved irregular moves. After some patience, I found a solution that only involved regular and nice and smart and beautiful and etc moves.
I am very happy with it since it is the first "magic puzzle" I solve on my own.

My best time is about 34 seconds. I would like to break 30 seconds with this puzzle.
Here is a video of my solution: Magic Chess - 37.07 seconds (7.0 MB)

Now I will describe my method here.
I actually found that in order to solve it easily using the very last flips you can see at the end of the video, all tiles have to be rotated by 180° iin comparison with the start position. So my solution is mainly composed of 2 steps, each one rotating each tile by 90°. When everything is rotated, I proceed to some flips to come to the solved state.

I know other people already found a solution but I never saw it.

Please leave me any comment if you have.