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Future Cuber

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Well your F2L pairs is about as good as a sub14 cuber. And I wonder if you accounted for recognition time in OLL and PLL as that can take seconds for some people pushing you up to 20 seconds. If you decide to isolate practice for cross do cross+1 because you want to practice the transition. Since your F2L pairs is sub 14 level though I will just set a goal of 14 for every other step and so

cross+1 3.43
F2L pairs 7.00
OLL (no inspection) 2.31
PLL (no inspection) 3.01

are the ideals for you to balance out everything. You seem to meet the OLL and PLL requirements but I have a feeling that if you time without inspecting the cube first it will go over. Also it seems the cross is your biggest weakness if the OLL and PLL stuff is without inspection since you should be doing the cross and a pair in much less time.

So learn some better cross solutions. http://www.cubesolv.es/ pick your favorite cuber and study their crosses until you pick up some new ideas and practice cross+1 or just full solves. Sometimes they will have a solution that is too advanced for you but just try your best to understand and pick something up from each cross solution.

The way I do it is I will take the ideal for each step and practice until my best avg 100 is under the ideal and when that is the case for each step I do full solves until I break that barrier. When focusing on a new step watch youtube videos and learn as many new things about that step as you can and practice a lot (1 hour a day is nice enough to make great progress over time). I don't always like doing full solves so this suits me but find a way that makes practicing fun for you and you will improve but know your weaknesses and don't avoid them or they will hold you back. You came here for F2L pair advice yet your F2L pairs are the best part of your solve to an extreme. I was the same way I liked practicing the pairs and it was because I hated the cross so I avoided it in practice. It wasn't until I started focusing on weaknesses that I began to appreciate the cross and started making real improvements.

Yea Spot on .... i didnt count the inspection time for my LL and Btw do all cubers pass this state of cubing
I hated my cross ALOT than pops generally i time my self starting from 1 st f2l pair
its high time i beging loving my cross

Thnx for this useful info
 

jeff081692

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Yea Spot on .... i didnt count the inspection time for my LL and Btw do all cubers pass this state of cubing
I hated my cross ALOT than pops generally i time my self starting from 1 st f2l pair
its high time i beging loving my cross

Thnx for this useful info

It's very common for people to focus on what they are good at but if you want to be as good as possible then it's important to focus weaknesses. So as long as you understand that you can go far. And I'm not sure what you mean by pass this state of cubing. If it's the breakdowns I described then it's based on the percentage of each step of the fastest cubers and can easily be modified to set goals for any barrier and it's generally an accurate range of what you would expect for any cuber. But it's not always followed exactly.
 

Future Cuber

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It's very common for people to focus on what they are good at but if you want to be as good as possible then it's important to focus weaknesses. So as long as you understand that you can go far. And I'm not sure what you mean by pass this state of cubing. If it's the breakdowns I described then it's based on the percentage of each step of the fastest cubers and can easily be modified to set goals for any barrier and it's generally an accurate range of what you would expect for any cuber. But it's not always followed exactly.

you see feliks, mats, lau ....fast cubers probalby like all stages in CFOP
and i dont
i meant this stage
anyway your info was really helpful
 
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jeff081692

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you see feliks, mats, lau ....fast cubers probalby like all stages in CFOP
and i dont
i meant this stage
anyway your info was really helpful

Oh well Feliks in particular doesn't really drill steps he just does full solves so he probably likes the full experience and has shown what's possible with that method of practice. Many cubers get fast this way by practicing everything at once. Alex on the other hand is someone who I believe practiced techniques individually at times when he saw weaknesses. He used to do 500 LSE solves and 40 CMLL time attacks or something a day for a period of time and would consolidate that knowledge with full solves later or do a few full solves but focus mainly on technique.

The main point though is that the best in any field practice things that they might not necessarily like because it is important for improvement. And when you get better at something you start to like it more.
 
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Future Cuber

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Oh well Feliks in particular doesn't really drill steps he just does full solves so he probably likes the full experience and has shown what's possible with that method of practice. Many cubers get fast this way by practicing everything at once. Alex on the other hand is someone who I believe practiced techniques individually at times when he saw weaknesses. He used to do 500 LSE solves and 40 CMLL time attacks or something a day for a period of time and would consolidate that knowledge with full solves later or do a few full solves but focus mainly on technique.

The main point though is that the best in any field practice things that they might not necessarily like because it is important for improvement. And when you get better at something you start to like it more.

inspiring words
but i really meant FAST not fat
srry
 

Note

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Look Ahead... Learning to insert pairs from different angles....Learning tricky cases... What order should I be learning all of this?(And did I forget any other important F2L tricks?)
 

Hypocrism

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..And should the algs be learned as if I were learning PLLs/OLLs? (Sometimes I feel like I ask too many questions.. ._.)

F2L isn't learnt with algorithms-it's learnt intuitively with extensive practice. Just keep doing solves, you'll notice patterns, and come to know the cases and their solution by sight even if you haven't brute memorized an algorithm for the case.

Don't worry about asking questions, that's what the forum is for!
 

confusedcuber

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I have a few nooby F2L questions if someone wouldn't mind, bear in mind i haven't started look ahead yet.

1. How do people handle 'edge in a slot (but not necessarily the correct slot) and corner in U face with white not on top'? I've struggled to find anyone that explains this and haven't got a particularly good way myself (i move the corner behind the edge, with the white facing outward, and then (with the edge closest to me) do either R U' R' or R U R depending on orientation) ...my way takes a while to get right to work for me because there's a lot of things to do for it to work.

2. When doing any unpaired F2L pair, what order do you do things? I spot corner, spot edge, pair them, then look where they need to be inserted and insert. But am i better to note which slot it needs to go into before i pair them so I can insert straight away?

3. (not strictly F2l..but close enough) when people say 'go slow/avoid pauses/work to metronome etc.' does that apply to last layer as well? Or are you just best turning as fast as you can for last layer?

Thanks.
 

TDM

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I have a few nooby F2L questions if someone wouldn't mind, bear in mind i haven't started look ahead yet.

1. How do people handle 'edge in a slot (but not necessarily the correct slot) and corner in U face with white not on top'? I've struggled to find anyone that explains this and haven't got a particularly good way myself (i move the corner behind the edge, with the white facing outward, and then (with the edge closest to me) do either R U' R' or R U R depending on orientation) ...my way takes a while to get right to work for me because there's a lot of things to do for it to work.

2. When doing any unpaired F2L pair, what order do you do things? I spot corner, spot edge, pair them, then look where they need to be inserted and insert. But am i better to note which slot it needs to go into before i pair them so I can insert straight away?

3. (not strictly F2l..but close enough) when people say 'go slow/avoid pauses/work to metronome etc.' does that apply to last layer as well? Or are you just best turning as fast as you can for last layer?

Thanks.
1. That's quite a few cases, can you give an example of a couple you mean?
2. I have no idea, I don't really think that hard when solving.
3. Turn as fast as possible for the LL. There's nothing you can look ahead to.
 

Hypocrism

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I have a few nooby F2L questions if someone wouldn't mind, bear in mind i haven't started look ahead yet.

1. How do people handle 'edge in a slot (but not necessarily the correct slot) and corner in U face with white not on top'? I've struggled to find anyone that explains this and haven't got a particularly good way myself (i move the corner behind the edge, with the white facing outward, and then (with the edge closest to me) do either R U' R' or R U R depending on orientation) ...my way takes a while to get right to work for me because there's a lot of things to do for it to work.

2. When doing any unpaired F2L pair, what order do you do things? I spot corner, spot edge, pair them, then look where they need to be inserted and insert. But am i better to note which slot it needs to go into before i pair them so I can insert straight away?

3. (not strictly F2l..but close enough) when people say 'go slow/avoid pauses/work to metronome etc.' does that apply to last layer as well? Or are you just best turning as fast as you can for last layer?

Thanks.

1) The way you describe is how I do it. It should be pretty fast, it's either oriented where you can set up a pair, or not so you set up an RUR' insert
2) You should have an instinctive feel for where they go-that comes from practice and lookahead. In the same way lookahead will mean you don't need to spot where they are, you'll just have already seen them. Until then, just take whatever you can see quickly and don't have rules for which to spot first.
3) No, going slow applies for F2L training only. Later you might practice predicting PLL or spotting blocks to make recognition faster, but not yet.
 

confusedcuber

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1. That's quite a few cases, can you give an example of a couple you mean?
2. I have no idea, I don't really think that hard when solving.
3. Turn as fast as possible for the LL. There's nothing you can look ahead to.

For 2: I actually treat any one where the edge is in a slot, and the corner is in the top layer with the white to the side as the same. Then i always move it to how i said and solve it like that. Maybe my problem is partly that i need to treat them as different cases. Here i made an image to make it clear (hopefully)

Example F2l.jpg

1) The way you describe is how I do it. It should be pretty fast, it's either oriented where you can set up a pair, or not so you set up an RUR' insert
2) You should have an instinctive feel for where they go-that comes from practice and lookahead. In the same way lookahead will mean you don't need to spot where they are, you'll just have already seen them. Until then, just take whatever you can see quickly and don't have rules for which to spot first.
3) No, going slow applies for F2L training only. Later you might practice predicting PLL or spotting blocks to make recognition faster, but not yet.

Ok ty, I'll keep practicing then, just wanted to make sure I wasn't practicing bad technique.
 

TDM

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I actually treat any one where the edge is in a slot, and the corner is in the top layer with the white to the side as the same. Then i always move it to how i said and solve it like that. Maybe my problem is partly that i need to treat them as different cases. Here i made an image to make it clear (hopefully)

View attachment 4156
Yes, there are two different cases and their mirrors, but also four slots they can each go to, giving a total of 16 cases. Yours doesn't give me centres, but I'll assume you can see the U, F and L faces on that image:
Case 1: setup with L' U' L
FL: U2 L' U' L
FR: d R' U' R or U y' R' U' R
BL: d' R' U' R or U' y' L' U' L
BR: U' R' U' R
You could also start with the cube rotated differently: setup with y' U' R U' R'
FR: U2 R U' R'
FL: U' F U' F' or y' U' R U' R'
BR: U2 R2 F R F' R or U2 R2 F R2 F' (if FR slot is empty) or U y R U' R'
BL: L U' L'
Case 2: I don't have time to write out everything, but that setup looks good. Another setup (also assuming the visible faces are L, F and U) is d R U' R' or U y' R U' R' (from the first image).

All these, except F U' F', are easy to front/back mirror if necessary, meaning that as I've shown you how to setup the cases from two angles you can therefore setup the case from all four angles, which is necessary for F2L.
 

xsolver

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Sorry if this was asked before, the thread is too big to search.

What do you think, is it worth to learn algorithms for some cases where some of the F2L pairs are joined together but flipped incorrectly?
Example:

In my experience, this case happens way too often, so instead of splitting them up and joining them together flipped correctly, i just do an easy alg
67rowZj.png

F' U F U2 R U R' - and the pair is solved. If its worth it learning some easy algs for cases like this, can anyone tell me which cases in their experience are common and its better to use algorithms for them?
Thanks!
 

Rocky0701

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Sorry if this was asked before, the thread is too big to search.

What do you think, is it worth to learn algorithms for some cases where some of the F2L pairs are joined together but flipped incorrectly?
Example:

In my experience, this case happens way too often, so instead of splitting them up and joining them together flipped correctly, i just do an easy alg
View attachment 4160

F' U F U2 R U R' - and the pair is solved. If its worth it learning some easy algs for cases like this, can anyone tell me which cases in their experience are common and its better to use algorithms for them?
Thanks!
I would suggest learning algorithms for the following cases: The two where the ege and corner are in the slot but the corner isn't permuted, the three where the edge is in the right spot correctly, but the corner is in the top layer, the two where the corner is in the slot, but the edge is in the top layer, and the one where the edge and corner are i the slot, but the edge is mispermuted. Good luck!
 

xsolver

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I would suggest learning algorithms for the following cases: The two where the ege and corner are in the slot but the corner isn't permuted, the three where the edge is in the right spot correctly, but the corner is in the top layer, the two where the corner is in the slot, but the edge is in the top layer, and the one where the edge and corner are i the slot, but the edge is mispermuted. Good luck!

Could you please specify the cases? Im having trouble understanding that way.
http://www.speedsolving.com/wiki/index.php/First_Two_Layers

Ill be very thankfull.
 

mark49152

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In my experience, this case happens way too often, so instead of splitting them up and joining them together flipped correctly, i just do an easy alg
View attachment 4160

F' U F U2 R U R' - and the pair is solved.
I do U (R' F R F') U (R U R'). Is that an alg? I guess you could say it is, but to me it's certainly not like PLL where I will turn as fast as possible and have no idea how the pieces are moving around. For this F2L solution I know how the pieces are affected and that lets me adapt it as needed. For example, if that pair belonged in the BL slot (and FR was open) I might do U (R' F R F') U' L U L'. Or I might mirror the whole thing to BL, depending on where my hands are.

What would you do if you encountered that case on the BL slot?

If there's a line between intuitive and algorithmic F2L at all, it's a pretty blurred one.
 

xsolver

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I do U (R' F R F') U (R U R'). Is that an alg? I guess you could say it is, but to me it's certainly not like PLL where I will turn as fast as possible and have no idea how the pieces are moving around. For this F2L solution I know how the pieces are affected and that lets me adapt it as needed. For example, if that pair belonged in the BL slot (and FR was open) I might do U (R' F R F') U' L U L'. Or I might mirror the whole thing to BL, depending on where my hands are.

What would you do if you encountered that case on the BL slot?

If there's a line between intuitive and algorithmic F2L at all, it's a pretty blurred one.
Id just split it up in that case and insert it the normal way, without using algs. But since im not happy with my current F2L time (around 12 to 15 secs) i considered algs as an solution.
 
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