What should I average before entering competitions? (3x3)

[freshcuber]

i thinkits my last layer and cross that holds me back my F2L is about 10-13 seconds but my cross is above 6 seconds andmy LL is about 13+

i dont really solve the entire cube i just practice my lookahead in f2l

Practice Cross. F2L+Cross should be <12 seconds. My F2L time includes cross. That's killing your times. Open up qqTimer and just do some cross scrambles. Or use cubetimer and get the splits of your whole solve.

 

[Jedi5412]

LL 3: 00:08.78 x Had a PLL i knew (F perm)
F2L 2: 00:12.02 x
Cross 1: 00:07.22 x

27.02

 

[freshcuber]

There is no reason at all that your cross should take you as long as you LL. Watch badmephisto's cross tutorials.

 

[cyoubx]

LL 3: 00:08.78 x Had a PLL i knew (F perm)
F2L 2: 00:12.02 x
Cross 1: 00:07.22 x

27.02

Definitely focus on cross. Try to get it around 3-4 seconds.


I average around 15 seconds and my breakdown is
LL: 4
F2L: 8
Cross: 2
+pauses here and there.

I don't really remember what my breakdowns were for sub 20, but I'd assume something like this:
LL: 5
F2L: 12
Cross: 3

As you can see, F2L was greatly improved (started using look ahead). Comparing my breakdown to yours, cross is definitely something I would work on. Your F2L is actually fast enough for sub 20. As for LL, learn all the PLL's!!

 

[freshcuber]

His F2L needs to be a little faster. F2L and cross should be around 12 to sub-20. If he spends 3 seconds on cross and then 12 on F2L he's only left with 5 seconds for his LL. Not extremely hard but by no means easy.

 

[cubeslayer]

I tend to have the same problems with my cross, though it is improving. It's bad b/c I am in the habit of doing it on top...it's the cube rotation and wasting time to find my first f2l pair that kills it. anyway, go to the competition and have fun with all the other rainbow addicts and get a high off of cube tips, tricks, and jargon.

 

[cyoubx]

His F2L needs to be a little faster. F2L and cross should be around 12 to sub-20. If he spends 3 seconds on cross and then 12 on F2L he's only left with 5 seconds for his LL. Not extremely hard but by no means easy.

I suppose it really depends on the person. For me, LL is the easiest since it's algorithmic. As long as you know the algorithm, you should be able to rip through the moves fairly quickly. Getting a 12 second F2L+Cross took a long time for me to achieve simply because it takes more practice. Just solving a cube over and over again won't help decrease F2L as quickly as LL can be improved.

But I do agree that a faster F2L would yield less stress for LL.

 

[freshcuber]

Yea I'm assuming he knows some PLL and is using 2LOLL. With full LL Fridrich 5 seconds is easy but if he's doing four algs for is LL 5 seconds is pretty hard.

 

[cyoubx]

Okay. Assuming he doesn't learn any new algorithms for the moment and just wants to get faster, I guess a better breakdown would be:

Cross: 3
F2L: 10
LL: 7

Essentially, work on cross!
However, eventually, you will want to finish up your PLL's; 2LOLL + 1LPLL can be sub 4 pretty easily.
In summary, practice (in order of importance):
1. Cross
2. PLL
3. F2L
4. OLL if you have time and are committed.

 

[freshcuber]

Okay. Assuming he doesn't learn any new algorithms for the moment and just wants to get faster, I guess a better breakdown would be:

Cross: 3
F2L: 10
LL: 7

Essentially, work on cross!
However, eventually, you will want to finish up your PLL's; 2LOLL + 1LPLL can be sub 4 pretty easily.
In summary, practice (in order of importance):
1. Cross
2. PLL
3. F2L
4. OLL if you have time and are committed.

That's probably a pretty good break down. Even not learning new algs improving recognition and execution he could do

Cross:3
F2L:11
LL:6

Regardless of the break down the moral of the story is work on cross lol

 

[Jedi5412]

yea im starting to learn all the plls just need to learn the v per g perm r perm and some more

i currently hate the cross F2L would be my favourite since my pll/oll execution skills arnt good i have been working on lookahead for quite a while but it seems pretty hard to go fast with looking ahead.

 

[cyoubx]

but it seems pretty hard to go fast with looking ahead.

Actually, high tps and no look ahead is pretty easy haha

3tps is literally all you need for F2L.

Note: I don't want to deter you away from look ahead since it's better in the long run, but you can get sub-20 with burst F2L (fast tps with pauses). No one recommends it, but my point is that for sub 20, F2L isn't really essential if you have other things to work on.

 

[Jedi5412]

i wonder how faz goes so fast without any pauses

 

[freshcuber]

Practice.

Spoiler

and just a bit of talent

 

[protocoldoug]

Practice Cross. F2L+Cross should be <12 seconds. My F2L time includes cross. That's killing your times. Open up qqTimer and just do some cross scrambles. Or use cubetimer and get the splits of your whole solve.

Maybe you guys don't mind if I piggy back a question here... I'm working on my cross/F2L quite a bit (and seeing your breakdowns is giving me a lot of hope with how I'm improving)

What's your preferred method for scrambling for a lot of cross / F2L solves? Do you use the whole scramble in qqTimer or CCT or whatnot? Or is there a feature for a quicker scramble? So, in theory, I could solve more with scrambling less. Not sure if this is possible, but, just trying to think how I can fit more partial solves in less time.

Thanks much :tu

 

[IamWEB]

You need a fully scrambled cube to work on your Cross and F2L, unlike practicing your LL.
When you finish the F2L, just stop and and scramble from there. Maybe you can do 20 moves instead of 25 when scrambling a cube w/o a complete LL, but that's not much of a difference...

 

[cmhardw]

I'm talking about a semi-serious competition, not just "Oh look, he can solve a Rubik's Cube.. *walks away*"

You will be inspired to improve, and learn more, by going to a 1 day competition than you can achieve in weeks of practicing on your own. If you're talking about being competitive at cubing (not even the having fun aspect of a competition, which is way more valuable) then you will do far worse by not going to the competition.

If you're sub-10 minutes, which you are, then the clear choice is to go to a competition.

 

[amostay2004]

You need a fully scrambled cube to work on your Cross and F2L, unlike practicing your LL.
When you finish the F2L, just stop and and scramble from there. Maybe you can do 20 moves instead of 25 when scrambling a cube w/o a complete LL, but that's not much of a difference...

If you're not colour neutral you're just scrambling the F2L again from a 'solved' position so you should still use 25 moves

 

[Yuxuibbs]

g perm and i only knew 4 olls, u perm, h perm, z perm, a perm, and t perm....
cross:2.35
f2l:15.89 (didn't do look ahead very well)
oll:4.33
pll:5.09

i average anything between high 20's to mid 40's depending on which pll case i get, the cross, and my f2l look ahead

thinking about going to a competition when there's one around my area. i've seen some people get more than 1 min that go to competitions. you go to competitions for fun unless you're looking to win something. i made a cubing club at school and i did an unofficial competition and i won with around 35 seconds (3 of 5)

 

[MrIndianTeen]

Sub - 10

minutes