I think a lot of is is determined by what method you use. I used Keyhole with a 4 Look Last Layer which usually ended up in repeating Sune too often. I dropped to under a minute in about a month, then to about 45 in probably 1.5-2 months (this was 8 years ago now so my memory is somewhat faded). I practiced probably over an hour a day, but what got me down to consistently sub45 was learning the other OCLLs. I didn't ever really want to learn full OLL or PLL, but after I finally decided to switch to Fridrich (2 years ago now) I also went ahead and learned full PLL then OLL.
Everything depends on how you practice. I once heard a quote from a coach "Practice doesn't make perfect, perfect practice makes perfect." and I agree with that to at least a certain degree. Practicing without focusing on improving specific areas are basically just doing repetitive actions which eventually you will plateau with until you work on making those specific actions more efficient.
If I had it to do all over again, I would have learned the 7 OCLLs right off the bat, then learned CFOP just afterwards. However, in 2003, there weren't all these youtube tutorials and such, I remember seeing Jessica Fridrich's website and not wanting to learn the algs for F2L because I was severely lazy.
In terms of CFOP/Beginners, here is how I would suggest learning the methods:
Beginners Method (First layer, 2nd layer edges, EO, EP, CP, CO; although I much prefer CO then CP)
Beginners Method with 4 Look Last Layer (2LOLL, 2LPLL) - To be honest, I would probably omit this step if it was myself, but that's only because I feel like beginners LL can be fast enough (sub10) with practice, I feel like you'd be saving a lot more time at this point by giving yourself the jump start on F2L.
F2L with 4LLL
F2L with 2LOLL and Full PLL
F2L with Full OLL and Full PLL
Note here how I didn't put "learn this when you get so fast" type of field. I did this because I honestly think it is silly to not learn something until you get to a certain speed. I kept hearing "You don't need full OLL until you're sub20." You also don't need full PLL until then, either. My advice is once you've got all the PLLs memorized and your recall is at least decent, start right in with full OLL. You'll thank yourself if you can already recognize all 57 cases when you're say ~18s and not take a time hit, compared to learning full OLL at ~18s and then you start messing up recall and your times start jumping back up to 22-24.
- not complaining and just enjoying the journey (I love taking my time working on the intricasies of cross and intuitive F2L)! But just curious as to any thoughts on how people do this so fast?
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