Color neutrality or look ahead? Or both?

[Nilsibert]

I apologise if this topic was previously discussed, I couldn't exactly find something regarding this when searching the forums.

Basically, I avg about 25s right now, and wanted to start learning to look ahead, which I never tried before. The other day I became interested in color neutrality as well, which I would try to get to by first learning to solve on yellow(strictly yellow for a week or so, no white at all) and moving on from there. Basically relearn solving by restricting myself to a certain color for a week or two, depending on how well I do.

The problem that I now face is that I'm not sure what I should learn first, because there's basically 3 options:

1. Ignore look ahead for now and learn color neutrality,
2. Ignore color neutrality for now and learn look ahead or
3. Both! Learn solving on other colored crosses while learning to look ahead.

I really don't want to do the wrong thing, so I'd like to ask what you think. Has anyone had experience with either of the options or do you have an idea about what would be the best option? Would solving on different cross colors actually help my look ahead since I'd have to go slower because it's harder? Or is it better to learn one after the other? What do you think? Could be an interesting discussion

Thanks!

 

[YddEd]

Probably learn look ahead then be colour neutral. Just my opinion.

 

[JianhanC]

CN is not synonymous with speed at all. At most do white/yellow. Lookahead by far more important.

 

[Nilsibert]

CN is not synonymous with speed at all. At most do white/yellow. Lookahead by far more important.

I'm aware that color neutrality won't make me sub 20 and that it's a small advantage most of the time. I just thought it would be fun to learn and in the long run I think I'd benefit from easier crosses or possibly x-crosses. And it's not like I won't ever learn look ahead anyway if I learn color neutrality.

 

[windhero]

Color Choice

The most often chosen side to make a cross on, by convention, is white. Most people are thus said to make a 'white cross'.

However, there are a few people that are called color-neutral. This means that they first decide which cross looks easy to make, and then they make that cross. This approach saves about 1 move in the cross stage, but it is often argued that it is not worth doing it because of slower recognition times especially in F2L stage, because the color scheme is ever-changing.

There is yet one more class of people that make dual-color crosses. They choose to do either white or yellow cross. This decreases the number of moves in cross stage, but arguably doesn't change the F2L recognition times by as much.

This issue often leads to a lot of discussion, and there is no definite consensus on what cross color(s) are best to use.

Lars Vandenbergh analyzed this issue quantitavily and the whole page can be seen here. Here are the results summarized:

Averge number of moves to solve white cross: 5.81
Averge number of moves to solve dual cross: 5.39
Averge number of moves to solve neutral cross: 4.81

Looking at the results I am personally convinced that it is best to choose one color and stick with it

That's my opinion as well. You wont save many moves during an average solve by learning CN. Lookahead is far more important.

 

[Username]

That's my opinion as well. You wont save many moves during an average solve by learning CN. Lookahead is far more important.

I've never seen that text before. I might go back to white only (currently white and yellow)

 

[YddEd]

I've never seen that text before. I might go back to white only (currently white and yellow)

Aw.. don't do that..

 

[Cubemaestro]

i average 19 and i have just started learning lookahead. when i averaged 25, my cross was so bad that it took me about 5-6 seconds. i tried to be color neutral,and it reduced my times by 2-3 seconds. so u can get sub20 without knowing lookahead ( maybe its because i'm fast with fingers? )
and please cud u tell me your alg list?
btw, i dont know what xcrosses are

 

[YddEd]

i average 19 and i have just started learning lookahead. when i averaged 25, my cross was so bad that it took me about 5-6 seconds. i tried to be color neutral,and it reduced my times by 2-3 seconds. so u can get sub20 without knowing lookahead ( maybe its because i'm fast with fingers? )
and please cud u tell me your alg list?
btw, i dont know what xcrosses are

Fast with fingers? Probably not. Fast recognition? Probably. I still avg 25 with CFOP, I would say my cross is around 5-6

 

[Username]

Fast with fingers? Probably not. Fast recognition? Probably. I still avg 25 with CFOP, I would say my cross is around 5-6

Practice cross BLD

 

[Nilsibert]

and please cud u tell me your alg list?
btw, i dont know what xcrosses are

PLL and OLL?

 

[YddEd]

Practice cross BLD

Nah no thanks, But Ill practise my blocks BLD

 

[ottozing]

You really should practice cross BLD. Unless of course, you're one of those people who just expects to get faster by doing solves over and over.

 

[Nilsibert]

I understand all the arguments that go against color neutrality and I'm not expecting to get much better times instantly by learning it. It was just an idea and I'm fully aware that it doesn't necessarily give me a great advantage. The only problem I had that I didn't know if learning look ahead first would be better or if I should learn it later. Or even at the same time. I am definitaly go gonna learn opposite cross(white and yellow) because that isn't too hard to do and I'm already working on it. My cross sucks anyway, I'm gonna have to work on that, I think I could drop 2-3 seconds by getting much better at the cross.

 

[YddEd]

I would learn lookahead first. Then full CN.

 

[Ross The Boss]

i would learn CN first because if you learn look ahead with one colour, you will be used to that colour and that will male it harder to transition to CN.

 

[MWilson]

Color neutral is not something you do to get faster, it's something you do if it appeals to you. If you enjoy it, do it, but you need to be very patient, because it will not make you faster any time soon, and will in fact do the opposite for quite a while.

Look ahead is definitely something you do to get faster. So practice that if you are familiar enough with your method to make real use of it. By familiar enough I mean you can't be thinking "Hmm I don't know what to do here.. but I need to turn continuously so.. ~randomish moves until you recognize something you know~ Okay now I can continue". That's just going to result in bad habits. If you have to pause, pause. If you just don't have a clue what to do even after finding the right pieces, then you clearly need to learn something new, not get faster at working around what you don't know how to do. If you have to stop the timer and use cube explorer or ask a question on the forum or just sit and stare are the cube for a while until it clicks, do that. Practicing look ahead is practicing recognition and reaction. If you don't already have enough experience to know what you're looking for (recognition) and how to react to it, then you're not ready for look ahead.

1. Encounter an issue during a solve, including inspection.

2. Capitalize and learn something new, using all tools and resources necessary.

3a. If it's an inspection thing, don't time the inspection and take as long as you need to figure it out, even if it's ten minutes.

3b. If it's part of an intuitive step of your solves, do slow, comfortable solves without a timer and with pauses if necessary until you get your mind around it. Don't try to turn fast or continuously and just end up falling into old habits, that would counter productive to replacing those habits.

3c. If it's an algorithm, practice it as slow as you need to such that you are not pausing, locking up, or fumbling. Try to have the image of the case in your head while doing to strengthen association of recognition and reaction.

4. Use constant turning with look ahead to ingrain it into your automatic reaction arsenal.

5. Keep solving until you end up back at 1. Don't ignore things that may take you back to 1, or you will eventually plateau.

 

[kcl]

You really should practice cross BLD. Unless of course, you're one of those people who just expects to get faster by doing solves over and over.

That makes you faster... In my opinion if you practice A LOT and use your inspection, the cross will get better fairly quickly. It's how I dropped 20 seconds off my average in less than a mont. However, BLD cross is a good exercise, I do agree.

 

[pipkiksass]

Color neutral is not something you do to get faster, it's something you do if it appeals to you. If you enjoy it, do it, but you need to be very patient, because it will not make you faster any time soon, and will in fact do the opposite for quite a while.

Look ahead is definitely something you do to get faster. So practice that if you are familiar enough with your method to make real use of it. By familiar enough I mean you can't be thinking "Hmm I don't know what to do here.. but I need to turn continuously so.. ~randomish moves until you recognize something you know~ Okay now I can continue". That's just going to result in bad habits. If you have to pause, pause. If you just don't have a clue what to do even after finding the right pieces, then you clearly need to learn something new, not get faster at working around what you don't know how to do. If you have to stop the timer and use cube explorer or ask a question on the forum or just sit and stare are the cube for a while until it clicks, do that. Practicing look ahead is practicing recognition and reaction. If you don't already have enough experience to know what you're looking for (recognition) and how to react to it, then you're not ready for look ahead.

1. Encounter an issue during a solve, including inspection.

2. Capitalize and learn something new, using all tools and resources necessary.

3a. If it's an inspection thing, don't time the inspection and take as long as you need to figure it out, even if it's ten minutes.

3b. If it's part of an intuitive step of your solves, do slow, comfortable solves without a timer and with pauses if necessary until you get your mind around it. Don't try to turn fast or continuously and just end up falling into old habits, that would counter productive to replacing those habits.

3c. If it's an algorithm, practice it as slow as you need to such that you are not pausing, locking up, or fumbling. Try to have the image of the case in your head while doing to strengthen association of recognition and reaction.

4. Use constant turning with look ahead to ingrain it into your automatic reaction arsenal.

5. Keep solving until you end up back at 1. Don't ignore things that may take you back to 1, or you will eventually plateau.

This is fantastic advice - a thoroughly well thought-out and well considered reply. I was guilty of just repeating bad habits for a LONG time - timed solve after timed solve. I crept down from a 29s average to about 26/27 in about 2 months, then barely made any progress for AGES. This was about 14 days ago, and I'm currently averaging 24-25s (i.e. 2 months to improve by 2 seconds, then the same improvement again in 2 weeks!). When I get a solve where I can actually look forward a bit, I get sub-20. Things just gradually become automatic and, as this happens, you have more time to look further ahead in the solve. This won't happen, or will happen much more slowly, if you are solving fast.

I recently took a week off doing timed solves, something I've been promising myself I'd do for months. No timer at all for 12 days and, although I probably cut down from maybe 100 solves a day to 30-40, I was looking at my F2L efficiency, cross planning, and trying to look ahead a little. First timed session back I knocked almost a second off my Ao50 PB. Next day I did the same again. Yesterday I knocked almost another second off it in my first ever Ao100 (24.61 - not bad for someone averaging high 26s for a good Ao12 only 2 weeks earlier). I hadn't got close to my Ao5 and Ao12 PBs for months, but I've since broken my Ao12 PB about 10 times, and knocked 3 seconds off my Ao5 PB (now reduced from 23.2x to 20.24). It's got to the stage where I'm sick of updating my sig!

My advice, which has been said 1,000 times before, but bears saying again - if you want to get faster, stop worrying about getting faster. Put the timer away, solve slowER (not necessarily slowLY) and concentrate on efficiency and eliminating bad habits. In the same way algs become automatic, and you stop having to think "R U R' U'..." as you execute, the more you do slow solves, the more your F2L becomes something you don't have to think about. I like Dominate's term "automatic reaction arsenal" - sums it up nicely: something you can do to the cube without looking, to the extent that you can look elsewhere, and plan what you're going to do next.

 

[qqwref]

Lookahead can save you 10+ seconds. Color neutrality can save you a second (maybe!). It's up to you.