Older cubers discussions

[mark49152]

Mark got 10/14.

No PB, but it was my biggest official attempt and I was pleased to manage it fairly comfortably within the time limit - faster than my 10/12. Memo and execution were both generally good. As usual it was silly mistakes that spoiled it.

More fun tomorrow.

 

[David Zemdegs]

I saw that. You're a natural. Do you do public speaking or anything similar?

I have done computer training for over 20 years. I also dabbled in politics for 10 years.

 

[newtonbase]

I have done computer training for over 20 years. I also dabbled in politics for 10 years.

That makes sense. Really liked the video.

 

[moralsh]

Mark just got a sub 6 4BLD mean (5:53.16 I think), wow

http://cubecomps.com/live.php?cid=2261&cat=17&rnd=1

 

[h2f]

Mark just got a sub 6 4BLD mean (5:53.16 I think), wow

http://cubecomps.com/live.php?cid=2261&cat=17&rnd=1

Nice. And a mo3 sub6 too. Congrats @mark49152

 

[pglewis]

A postmortem on the bad solves: the 1:39 was going to be an "okay" solve for me, even landed a friendly J-Perm, but for some unknown reason my hands decided to go into a Y-Perm. I realized it quickly but already several moves into the wrong alg. I should have just taken my lumps and done a CFOPP solve but I compounded it by halting mid alg and trying to undo what I'd started. It was at this point my brain announced "my work here is done!" leaving me to struggle even finding pairs to re-solve f2l. The second solve was a OLL fail that I'm not even sure what I did wrong.

 

[newtonbase]

A postmortem on the bad solves: the 1:39 was going to be an "okay" solve for me, even landed a friendly J-Perm, but for some unknown reason my hands decided to go into a Y-Perm. I realized it quickly but already several moves into the wrong alg. I should have just taken my lumps and done a CFOPP solve but I compounded it by halting mid alg and trying to undo what I'd started. It was at this point my brain announced "my work here is done!" leaving me to struggle even finding pairs to re-solve f2l. The second solve was a OLL fail that I'm not even sure what I did wrong.

Unlucky. Always best to finish the alg and then sort the problem but I expect you know that now!

 

[newtonbase]

And well done to @mark49152 on that mean. Last solve was fastest so I guess he wasn't taking it easy.

 

[pglewis]

Unlucky. Always best to finish the alg and then sort the problem but I expect you know that now!

I can attest that doing it the wrong way can be even more enlightening than the correct one

I suppose I could have left frustrated that I "blew all my good solves on warm-up" but it was very satisfying even though it didn't completely carry into my official solves. If I had an extended session like that at home I'd certainly have been over the moon, I should have been logging into csTimer.

And well done to @mark49152 on that mean. Last solve was fastest so I guess he wasn't taking it easy.

Yeah, he's approaching alien status.

 

[Jason Green]

I finally edited some of my solves from my APRIL competition! I wouldn't say I procrastinate so much as I'd rather spend my free time cubing.

 

[CLL Smooth]

Haven't been cubing much lately. I'm still speed solving though.

 

[mark49152]

Yeah, he's approaching alien status.

LOL. Nice comment from someone at the comp yesterday: "He's not supposed to be that fast, he's OLD!" (Thanks Callum )

Congrats to Andy as well on the awesome PB clock average in the finals, and coming 7th .

Here's my comp report from Crawley Open 2017, in chronological order.

4x4: Couldn't really find my form but at least my average in the second round was only 0.5 seconds off a PB.

MBLD: Disappointed not to get a PB of course, but 10/14 in less time than my 10/12 comp PB is still progress. My time management was good and I don't think more time or fewer cubes would have helped my accuracy, as they were silly mistakes that would have happened anyway. My plan is to keep working on speed and time management, and keep shooting for as many cubes as I can fit into an hour.

3x3: Dreadful. Worst average since 2015. By the end, my lookahead had completely gone and I was stopping (not even pausing) after every pair. Deliberately DNF'ed solve 4 because it was over 30 seconds and I was too annoyed. Basically, I forgot how to solve .

4BLD: I had no expectations as I felt my PB of 5:56.72 would be hard for me to beat, especially since I was having a poor comp anyway. What transpired was a single PB of 5:30.67 (and 3rd place) to finish off a mean of 5:56.60. So my mean was faster than my old single . Delighted with that. Means are unofficial but that's still 20th in the world.

5x5: I missed the (harsher than usual) soft cut and scraped through to second round on a single. Much like 4x4, second round gave me my second-best official average but I didn't really feel on form.

3BLD. Another PB, 1:11.80. Good improvement but still a bit disappointing because it was an easy scramble (two solved corners) and would likely have been sub-1 at home. My memo is still way slower under comp pressure - like ~40 seconds instead of ~25.

As usual, great to catch up with Andy, Ben and everyone else. Looking forward to WC next!

EDIT: I forgot clock. Did a couple of solves Sunday morning as another chance to keep my PB run alive. One was a complete fail because I forgot how to solve it. The other was PB but DNF for being over the time limit.

 

[NewbieCuber]

Hi folks. I'm a new older cuber as well (in my 50s). Only yesterday did I finally memorize enough algorithms to finish the cube via the beginners method. I'm using TwistyTimer on my Android phone and I have a low time of 1:22 (which really surprised me) a high time of over 5 minutes, but my last 5 solves have averaged 2:05. 2 minutes seems to be a pretty normal average for me.

That's probably not bad for what is literally my first day. I'm happy to be able to solve it at all.

 

[muchacho]

Welcome! I was averaging more than 3 minutes after a day, and I already knew how to solve a 2x2 for some weeks (so I also knew most of the algs I needed for 3x3).

 

[newtonbase]

Means are unofficial but that's still 20th in the world.

That's (unofficially) fantastic!

 

[Selkie]

@mafergut - Cube/Life balance is important as you will be able to tell from my absences. Best of luck and look forward to seeing updates if/when you have the time.

Some great results from the older brethren recently includes my UK mates, @Lid and @Jason Green

Been practicing more and more 3x3 in the last week after meeting @Logiqx and some other younger UK cubers for a beer last week. Had a 15.34 Ao100 today. Stepping up practice for London which is only 5 weeks away. being so close to average cuts for 4x4 (1:00), 5x5 (2:00) and 6x6 (3:30), I need to ensure I don't spend all my time on 3x3 but really looking forward to a comp. Last December and Birmingham Open seems an age ago.

Also great to see Weston-super-mare open has had its initial announcement @Shaky Hands my friend. Should be a blast buddy

@David Zemdegs - Haha cool video. Best of luck at Worlds. Unfortunately I cannot make it this time round though a lot o the older UK cubers are going. Looking forward to meeting Felix at London Open next month though

 

[chtiger]

I'm glad to see others had some good results at comp this weekend. I sure didn't. Here's a vid of my solves

14 blind attempts, 12 DNF's and 2 mediocre successes. Half the DNFs I literally did not finish the attempt. Also DNFed in clock finals after nearly DNFing the first round.

Spoiler: day 2 commentary

5BLD attempt 2: went fairly smooth, thought it had a chance. I think I forgot to undo a setup early, and I also switched the last 2 corner pairs in my memo at some point. Time improved to 32:xx

3BLD rd 1: The first 2 attempts were close and between 2:20 and 3:00. Third attempt I went slower to try to make next round and got 3:32.

Clock rd 1: 10.24, 14.10, 8.64, DNF, 22.04 = 15.46. DNF was a low 9. Last solve went slow to make next round, but then repeatedly messed up.

MBLD attempt 3: did a smaller attempt after Saturday's disaster and with so much other BLDs. 2/4, 21:26. Forgot edge memo of 1 cube. Set it aside, came back to it later, recalled the memo correctly, but then forgot to do the flipped edge. Other miss was off by 3 edges.

4BLD attempt 3: Took forever to memo. Quit midsolve at some point, can't remember.

Clock final: DNF, 8.77, DNF, 9.67, 9.30. DNF's were a 10 and 11

5BLD attempt 3: On 2nd target, I thought I setup for x-center when i was doing +center. Undid it, then thought maybe I did it right the first time. Then couldn't remember if i did the U2 for 1st target. Didn't want to spend 15 more minutes solving when I probably already messed up, so quit, but I actually had it correct.

3BLD final: was mentally out of it at this point. First solve was over 3:00 and not all that close. Next 2 solves were slow memo and couldn't even remember it.

Still enjoyed this comp. I like smaller comps, and this one only had 15 people because it was just BLDs and FMC with a couple other things mixed in. Also cool to watch Mark Boyanowski attempt 42 cubes. It was waaaay more BLD than I'm used to. A typical practice day is 3 3BLDs and 1 4BLD.

 

[pglewis]

Here's a vid of my solves

Momma said there'd be days like that, hats off for keeping your sense of humor.

Hi folks. I'm a new older cuber as well (in my 50s). Only yesterday did I finally memorize enough algorithms to finish the cube via the beginners method. I'm using TwistyTimer on my Android phone and I have a low time of 1:22 (which really surprised me) a high time of over 5 minutes, but my last 5 solves have averaged 2:05. 2 minutes seems to be a pretty normal average for me.

That's probably not bad for what is literally my first day. I'm happy to be able to solve it at all.

Welcome, and that's definitely a great first day PB, nicely done.

 

[pglewis]

LOL. Nice comment from someone at the comp yesterday: "He's not supposed to be that fast, he's OLD!" (Thanks Callum )

I'm pretty much a unicorn in my area. I don't think there was anyone else over 30 this weekend and though I don't nearly look my age I got a lot of smiles and nods from people for being "the old guy with a lanyard". I try to work on a few parents here and there. Some of them can solve and, geeze... you're going to be there all day anyway, spend some of that time warming up and go get an official time!

3x3: Dreadful. Worst average since 2015. By the end, my lookahead had completely gone and I was stopping (not even pausing) after every pair.

I saw that and kept looking back ("wait, is that OH?"). Looked like you were "on" this weekend but 3x3 totally didn't fit.

Means are unofficial but that's still 20th in the world.

As if leap-frogging some more top 100 singles wasn't impressive enough. We need to get the merchandising machinery rolling.

 

[newtonbase]

Hi folks. I'm a new older cuber as well (in my 50s). Only yesterday did I finally memorize enough algorithms to finish the cube via the beginners method. I'm using TwistyTimer on my Android phone and I have a low time of 1:22 (which really surprised me) a high time of over 5 minutes, but my last 5 solves have averaged 2:05. 2 minutes seems to be a pretty normal average for me.

That's probably not bad for what is literally my first day. I'm happy to be able to solve it at all.

That's an excellent start. I hope you keep at it.