What are the best methods for improving TPS?

[Selkie]

I was suprised with a forum search that there were no specific threads on TPS. I have found the odd scattered post in the odd thread but no discussion on the subject recently. If I have overlooked an obvious resource of thread, apologies.

Well I would be very interested what other cubers have done to improve their TPS. Whether exercices, drills etc.

Take my recent 23.x Ao5. A 23 second solve for me would ordinarily mean 2 seconds cross, a further 11 seconds F2L, then 9-10 seconds LL (and thats 1 look OLL and 1 look PLL!).

I have to say I have recently been feeling my PLLs getting faster and I attribute this to learning them first and 3 months down the line most can truely be performed from muscle with no thought whatsoever.

I realise I need no higher TPS than I have now to be sub-20. There are plenty of other holes to plug where I am leaking time, such as Cross to F2L transition, better improvement to lookahead that will come with practice, recognition and reaction time in LL and generally practice, practice, practice, which although is a cliche, has helped me get from ~52s to ~26s in 4 months so I realise it is the single most important improvement factor.

Starting speed cubing in my 40's I also realise I will never have the turnspeed of Feliks, Breandan or Rowe, it is just not realistic, so I know that to achieve my goal of sub 15 I will have to utilise every possible advantage I can take. This is one reason why I learned full OLL so early and why I am trying to adopt techniques such as multislotting so early. I am also looking into VHF2L, COLL etc so I can choose optimal LL techniques depending on the solve.

But even with all these a 9-10 second LL wont get me to sub 15 so if I am going to have to work on TPS, I'd like to start as quickly as possible.

So have cubers adopted certain techniques to improve their TPS? Have they found TPS automatically improves further down the line and have other more mature cubers done anything specific to try and improve their TPS?

I would be very welcome of any advise in this area!

EDIT:
I will be posting a video of an average this coming weekend, having just bought a tripod for some wider feedback and advise.

 

[Kirjava]

practise your algs until you can do them faster

 

[Godmil]

Have you tried PLL time attacks, or just drilling one alg for a few minutes? That should really help with your LL.
Also do you get many lockups during your PLL's? Sometimes I go slow and steady with them and actually find the execution quicker.

 

[Selkie]

Yes, drilling the algs would appears to be the most sensible approach. I did start drilling and optimising them. I think it is no coincidence I have 1xU, 1xG, T and Y that are faster than the others since these are the ones I started on. I do not really know why I stopped doing it to be honest, I was probably distracted by other things I wanted to work on. One thing that has stopped me is not wanting to drill algs that I had bad finger tricks for, I did want to ensure I knew how I would execute each one before burning that too far in muscle memory. I think that would be a very sensible first port of call. Then if I drill each for 5 mins, thats just over an hour for a drilling session, say 3 -4 times a week and I dare say i would see good improvement. In addition I have just learned z rotation N perms as the RUL once were pittiful for me.

Lockups is a very valid point mate. I was stuck not having a sub-20 full step until yesterday, consequently when F2L went fast I would try rushing LL and locking up like crazy. As soon as I got that sub 20 yesterday, I then had 3 more full step sub 20's during the evening, all I bet it was because I wasnt rushing LL and locking up. If I think about it, I am so conscious of my speed-lacking LL that I do try and overrush and get many, many, many lockups, no mean feat on a Lingyun!

 

[cocos0329]

Tips for how to increase turn speed?

Hi! My i turn really slow. I need tips. Or is it just practice?? Should i buy a guhong?

 

[Clayy9]

Practice.

 

[Vinny]

Fingertricks will develop with practice.

I don't know if you should buy a GuHong...
What are your averages?
What cube do you use?
What method do you use?
Some info would really help

 

[cocos0329]

My average is 19.45 of 5 and 20.98 10 of 12. I use fridrich. I use a Alpha V-F. Thanks for the tips!

 

[Vinny]

A better cube could help you a bit. I'm assuming that's your PB average, so you're not sub 20 yet.

 

[cocos0329]

Thats my Pb average.

 

[MaeLSTRoM]

Do you know full PLL/OLL? That can speed you up without affecting your turn speed.
To increase your TPS, practice solving and also practice triggers (common part of algs) and lookahead, which can help to give you a good average TPS, instead of bursts of high speed which are actually slower.

 

[cocos0329]

I know almost all plls (19 of 21) and 2 look oll. Thanks for all the tips!

 

[5BLD]

I doubt a new cube will immediately increase your TPS. The thing is, whenever you try to go fast, you get lockups. So turn slowly, and it will increase over time!
I use a storebought, but when I tried my friend's guhong, I just went out of control, which meant I couldn't look ahead which meant bad times...

 

[CubicNL]

I think that it is very important (mainly for algs) that all movements are smooth in order to get faster turn speed.
Because if your pll's are locky and you try to go as fast as you can, you won't get much faster by practice.
So for your algs I'd say, make up grips and practice them slowly at first so that you can go for speed later.

 

[Pandadudex96]

In my opinion, increasing your tps isn't important until you could reach the sub-15 mark. This is because when looking ahead and turning slowly, you can potentially get sub-20 without any doubt so by this, I mean focus on you lookahead than to increase the tps. My tip would to start off getting the storebought, then the diansheng (not necessary), then a DIY, then maybe the Guhong after you've practiced a lot. At school, I've always used fast cubes so, you could say that I kind of spoiled my friends.... They can't even use the storebought and will put it down and will just pick back up there guhong and fII.... This is bad!!! To recap what I've said, just lookahead (slow turning) until you could get sub-15 averages!!!

 

[CubeLord]

TPS

How do you improve your tps???

 

[Ranzha]

Um, the answer to this should be intuitive.
Practice.
Drill algs. Also, going slow and looking ahead's nice.
What?! Look ahead improving tps? Absurd!
No, it's not. It saves the pauses. And as pauses grow shorter, time lowers, and overall tps gets higher, whether or not you're making the moves faster.

Edit: Additionally, this question could be posted in the One Answer Question Thread. It's stickied in the Speedcubing Help section. That thread saves a lot of flames and harsh remarks.

 

[bluecloe45]

Butter your fingers

 

[Jorghi]

Look ahead lowers pauses but doesn't make you turn faster. Tps is mainly dexterity like cup stacking.

 

[Ranzha]

Look ahead lowers pauses but doesn't make you turn faster. Tps is mainly dexterity like cup stacking.

Improving tps doesn't necessarily mean turning faster. I'd say it involves turning quickly, accurately, and efficiently while making sure you always plan what to do next.