It's not just cubing any more

The last month, I've been getting into more puzzles than just Rubik's Cube.

**** Crosswords

I've been doing the New York Times crossworld puzzle daily for a couple years and just recently discovered the American Crossworld Puzzle Tournament (http://www.crosswordtournament.com/). I tried the online contest this year, and did reasonably well with 8355 points (good enough for 47th place online (out of the 200 or so people who did it online).

That score would have put me in the top half at the real tournament, 136th in Divsion C, and 32nd among rookies. Pretty good, especially considering I made some typing mistakes that cost me two correct solves aka 300+ more points (I had three all correct solves already).

I continue to do the daily NYTimes and have also started working through books of daily and Tough puzzles to try to get better.

**** Sudoku

After trying to resist Sudoku, I finally have started doing them. I have a book of 200 Sudoku published by GAMES Magazine that I'm working through (starting with easy) and now do the daily Sudoku in the paper. I'm still a beginner at this, but feel like I'm starting to pick it up.

**** Puzzle Competitions

I discovered the US Puzzle Championship (http://wpc.puzzles.com/) and have been tackling the 2006 competition (held back in June). These truly are challenging and interesting and there are many styles of puzzles I haven't seen before. There are also books collecting old competitions that one can get to gain more experience. I'll keep going and give the 2007 US Championships a try when they roll around.

There's also other puzzle competitions that are interesting - I found links to other puzzles and competitions on Ken Duisenberg's puzzle site (http://ken.duisenberg.com/potw/) and might give those a try, too.

**** Rubiks Cube

I'm still a cuber, but not practicing as much these days. There's only so much time. I need to get back into the Sunday Contest (http://www.nascarjon.us/sunday.htm) so I can see where I stand now.

Cubing Update

Well, it's been a little while since a cubing-related post. The big event of the last few months was my trip to the 2006 US Nationals in San Francisco on Friday August 4. They were held at the Exploratorium (http://www.exploratorium.edu), a great interactive science museum in the Northwest part of the city near Fort Mason.

My day at the Nationals was a very mixed bag. I had a difficult time in the first few events, but by the end of the day was doing rather well. Here's a summary of my standings in the competition, in order of events:

- 3x3x3: Best time was 33.43 (other two were 35.*), so I ended up 43rd (top 36 advanced).

This was disappointing, as I had been averaging better than 33.43 in the Sunday Contest. I was also practicing about 30 minutes before the contest and was hitting times that would have gotten me into the next round. Nerves got to me again - I was turning too fast and definitely not able to relax and concentrate.

- 4x4x4: A 2:26 and a 2:43, so I ended up 18th (top 12 advanced).

My best time, 2:26.68, is about as well as I can do with lack of practice and a slowly degrading cube. I need to figure out how to get faster, but I'm not quite sure what the best path is - prep a new cube or get better at edges (or both!). I was reasonably content with this event.

- 5x5x5: One time of 8 minutes and one DNF. I ended up 15th (top 8 advanced).

The one time I was able to record was a 7:58.60, which is pretty bad for me (I'm usually around 7 minutes). It was getting really warm on the stage (which was right in the sun at that time), I was not paying attention and felt like I was doing edge matching again and again, and I was regularly making mistakes. I got paranoid enough that I imagined the person timing was thinking "when will this guy be done?". One the second solve, I messed up some edge parity and was already doing poorly enough that I said "I'm done here" and stopped the timer with the cube unsolved. By far, my worst event.

- Rubik's Magic: Three times around 3 seconds, one of 3.5, one of 4. Overall, a best time of 2.92 and an average of 3.15. I ended up 11th (top 8 advanced).

Both the best time and the average were personal bests for me, so I was rather pleased especially since I only got my new magics two days before the competition (I had broken all my other ones). The time to advance was 2.94, so I wasn't that far off!

- 3x3x3 one handed: My times were 71.19 and 73.97. I ended up 22nd (top 12 advanced).

These times are about as good as it gets for me without a lucky solve. The 71.19 was actually a personal best. I still feel rather clumsy in my one-handed, so I think there's lots of room for improvement and I can get closer to one minutes with cleaner technique.

- Megamix: One run, a tad over 6 minutes. I ended up 4th (top 4 advanced).

My best event, especially considering that right before the competition I was running around the Exploratorium trying to find a screwdriver so I could fix a screw and put a center cap back on (it popped while I was warming up). I actually advanced to the finals but since I wasn't coming back I didn't compete. But I can claim fourth place in nationals (and second place American). Of course, a lot of top US Megaminxers weren't there, but I'll take it!

- 2x2x2: One time of 12 seconds, three times of 13.X, and a ludicrous 7.28 lucky solve. Best time of 7.28, average of 12.86. I ended up 14th (top 8 advanced).

This also went really well. The average was a personal best, as was the 7.28 (which was the 9th best time of all times that day!). 7.28 was really lucky - quick fix to orient the white side, orient the yellow side and hey I'm done! I really think that if I could make a good 2x2x2 cube for speedsolving, I could be in the 10 second range - I learned a very efficient method (Ortega-Jelnek Corners First, URL = http://rubikscube.info/ortega.html) so with a good cube I could really cook (my cube is way too loose).

Overall, a very mixed set of results. But, I am very glad I went - I had a lot of fun and met a bunch of people I previously only knew by name. I took some pictures, I'll upload them to Snapfish and post the URL here.

Full results from the US Nationals can be found at: http://www.chrisandkori.us/fw/main/US_Nationals_2006_Results-1506.html.