There are only 30 more days to go before the most awaited event on the speedcubing calendar: the World Rubik’s Cube Championship. With around 400 competitors from 34 different countries and a stronger field than ever before, this edition promises to eclipse all the previous ones put together.
This will be my fourth world championship and there’s no need to say that I’m very excited. I’ve always lived up to them with anticipation. As a Rubik’s Cube enthusiast and a seasoned competitor, if this doesn’t get your juices flowing then what else does?
One thing that makes a world championship special is that it always could be your last. Two years is a long time. Maybe in two years time, I’ve moved on to other things or I may not even qualify for the big occasion.
Past experiences
Behind every tournament is a story and world championships are no different. They’re very eventful competitions. The surroundings are usually rather different from a regular competition and give them a sense of importance. People that would otherwise never meet each other, meet for the first time. Some people even get to chat with their idols that inspired them to take up cubing. Cubers are in record breaking form and raise the bar even higher.
Here are some of my recollections from the previous championships.
Toronto 2003
Can you imagine a world championship in which no competitor had ever competed before, except for maybe two or three?
You could say that this championship was mostly the publicity stunt that we needed to get cubing known to the greater public and launch it as an official sport. And with that respect it certainly delivered!
Admittedly, the level of competition was rather poor. The only event people really practiced to a decent standard was 3x3x3 speedsolving. Quite a few people were capable of 15-17 second averages at home but struggled to emulate that on center stage as they found out that there’s more to competing than just being able to solve a cube fast.
One person, however, already understood this months before the championship had started. Dan Knights didn’t prepare for this competition by doing averages in his living room or practicing his algorithms. Instead he did public appearances on the street and on television while showing off solving the cube. He solved a cube while skydiving and even consulted a psychologist. Watching him perform on stage, you could tell even his finger tricks and turning style were designed to hold up better under pressure.
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| Dan Knights coolly solving for the title while all eyes are on him | Jessica Fridrich (2nd), Dan Knights (1st) and David Wesley (3rd) |
This gave him enough edge to stay on top in a final where everyone, including himself, greatly underachieved. But Dan managed to control his nerves just that little bit better. All that meticulous preparation had paid off.
I think it was quite fitting to see Dan lift the trophy because his website and videos were the first of his kind and inspired many a cuber. This victory was a suitable reward for all what he had contributed.
Orlando 2005
As far as I know this is the only competition ever to be held outdoors. Competitors had to battle it out under the blazing East Coast sun. Maybe this partly explains why 8 out of 12 finalists in the 3x3x3 event where based in the US and 6 Western Europeans just missed out on a final spot by placing between 13th and 18th in the semi-final. That certainly hurt!
That is with the exception of French duo Jean Pons and Edouard Chambon, who took 1st and 2nd place while holding off world record holder for 3x3x3 average Shotaro Mackisumi in 3rd place. Jean won the final with a classy 15.10 seconds average, which was unprecedented for an important, big-time final like this.
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| Jean Pons being awarded the trophy by Dan Knights | Edouard Chambon (2nd), Jean Pons (1st) and Shotaro Mackisumi (3rd) |
For me this competition was also the introduction to team blindfolded solving. During a team blindfolded solve, one person is not allowed to see the cube and is holding the cube while blindfolded. He is allowed to move the cube. The other person is not allowed to touch the cube and can only give instructions to his team mate. He is allowed to see the cube.
Ian Winokur was the one who first got me into this style of team solving and we had many tries at it, some of them that ended in tears because we couldn’t stop laughing. 
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| Alexander Ooms doing a team blindfolded solve with Gilles van den Peereboom |
This “event” has become a favorite among many cubers and is a perfect example of how much fun we have together outside the heat of the battle.
Budapest 2007
You can’t go very wrong with holding a world championship in the beautiful, iconic city of Budapest, the home town of the inventor. In the build up to the competition and during the whole weekend everyone was wondering whether professor Ernö Rubik himself was going to turn up at some point.
On Sunday evening there was suddenly a buzz going through the auditorium as if something remarkable had just happened. Then someone stepped up to me and said: “I saw Mr. Rubik! Look, I even snapped a photo of him!”. Moments later he was standing on stage during the winners ceremony of the main events. He looked extremely fit and gave a speech in Hungarian. Everyone stopped breathing for a while and was looking in awe at the man that initiated all this.
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| Mr. Rubik giving a speech at the awards ceremony with an interpreter by his side | The professor autographing cubes and shaking hands at the after party |
The 2007 championship was also a great success story for a very talented cuber from Japan. The Japanese cubers were shadowed by a camera crew who were making a documentary and the expectations on their shoulders were very high. Nervous as they were, they couldn’t fulfill their potential during the early rounds.
But as the tournament progressed, they were gaining in confidence and getting stronger. Yu Nakajima redefined how good you have to be to become world champion by setting a 12.46 seconds average in the final, less than a year after picking up a cube for the first time.
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| Mitsuki Gunji (3rd), Yu Nakajima (1st) and Andrew Kang (2nd) receiving their prize | A very proud Japanese team surrounding champion Yu Nakajima |
Expectations and goals for Düsseldorf 2009
A big competition is always a good time to set new goals and put in that extra bit of effort to try to improve.
The last 12-18 months have been a transition period for me where I tried out many new ideas and made a lot of changes to my technique. While experimenting and going back to basics is necessary from time to time, I think now is the time to stick to my method and just practice a lot.
So here it goes. At the next world championship I want to:
- average under 13s for 3x3x3
- average under 55s for 4x4x4
- average under 1m40s for 5x5x5
- average under 20s for Square-1
- average under 8s for pyraminx
If you check out my recent results, you’ll probably agree that these goals are ambitious but not beyond my capabilities. That’s exactly what good goals should be.
In order to achieve this, I also want to commit myself to put in at least a total of 100 hours of practice. Starting today! I will keep you posted on my progress.
I’m also teaming up with Charlie Cooper and Adam Wills for the mosaic event and we’re determined to come up with something special.
But more than anything, my number one goal will be to enjoy every minute of it!