Muscle memory, rote learning and luck are key to world-record times
IT WAS hailed as the world’s first “sub-4”. On November 24th 2018, Yusheng Du, a Chinese Rubik’s Cube enthusiast, solved a standard 3x3x3 cube in an astonishing 3.47 seconds. The feat, now an official Guinness World Record, smashed the previous record by 0.75 seconds. Today, at the World Cube Association’s World Championship in Melbourne, Australia, hundreds of eager “speedcubers” will try—and probably fail—to twist their way to a new record.
Speedcubing is a relatively new phenomenon. Erno Rubik, a Hungarian scientist, patented the original cube in 1974 . Made up of nine coloured squares on each of its six faces, the cube rotates around a central axis. By twisting the sides, the cube’s colours can be scrambled and unscrambled. When solved, each side of the cube is a solid colour.After a global craze in the 1980s, the puzzle’s popularity gradually faded; it was propelled back from oblivion by the internet.
The techniques to solving a Rubik’s Cube include the Corners-First method, The Petrus method and the CFOP method . Although the classic 3x3x3 cube has a mind-boggling number of possible configurations , solving it never requires more than 20 moves; most configurations require just 18. But for speedcubers, there are other factors to consider. The WCA allows players to lubricate and sand their cubes’ twisting mechanisms to improve their times.
For some, a puzzle that was initially designed to stimulate complex mathematical calculations has become a fiercely competitive test of muscle memory, rote learning and luck . For others, speedcubing is more light-hearted. Last year a 13-year-old Chinese boy went viral after setting world records for solving three Rubik’s Cubes simultaneously while juggling them or by using both hands and feet .
Mr Yusheng, for his part, may have room for improvement. In 2016 a German-built robot solved the puzzle in a blur lasting 0.637 seconds. In March 2018 a robot built by two MIT engineering students, Ben Katz and Jared Di Carlo, did better still. The machine, which was outfitted with PlayStation Eye cameras and could execute a move in 15 milliseconds, solved the puzzle in just 0.38 seconds.
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