# Australian Nationals 2016 (Sydney)



## TimMc (Jul 4, 2016)

*Australian Nationals 2016*

*Date: *August 20-21, 2016
*Time: *8:00am to 6:00pm
*Venue: *Turramurra High School
*Events: *Everything except Feet and Clock.
Max 200 competitors.

Thanks UNSW Rubik Society, especially Grant Lian and Nat Seeto, for organising the venue!

For more info and registration:
http://www.speedcubing.com.au/AustralianNationals2016/

Happy cubing,
Tim.


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## FastCubeMaster (Jul 4, 2016)

YEEEEEEEEESS ITS IN SYDNEY CHEAPER FLIGHTS FROM BRISBANE!!!!!!! 

I so hope I can go


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## OLLiver (Jul 4, 2016)

I will fly across the tasman even If I must sleep under bridge


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## TheBrutux168 (Jul 4, 2016)

OMG, yes!


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## Ben Wak (Jul 4, 2016)

Yessssssss
Can we please do feet or clock


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## RhysC (Jul 4, 2016)

Am I the only one disappointed there's no feet or clock? lol


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## Dene (Jul 4, 2016)

RhysC said:


> Am I the only one disappointed there's no feet or clock? lol



Pretty much


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## ottozing (Jul 4, 2016)

RhysC said:


> Am I the only one disappointed there's no *feet* or clock? lol



Even US nats doesn't have feet this year, what chance did you think Australia had? 

anyway, this'll be the first Aus nats I've missed since going to my first one. Can't be too mad though since the weekend before and after I'll be going to competitions in the US with all events and an FMC mo3 ¯\_(ツ)_/¯


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## Ben Wak (Jul 4, 2016)

N


RhysC said:


> Am I the only one disappointed there's no feet or clock? lol


No you are not


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## Kevin Luong (Jul 4, 2016)

yay! Now I just need to find a hotel


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## FastCubeMaster (Jul 4, 2016)

Kevin Luong said:


> yay! Now I just need to find a hotel


Same


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## Justin He (Jul 4, 2016)

Is the date confirmed? Because I'm going away for that weekend and I need to know!


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## Justin He (Jul 4, 2016)

Justin He said:


> Is the date confirmed? Because I'm going away for that weekend and I need to know!


Hopefully the date will change or else I'll be very disappointed 
:|


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## AlexMaass (Jul 4, 2016)

big national championships like these should have all events

interestingly, I'm holding a comp with 3 rounds of feet and 3 rounds of clock on August 20th lol


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## Dene (Jul 4, 2016)

Justin He said:


> Hopefully the date will change or else I'll be very disappointed
> :|



Did you just quote yourself? 

The date is 100% locked in. We aren't about to speculate with something like that.



AlexMaass said:


> big national championships like these should have all events
> 
> interestingly, I'm holding a comp with 3 rounds of feet and 3 rounds of clock on August 20th lol



cool story bro


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## EpiCuber7 (Jul 5, 2016)

If I can't find my main Dayan 2x2 by this time I'm going to be soo mad.
(I lost it about a week ago somewhere at my house and I can't find it...)


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## Nick4nick6 (Jul 5, 2016)

I'm a bit worried that my Term 3 exams may clash with this and I'll be REALLY angry if I cant make this as I already missed Autumn


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## Justin He (Jul 5, 2016)

Nick4nick6 said:


> I'm a bit worried that my Term 3 exams may clash with this and I'll be REALLY angry if I cant make this as I already missed Autumn


same!


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## Nick4nick6 (Jul 5, 2016)

Also Dene, when will this be announced on the speedcubing.com.au website?


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## FastCubeMaster (Jul 5, 2016)

Nick4nick6 said:


> Also Dene, when will this be announced on the speedcubing.com.au website?



Exactly what I was gonna ask


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## Nick4nick6 (Jul 5, 2016)

Kevin Luong said:


> Yeh, and when


I reckon maybe in the next few weeks.



FastCubeMaster said:


> Exactly what I was gonna ask


I reckon in the next few weeks.


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## Kevin Luong (Jul 5, 2016)

Auctually, its July now and August is next month,


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## EpiCuber7 (Jul 5, 2016)

Nick4nick6 said:


> I reckon maybe in the next few weeks.



I can guarantee you it will be up by August 6. It's in the regulations and it has to be announced by then.
Comps are usually annoucned a month before - a month and a bit in NSW, so I'd say sometime in the next few weeks.



Nick4nick6 said:


> ...next few weeks



Oh.
Okay then.


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## Ben Wak (Jul 5, 2016)

I think to make up for this we should have a comp with just feet,clock and 5BLD


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## KamoCubes (Jul 5, 2016)

Omg I'm so mad right now this is the day before I get back from Singapore and my cousins live 3 houses down from the school Cry every Time


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## Themhcuber (Jul 5, 2016)

Hopefully I can podium for square 1 if I go



KamoCubes said:


> Omg I'm so mad right now this is the day before I get back from Singapore and my cousins live 3 houses down from the school Cry every Time


Unlucky every Comp in Sydney coincides with ur holidays or something bro unlucky



TimMc said:


> TBA.
> 
> *Venue: *Turramurra High School
> *Date: *August 20-21
> ...


Is it just you and Dene delegating?


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## TimMc (Jul 5, 2016)

Nick4nick6 said:


> Also Dene, when will this be announced on the speedcubing.com.au website?



It will appear on speedcubing.com.au when it's announced on the WCA website 



Themhcuber said:


> Is it just you and Dene delegating?



Ray and Seb too.

Tim.


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## Kevin Luong (Jul 5, 2016)

Hey, will it be up soon? Estimate the time. Did you already send it to wca?


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## Nick4nick6 (Jul 5, 2016)

Themhcuber said:


> Is it just you and Dene delegating?


well, hey, martin I probably am going so we may meet for the first time


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## Nick4nick6 (Jul 5, 2016)

EpiCuber7 said:


> I can guarantee you it will be up by August 6. It's in the regulations and it has to be announced by then.
> Comps are usually annoucned a month before - a month and a bit in NSW, so I'd say sometime in the next few weeks.
> 
> 
> ...



Yeah. Most comps are announced before the actual date.


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## Nick4nick6 (Jul 5, 2016)

TimMc said:


> It will appear on speedcubing.com.au when it's announced on the WCA website
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Good one.


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## KamoCubes (Jul 5, 2016)

Made this shirt mockup http://imgur.com/0BZVgMr


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## TimMc (Jul 5, 2016)

https://www.worldcubeassociation.org/competitions/AustralianNationals2016


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## FastCubeMaster (Jul 5, 2016)

I'm doing everything except 4BLD and 5BLD and clock!


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## Faz (Jul 5, 2016)

TimMc said:


> *Events: *Everything except Feet and Clock.



Cut skewb and I'll be there.


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## Berd (Jul 5, 2016)

Faz said:


> Cut skewb and I'll be there.


Skewb god.


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## Kevin Luong (Jul 5, 2016)

I love skewb


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## TheBrutux168 (Jul 6, 2016)

Just registered. My first nationals, this gonna be fun.


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## FastCubeMaster (Jul 6, 2016)

TheBrutux168 said:


> Just registered. My first nationals, this gonna be fun.


Same with me, but you average 15 sec OH!?!
Do you use ZZ or something?


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## TheBrutux168 (Jul 6, 2016)

FastCubeMaster said:


> Same with me, but you average 15 sec OH!?!
> Do you use ZZ or something?


I use Roux for OH

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk


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## RhysC (Jul 6, 2016)

Faz said:


> Cut skewb and I'll be there.



Incoming 4 rounds of skewb


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## megaminxwin (Jul 6, 2016)

TimMc said:


> Events: Everything except Feet and Clock.



...why? There's obviously demand in the community for Clock at least, and it's the national championships! I made this point last year, do we really have to deal with this again?


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## ottozing (Jul 6, 2016)

megaminxwin said:


> ...why? There's obviously demand in the community for Clock at least, and it's the national championships! I made this point last year, do we really have to deal with this again?



Pretty sure Dene's only reason for not wanting to hold clock is because of the logistical issues that happened in 2014. That said, clock has ran at 2 Canberra comps since then perfectly fine thanks to having one good clock scrambler for 2 heats and pushing the faster one through for the first heat to help get the first heat done even quicker (I know, what a concept).


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## megaminxwin (Jul 6, 2016)

ottozing said:


> Pretty sure Dene's only reason for not wanting to hold clock is because of the logistical issues that happened in 2014. That said, clock has ran at 2 Canberra comps since then perfectly fine thanks to having one good clock scrambler for 2 heats and pushing the faster one through for the first heat to help get the first heat done even quicker (I know, what a concept).



I mean, if they're strapped for time, do what happened in Canberra this year and have 6 and 7 on simultaneously. That worked really well.

Hell, 4BLD and 5BLD simultaneously if you need to. Don't get rid of quick events that have demand just because you apparently don't like them.


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## FastCubeMaster (Jul 6, 2016)

megaminxwin said:


> I mean, if they're strapped for time, do what happened in Canberra this year and have 6 and 7 on simultaneously. That worked really well.
> 
> Hell, 4BLD and 5BLD simultaneously if you need to. Don't get rid of quick events that have demand just because you apparently don't like them.



I feel bad for you, clock NR holder


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## megaminxwin (Jul 6, 2016)

FastCubeMaster said:


> I feel bad for you, clock NR holder



That doesn't even come into it except maybe subconsciously. It's that a national championship should have every event, otherwise why should it be called a national championship??


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## Dene (Jul 6, 2016)

ottozing said:


> Pretty sure Dene's only reason for not wanting to hold clock is because of the logistical issues that happened in 2014. That said, clock has ran at 2 Canberra comps since then perfectly fine thanks to having one good clock scrambler for 2 heats and pushing the faster one through for the first heat to help get the first heat done even quicker (I know, what a concept).



Ignoring the crude sarcasm because I love ya, to be honest I hadn't even considered the possibility of including clock, and will only do so if it can be guaranteed that we have two competent scramblers (bearing in mind the notation changed a few years ago, although I bet most people don't even realise that...)

The schedule hasn't even been started yet, so what do you think?



Faz said:


> Cut skewb and I'll be there.



urfunny


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## Tommy Kiprillis (Jul 6, 2016)

Themhcuber said:


> Hopefully I can podium for square 1 if I go



what do you average on sq1?


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## bryson azzopard (Jul 6, 2016)

Ill register today sometime when my pay goes in. Only thing i hope for is that the bld events are spread out a decent amount over the 2 days! And that 4bld and 5bld arent run together with an hour limit like 2013, 2014 nats (don't know about 2015 wasnt there) even though i can do it now days its just a pain cramming all that info in that hour! How it was in 2012 was perfect 3bld first round and 5bld day one and 4bld, multi 3bld 2nd round day 2 *cough dene  *


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## Dene (Jul 6, 2016)

@bryson this time we should have much more space and time to have a good spread of events. Although one thing for all bld cubers to note is there won't be any quiet for bld events. You're just gonna have to accept the noise (like it was at Melbourne Central).


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## megaminxwin (Jul 6, 2016)

Dene said:


> Ignoring the crude sarcasm because I love ya, to be honest I hadn't even considered the possibility of including clock, and will only do so if it can be guaranteed that we have two competent scramblers (bearing in mind the notation changed a few years ago, although I bet most people don't even realise that...)
> 
> The schedule hasn't even been started yet, so what do you think?



I like to consider myself fairly competent at clock scrambling, so that's one down.


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## Kevin Luong (Jul 7, 2016)

In 3x3 is it gonna be spread or


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## FastCubeMaster (Jul 7, 2016)

Dene said:


> @bryson this time we should have much more space and time to have a good spread of events. Although one thing for all bld cubers to note is there won't be any quiet for bld events. You're just gonna have to accept the noise (like it was at Melbourne Central).



Thanks for the warning


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## Nick4nick6 (Jul 7, 2016)

Attention Dene or any WCA delegate!

I have apparently registered as a beginner on the WCA website when I go to Competitors and my is in blue (Nicholas Gayed) meaning I would've registered as a first time competitor. I have been to a competition before, Sydney Summer 2015. Then I was generated with the WCA ID 2015GAYE01. It would be greatly appreciated if you could link this with my current WCA ID so I will not be given a new WCA ID after Nationals

-Nicholas


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## RhysC (Jul 7, 2016)

Dene said:


> Ignoring the crude sarcasm because I love ya, to be honest I hadn't even considered the possibility of including clock, and will only do so if it can be guaranteed that we have two competent scramblers



I classify as a competent scrambler (also the new WCA notation ftw)


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## Nick4nick6 (Jul 7, 2016)

pyr14 said:


> perhaps you should email them directly instead of here.
> 
> tim would be preferred im pretty sure.


Thankyou!
I may email one of those delegates.

-Nicholas


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## megaminxwin (Jul 7, 2016)

Wait a minute. What if people weren't able to sign up for clock because they registered before it was put in as an optional event, but do want to do clock?


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## pyr14 (Jul 7, 2016)

megaminxwin said:


> Wait a minute. What if people weren't able to sign up for clock because they registered before it was put in as an optional event, but do want to do clock?



i registered for clock but it got denied. it's a shame clock is not running.


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## FastCubeMaster (Jul 7, 2016)

May I ask what the $20 fee is for? (Just wondering)
Delegate flights, prizes, venue hire?


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## megaminxwin (Jul 7, 2016)

pyr14 said:


> i registered for clock but it got denied. it's a shame clock is not running.



So did mine. God this is confusing.


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## Dene (Jul 7, 2016)

FastCubeMaster said:


> May I ask what the $20 fee is for? (Just wondering)
> Delegate flights, prizes, venue hire?



Like I don't want to be difficult but it's certainly not something we're going to openly discuss on a public forum. If you really care please e-mail us.

I wonder why you're even asking; the only reason I can think of that you'd even consider bringing it up is that you feel it's too high. Is that the case?

FYI, Speedcubing Australia is a registered Not-For-Profit in Australia, and all funds go there. Every cent that goes into SCA goes back into cubing.


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## Dene (Jul 7, 2016)

@Rhys you know I don't wanna be mean but I've heard this kind of thing before (and it rarely goes well). Any chance of posting video proof that you're competent with clocks? Both scrambling and solving. Same goes for anyone pushing for it to be hosted.


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## Dene (Jul 7, 2016)

Kevin Luong said:


> In 3x3 is it gonna be spread or



I don't understand the question. Try again please?


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## FastCubeMaster (Jul 7, 2016)

Dene said:


> I don't understand the question. Try again please?



He's wondering if the 3x3 rounds will be spread evenly throughout the day. Kind've pointless question.


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## FastCubeMaster (Jul 7, 2016)

Dene said:


> Like I don't want to be difficult but it's certainly not something we're going to openly discuss on a public forum. If you really care please e-mail us.
> 
> I wonder why you're even asking; the only reason I can think of that you'd even consider bringing it up is that you feel it's too high. Is that the case?
> 
> FYI, Speedcubing Australia is a registered Not-For-Profit in Australia, and all funds go there. Every cent that goes into SCA goes back into cubing.



Oh, no I can afford it. But I was wondering because some competitions had a fee where other competitions didn't, that made me curious. Didn't realise it was that complicated.


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## Dene (Jul 7, 2016)

FastCubeMaster said:


> Oh, no I can afford it. But I was wondering because some competitions had a fee where other competitions didn't, that made me curious. Didn't realise it was that complicated.



A lot of factors contribute to it. We try to keep fees low... compared to many countries Australia is generally one of the cheapest, and we'd like to keep it that way.


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## Dene (Jul 7, 2016)

FastCubeMaster said:


> He's wondering if the 3x3 rounds will be spread evenly throughout the day. Kind've pointless question.



Dunno I might just have a laugh and do it all in a row.


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## FastCubeMaster (Jul 7, 2016)

Dene said:


> Dunno I might just have a laugh and do it all in a row.



LOL!


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## TimMc (Jul 7, 2016)

pyr14 said:


> i registered for clock but it got denied.



Fixed!

Tim.


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## TimMc (Jul 7, 2016)

Dene said:


> Dunno I might just have a laugh and do it all in a row.



RIP data entry T_T

Tim.


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## pyr14 (Jul 7, 2016)

Dene said:


> Dunno I might just have a laugh and do it all in a row.



score takers, data enterers... BETTER GET A MOVE ON!!! lol


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## bryson azzopard (Jul 7, 2016)

Dene said:


> @bryson this time we should have much more space and time to have a good spread of events. Although one thing for all bld cubers to note is there won't be any quiet for bld events. You're just gonna have to accept the noise (like it was at Melbourne Central).


Id rather spread out events if it means noise im okay with that! For the clock talk i honestly are with you dene for not having it! At canberra we were 1/2 ahead then come clock and 1/2 behind. Although its a fastish event to slove seems to take forever to scramble.


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## Dene (Jul 7, 2016)

bryson azzopard said:


> Id rather spread out events if it means noise im okay with that! For the clock talk i honestly are with you dene for not having it! At canberra we were 1/2 ahead then come clock and 1/2 behind. Although its a fastish event to slove seems to take forever to scramble.



Orly interesting thanks for the insight (others certainly seem to have misrepresented that!). Actually it's super quick to scramble, if you know how and practice it. That's the problem though...


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## megaminxwin (Jul 7, 2016)

Dene said:


> Any chance of posting video proof that you're competent with clocks? Both scrambling and solving. Same goes for anyone pushing for it to be hosted.



For me:


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## KamoCubes (Jul 8, 2016)

Is speedcube.com.au vending at nats and what will the prizes be?


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## Dene (Jul 8, 2016)

@tomas ok good I'll give that a pass. Now I need one other (although preferably multiple of course).



KamoCubes said:


> Is speedcube.com.au vending at nats and what will the prizes be?



At this stage speedcube have confirmed they'll be there. We have no idea what prizes will be.


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## Kevin Luong (Jul 8, 2016)

How many people do you think there will Be?


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## Turbo Chicken (Jul 9, 2016)

Not really sure what competent scrambling is, hopefully this is enough.


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## Dene (Jul 9, 2016)

Hmm maybe you'd make a good assistant scrambler, but that's not fast enough to give it the go ahead (but if it does go ahead, I'll be looking for you to scramble  ).


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## Turbo Chicken (Jul 9, 2016)

Roughly how fast is one required to be in order for clock to be run? I only started doing clock yesterday and have probably done about 120 solves ever so hopefully I can practice enough to be a fast enough scrambler.


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## Dene (Jul 9, 2016)

Turbo Chicken said:


> Roughly how fast is one required to be in order for clock to be run? I only started doing clock yesterday and have probably done about 120 solves ever so hopefully I can practice enough to be a fast enough scrambler.



I'd want at least twice as fast. 

But funny you mention that, because it tells you something. If there's so much demand for clock, and you can get this quick in a day, then why do most people suck? This is why we haven't done clock much...


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## pyr14 (Jul 10, 2016)

Dene said:


> I'd want at least twice as fast.
> 
> But funny you mention that, because it tells you something. If there's so much demand for clock, and you can get this quick in a day, then why do most people suck? This is why we haven't done clock much...



yeah, plus most people have really bad clocks...

this took like 10 years to upload....


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## bryson azzopard (Jul 10, 2016)

So im not fully against clock or anything like i registered for it but ill probably drop out of it but multi-blind has more people registered than clock does so i dont really see the demand for the event that takes miminal time to solve as to an event that goes for upto an hour. So i dont think there really is such a demand for clock with only 13 (12 ill probably drop out) with 91 people registered. Just my opinion


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## Dene (Jul 10, 2016)

@Edbert again you'd make a sufficient back-up, but not suitable as a main scrambler.


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## ottozing (Jul 10, 2016)

bryson azzopard said:


> At canberra we were 1/2 ahead then come clock and 1/2 behind.





Dene said:


> Orly interesting thanks for the insight (others certainly seem to have misrepresented that!)


My b, I guess I just assumed it ran fine because we ended on time without cutting anything at the comp 

In any case, I like that people in this thread are actually trying to get competent at clock instead of just blindly demanding it be run without any intention of helping out, so I owe my thanks to you Dene <3


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## Dene (Jul 10, 2016)

If only you could make it, the clock covers that I spent many hours making wouldn't go to waste after being used only once ^_^


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## RhysC (Jul 10, 2016)

@Dene My PB clock avg is 12.xx and tbh I much prefer the new WCA scrambles and I can confidently scramble using them. I'll try and upload something for you, however my internet is uber-slow so uploading is basically a whole bunch of procrastination ;_;


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## Turbo Chicken (Jul 10, 2016)

Scrambling is roughly 8-10 seconds faster than before now.




Really this is a DNF average because I overinspect pretty much every solve...


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## megaminxwin (Jul 10, 2016)

bryson azzopard said:


> So im not fully against clock or anything like i registered for it but ill probably drop out of it but multi-blind has more people registered than clock does so i dont really see the demand for the event that takes miminal time to solve as to an event that goes for upto an hour. So i dont think there really is such a demand for clock with only 13 (12 ill probably drop out) with 91 people registered. Just my opinion



4BLD and 5BLD combined have less people than clock, and discounting you, 7x7 has the same number as clock. Should we get rid of those as well?


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## Dene (Jul 10, 2016)

@William better, but still needs more work. I'd want someone to be averaging maybe about 10s per scramble before I was confident enough.


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## RhysC (Jul 11, 2016)

Mods pls rename the thread "Dene vs. The Clock Community". (/s)

One thing that I've forgotten to mention is that some people have really poor clock hardware; either way too stiff or way too loose and smooth (no clicks). This can be very detrimental to scrambling quickly. However, if there are decent clocks being scrambled, I think we could fairly confidently hold the event and keep it on time.


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## FastCubeMaster (Jul 11, 2016)

I'm ordering a clock just so that I can enter!
But don't worry, I'll be decent by the time the competition comes.


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## Turbo Chicken (Jul 11, 2016)

Dene said:


> @William better, but still needs more work. I'd want someone to be averaging maybe about 10s per scramble before I was confident enough.


Considering Tomas' scrambles took on average about 13 seconds, it might be hard for a beginner like me to average 10 seconds per scramble... Or anyone else to average 10 seconds per scramble for that matter.


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## Dene (Jul 11, 2016)

Oh dear how sad, someone who only just learnt to solve clock is heartbroken that they can't immediately compete in it. Life is hard sometimes...


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## thatkid (Jul 11, 2016)

https://www.facebook.com/events/1261447577222059/

There's the facebook event for it guys, share it around


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## bryson azzopard (Jul 14, 2016)

Yo dene surely we can have 2 rounds of 3bld this nats considering there is 26 people registered already yeah?


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## FastCubeMaster (Jul 14, 2016)

bryson azzopard said:


> Yo dene surely we can have 2 rounds of 3bld this nats considering there is 26 people registered already yeah?



Yes please


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## Dene (Jul 14, 2016)

It's a possibility. Of course it'd only be 8 people, so better get practising.


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## Kevin Luong (Jul 15, 2016)

Can schedule be up sooner please?


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## pyr14 (Jul 15, 2016)

Kevin Luong said:


> Can schedule be up sooner please?


schedules are easier to make when max competitor limit reached or registration closes. that way they can know how long they should make an event with the confirmed amount of competitors for each event.


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## Dene (Jul 15, 2016)

Kevin Luong said:


> Can schedule be up sooner please?



Just clarifying, sooner that what, exactly?


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## OLLiver (Jul 19, 2016)

Anyone know of any hostels near the venue? or other cheap places to stay?


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## OLLiver (Jul 19, 2016)

Soz for double post but, Dene/Tim any chance I can registration on sat a bit late as my flight would land in the morning and I could be there late?


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## bryson azzopard (Jul 19, 2016)

Also we doing fmc mean or just single?


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## Ben Wak (Jul 19, 2016)

Anyone willing to take me from Melbourne to Sydney 
LoL I probley won't be able to go anyway


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## Dene (Jul 19, 2016)

@OLLiver google knows. Also that's fine, as always we'll have peeps showing up late. Just make sure you register when you get there.

@bryson azzopard probably single, but we'll see what we have time for. We'll do 2 or 3 solves if we can. After all, all that time we make up not doing clock has to go somewhere


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## bryson azzopard (Jul 20, 2016)

Dene said:


> @OLLiver google knows. Also that's fine, as always we'll have peeps showing up late. Just make sure you register when you get there.
> 
> @bryson azzopard probably single, but we'll see what we have time for. We'll do 2 or 3 solves if we can. After all, all that time we make up not doing clock has to go somewhere


I think we should have 2 multi attempts this year and just single for fmc, that'd be a good use of clock time, agreed dene


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## Tommy Kiprillis (Jul 31, 2016)

@Dene @TimMc 
do you know when the schedule is going to be up?


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## FastCubeMaster (Jul 31, 2016)

Tommy Kiprillis said:


> @Dene @TimMc
> do you know when the schedule is going to be up?



When registration has closed.


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## RhysC (Jul 31, 2016)

Schedule I predict will be announced August 13


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## Dene (Jul 31, 2016)

Tommy Kiprillis said:


> @Dene @TimMc
> do you know when the schedule is going to be up?



Not sure, but hopefully sooner rather than later.


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## Dene (Aug 2, 2016)

By the way guys, if you were thinking of putting off registering, we're not far off maxing out, so I suggest you do it asap!


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## FastCubeMaster (Aug 3, 2016)

Dene or Tim, can I please Register for clock, because I have already registered for the competition but I have now decided to do clock.
Thanks.


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## Dene (Aug 3, 2016)

We aren't doing clock so don't worry about it.


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## megaminxwin (Aug 8, 2016)

Dene said:


> We aren't doing clock so don't worry about it.



Then I vote we don't do 7x7, 4BLD, 5BLD, or MBLD, since those have equal or lesser numbers and take longer to do.


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## Dene (Aug 8, 2016)

lol funny, you think it's a vote, haha


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## megaminxwin (Aug 9, 2016)

Dene said:


> lol funny, you think it's a vote, haha



Then give me a reason why Australian _Nationals _won't have clock, but will have less popular events, even though it should have every event since it's a national championship. That's the whole point of nationals, to find out the best in every event.

And if it's just a name, why bother calling it nationals? Why not just call it "Sydney Winter 2016" or whatever?


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## Dene (Aug 9, 2016)

tbh, what you're saying doesn't really make much sense. Nothing obliges a national competition to have every event. Since when was the "whole point" of nationals to find the best in every event? Also, fyi we've never had feet at nationals but I don't see you fighting for that.

Why shouldn't we call it nationals? You're right, it is just a name. None of it means anything, other than a few people being able to say, if they so desire, that at the competition we decided to call "nationals" they won a particular event. The only thing that really differentiates it from other competitions is we deliberately make the time to do more events, more rounds, and have better prizes and things. Other than that there's nothing special about it.


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## RhysC (Aug 9, 2016)

Schedules up, woo for FMC mo3


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## Dene (Aug 9, 2016)

RhysC said:


> Schedules up, woo for FMC mo3



Gee wizz Rhys you don't even give us time to make sure it's 100% ok before you notice it's up. Anyway, that's pretty much it.

Everyone please note that we've put rough estimates for groups, by first name of course. There's lots of overlap between the two stages so make sure you know exactly where you need to be, at what time. If you have a clash we'll make it work so don't stress.

TAKE SOME GOOD ADVICE and please _write down_ your own personal schedule so you know exactly what you'll be doing across the weekend.


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## bryson azzopard (Aug 9, 2016)

Yo dene thought you said the bld events are going to be spread out but multi is on the same day as 4bld and 5bld even if it is near the end of the day! Surely it can be swapped with fmc man? To give as competitive bld solvers a good chance at a good attempt


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## Dene (Aug 9, 2016)

Yea sorry Bryson, I did my best but that's the way it panned out. Originally I had 4 and 5bld on Sunday, but it wasn't working; we simply don't have enough time.

Unfortunately we can't swap FMC and multi because we need both stages for FMC (with 50 people competing, we need more than 6 tables!)


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## FastCubeMaster (Aug 9, 2016)

Is multi blind 10mins per cube up to 60mins like normal? Because it just says 1hr total on the time limit


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## bryson azzopard (Aug 9, 2016)

Dene said:


> Yea sorry Bryson, I did myt that's the way it panned out. Originally I had 4 and 5bld on Sunday, but it wasn't working; we simply don't have enough time.
> 
> Unfortunately we can't swap FMC and multi because we need both stages for FMC (with 50 people competing, we need more than 6 tables!)


All good hopefully i can forget all my memo in my rooms then so i can stills


Dene said:


> Yea sorry Bryson, I did my best but that's the way it panned out. Originally I had 4 and 5bld on Sunday, but it wasn't working; we simply don't have enough time.
> 
> Unfortunately we can't swap FMC and multi because we need both stages for FMC (with 50 people competing, we need more than 6 tables!)


Dang all good though worth a shoot in asking . Hopefully i forget my memo in rooms for multi otherwise my 15+ attempt will turn into like 8 haha


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## megaminxwin (Aug 10, 2016)

Dene said:


> tbh, what you're saying doesn't really make much sense. Nothing obliges a national competition to have every event. Since when was the "whole point" of nationals to find the best in every event? Also, fyi we've never had feet at nationals but I don't see you fighting for that.
> 
> Why shouldn't we call it nationals? You're right, it is just a name. None of it means anything, other than a few people being able to say, if they so desire, that at the competition we decided to call "nationals" they won a particular event. The only thing that really differentiates it from other competitions is we deliberately make the time to do more events, more rounds, and have better prizes and things. Other than that there's nothing special about it.



When people hear "national championship", what are they going to think? They're going to think that this is the biggest competition of the year, and that the purpose is to find the best people in each event in the country. Could you at least attempt to go along with that? By the way, I would be advocating for feet as well, but I figured it would be way too difficult to convince you there.

Sure, it might not mean anything, but people expect it to. Call them stupid for having false expectations, but that's what they're going to think. So of course they'll think that the winner of nationals is the national champion. The least you could do there is have a national champion for every event.


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## David Zemdegs (Aug 10, 2016)

I guess we are learning that as competitions get bigger there are greater organisational and logistic challenges. Maybe we are getting to a stage where we need to look at our 'Nationals' being three day competitions? And with that should we mirror Europe etc and only have them every two years? Food for thought...


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## FastCubeMaster (Aug 10, 2016)

If we have 3 day competitions, we should try and get it done on the holidays, so there's no missed school, not many people are busy etc...


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## Gpermfan123 (Aug 10, 2016)

Kevin Luong said:


> Can schedule be up sooner please?


Yeah need to know if i should go to the 2 days of comp for my events


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## hamfaceman (Aug 10, 2016)

Gpermfan123 said:


> Yeah need to know if i should go to the 2 days of comp for my events


The schedule already is up.


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## Dene (Aug 10, 2016)

megaminxwin said:


> When people hear "national championship", what are they going to think? They're going to think that this is the biggest competition of the year, and that the purpose is to find the best people in each event in the country. Could you at least attempt to go along with that? By the way, I would be advocating for feet as well, but I figured it would be way too difficult to convince you there.
> 
> Sure, it might not mean anything, but people expect it to. Call them stupid for having false expectations, but that's what they're going to think. So of course they'll think that the winner of nationals is the national champion. The least you could do there is have a national champion for every event.



I dunno... you're the only one complaining, so I don't know if too many other people are thinking "every event". Certainly I expect people to think "big competition" "lots of people" "lots of events/rounds", and other things along those lines, but who knows?

I mean, you can whinge all you like because we're not doing clock, but what you're saying is out of touch with reality. Might I direct you towards US Nationals, one of the biggest yearly events on the planet, which still never does feet? Or perhaps Dutch Nationals this year, delegated by the one and only Ron van Bruchem, which doesn't even have half the events?

The WCA has no rules for what dictates something to be a "national" competition. If such rules exist in the future we'll follow them, but until then we can do what we like. I gave everyone the chance to prove that doing clock would be feasible and the Australian community didn't pull through, which makes me think the Australian community doesn't generally care.

At the end of the day, nothing's stopping you having a chat with Ray and organising a competition with multiple rounds of clock yourself. You never know, you might even get enough people to have three rounds


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## Dene (Aug 10, 2016)

FastCubeMaster said:


> Is multi blind 10mins per cube up to 60mins like normal? Because it just says 1hr total on the time limit



We will of course be following every WCA regulation, as always.


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## AlexMaass (Aug 10, 2016)

Dene said:


> Might I direct you towards US Nationals, one of the biggest yearly events on the planet, which still never does feet


 I think this is the first year that they decided to not do feet (excluding like 2004 era or whatever)


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## cubizh (Aug 10, 2016)

Looking from the outside, so therefore without an inside knowledge, there are a few things I have to comment on:


Speedcubing Australia and UNSW Rubik Society are the organizers of this competition, so they are responsable for what events take place or not, the schedule and the venue. The delegates (there are 4 for this competition) are also involved in this decision and their decision should be respected. Organizing a competition with 200 competitors is not an easy task at all and you have to deal with a lot of pressure with scheduling and having enough people to help and have things run smoothly, so there is no doubt some sacrifices that have to be made, either in number rounds or events to take place.

There is no regulation (official or unofficial) at this point in time that says that a "National" or "Continental" championship should have all events or any events for that matter. It is up to the organizer(s) and delegate(s) to decide what to hold or not to and in what duration. There is also no written convention at this time in naming competitions to have special connotations (besides the unwritten rules of common sense). So even though it is called "Nationals" it should not be understood any differently than any other competition (even if the common competitor feels differently about this competition or attracts more spectators and media, and competitors are more compelled to do good at it).

In national championships (as advertised), it is however common practice in WCA competitions to do it at most once a year (as you can't repeat competition names within the same year) and with a duration of two or more days. It is also common to only give out awards to local competitors and call them national champions. However this is not mandatory, but again up to the organizer(s)/delegate(s).

Some organizers and delegates prefer to focus more on popular events and offer more rounds of said events for more people than holding all or most events, where eventually other fewer people would participate in. It doesn't go against the WCA spirit and mission, as long as it's done fairly.

Even though the delegates and organizers have the ultimate power to decide, I think they also have to be open to criticism and suggestions in a non condescending way from members of the community and take it as a chance to improve their procedures for future events.

I have to say it has been very awkward to read this thread, regarding the addition or not of the Rubik's Clock event. Again, from the outside, reading this thread seems like it's a single man's competition that holds all the power to do whatever the hell he wants with it, regardless of what anyone might say or do and everyone else is an attention demanding child. This doesn't look like a very healthy and desirable public approach to me, be it true or not, and does not help solve any problem or explain anything.

I've also found very awkward the search for multiple fast scramblers as the reason to not hold an event, considering the argument of very few people interested in clock solving. Fast clock scramblers should not really make a difference because not a lot of competitors would participate anyway, from what is inferred, and there is always the possibility to cap the number of competitors that participate in any given event. I have found that clock is the easiest puzzle to teach how to scramble, even to people that do not use english notation and are under 6 years old, so the only reason I can find that it's hard to find people to scramble clock to be people that just don't know how to solve it in the first place. If you know how to solve clock, scrambling should be obvious, if you know the english abbreviations for directions and can count to 6. Also, considering that this competition has 4 WCA Delegates participating, I don't really like to see that an event wouldn't take place just because one couldn't find a scrambler, fast or not, either being for not knowing the notation or unwillingness to cooperate in such a way.

I get the feeling, true or not, that one of the reasons this event is not held is because if it was, lots of people would consider registering, without really caring for the event, just to try it out in what could be considered a giant time waste. I don't think this in itself should be a reason to disregard the event, as for some people only competing can you get motivated by comparing to others and these competitors end up having fun and compete. And if people register to it, well, it seems people actually care enough to register for it. It can always be controlled by stricter time limits and cutoffs, beyond competitor limit. I think a much more valid justification for not holding this event would not be lack of popularity, but could primarily be the lack of proper clock covers and the time and difficulty to verify clock hardware legality. Poor venue conditions or not enough qualified judging could also be a factor, but not so much.

Regarding the events choice and scheduling, again I'm sorry to say, but I have to agree that it does look odd, after this whole discussion, to see 1h30m of competition scheduling time be dedicated exclusively to only 7 registered competitors, for big blinds and 30 minutes for a workshop, without any concurrent events. I will assume the lack of concurrent events be because of not having side room or timers or not enough staff? 

Despite that, none of the decisions that have been taken are illegal under the current regulations. They may be questionable, but that judgement can only really be made by individual members of the local community, but they don't violate any rules that are set at this time. Delegates are supposed to decide in the best interest of the community and use fair judgement even if it sometimes goes against their personal choices. You can't however punish delegates or organizers for choosing certain events in favour of others.

megaminxwin, I cannot but feel bad for you or really any fast competitor that puts enough time to practice and get really good at any given event, isn't able to compete, improve his times and explore their own limits with the regularity of others, just because their event of choice is not popular enough comparatively.

However, if you are really interested in competing in this event and have the chance to compete for a national title for Rubik's Clock, I would like to suggest you to find a venue, gather a team, contact a delegate and organize a competition, and that you call it "Australian Clock Nationals" or something similar, where the winner of the event receives a national champion trophy in that event. If the current Australian Nationals competition does not hold this event, it should not prevent the existence of a national title to be given at another point in time, in another competition. In fact, you can think a Clock Nationals competition name (as was said before, competition names are just that, names, as long as they are pertinent to the competition details) would be much more impactful than just holding it with the rest of the other events. You could hold other side events and put clock as main event. I understand it's not desirable, but it is a possible solution for this or other less frequently attended events.

As you've seen, it's not easy to have an event in competitions when not a lot of people are interested in it, or a competition at all without support. Therefore, I think it would be a nice opportunity to try to make more people interested in the event, practice and getting good times on it. I would like to suggest that if you organize a competition with Clock, you establish worthwhile prizes for the event (monetary or puzzles) to people who achieve a certain goal, say for all achieving a sub-10 or sub-9 average or to the top 5 averages.

This is more of a general reflection and not exactly directed to this thread or community in particular, but I think this is a good example of the importance to stress that everyone should learn how to properly judge and scramble and help out whenever they can, so that competitions can have more events and rounds and organizers have less arguments to cut down because of time constraints.


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## Dene (Aug 10, 2016)

AlexMaass said:


> I think this is the first year that they decided to not do feet (excluding like 2004 era or whatever)



Ah, I'm too old school. I was under the impression that the old rule of never doing feet had continued to apply since I had been there but I guess not. But this definitely isn't the first year.


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## Tommy Kiprillis (Aug 11, 2016)

@Dene what is the Workshop on about?


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## Dene (Aug 11, 2016)

Tommy Kiprillis said:


> @Dene what is the Workshop on about?



Not sure yet, to be honest  We mostly just left open the opportunity to have something at the end of the day to wind it up. If something happens, it'll probably be announced on the day.


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## Dene (Aug 11, 2016)

cubizh said:


> Even though the delegates and organizers have the ultimate power to decide, I think they also have to be open to criticism and suggestions in a non condescending way from members of the community and take it as a chance to improve their procedures for future events.



Yes indeed, exactly why we dropped clock, after it went abysmally last time we tried.



cubizh said:


> I've also found very awkward the search for multiple fast scramblers as the reason to not hold an event, considering the argument of very few people interested in clock solving. Fast clock scramblers should not really make a difference because not a lot of competitors would participate anyway, from what is inferred, and there is always the possibility to cap the number of competitors that participate in any given event.



The problem is we have a history of problems with the event. In short, the responsibility of scrambling has tended to get dumped on me, and I would consider myself to be subpar at best. I'm a slow clock scrambler, and I never practise it so I'm a slow solver too (which is necessary when I inevitably scramble it wrong). Trying to scramble for 20 people by myself will take a very long time (as is what happened a couple of years ago (although I had a couple of helpers back then, they were worse than me!))



cubizh said:


> I get the feeling, true or not, that one of the reasons this event is not held is because if it was, lots of people would consider registering, without really caring for the event, just to try it out in what could be considered a giant time waste. I don't think this in itself should be a reason to disregard the event, as for some people only competing can you get motivated by comparing to others and these competitors end up having fun and compete. And if people register to it, well, it seems people actually care enough to register for it. It can always be controlled by stricter time limits and cutoffs, beyond competitor limit. I think a much more valid justification for not holding this event would not be lack of popularity, but could primarily be the lack of proper clock covers and the time and difficulty to verify clock hardware legality.



Clearly what you're saying is void because we had registration available for clock (fyi 20 people registered; 10% of the total competitors). Also if that was the reason, we wouldn't do skewb or 2x2 either. And it's not due to lack of popularity, because we're holding less popular events. In short, what you're saying just doesn't make any sense.

Oh btw, what made the competition a couple of years ago so heartbreaking to me was that I had invested many hours of my time making these awesome clock covers which have never been used since because I was let down by the so-called clock lovers.



cubizh said:


> Regarding the events choice and scheduling, again I'm sorry to say, but I have to agree that it does look odd, after this whole discussion, to see 1h30m of competition scheduling time be dedicated exclusively to only 7 registered competitors, for big blinds and 30 minutes for a workshop, without any concurrent events. I will assume the lack of concurrent events be because of not having side room or timers or not enough staff?



You'll notice that time is overlapping with registration and the welcome ceremony, which tbh is a bit of a slap in the face to those competitors, but we had to do it or miss out entirely. Anyway, if you made me pick between clock or 4+5bld, I would always choose the latter, because we have a small, yet dedicated community here that have proven their commitment to those events over the years. The same can't be said for the clock "community" (which appears to be one person).

As for the workshop, that's just a little extra thing we're considering (which may or may not go ahead). We have to have the venue completely cleared out by 7pm, so we absolutely have to stop all competition by 6. It's easy enough to have a little something extra going on out of the way, but we can't be running events that close to closing time.


Anyway, hopefully that gives you a bit more insight (although my vague responses may have left you with more questions than answers


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## Turbo Chicken (Aug 11, 2016)

Dene said:


> The problem is we have a history of problems with the event. In short, the responsibility of scrambling has tended to get dumped on me, and I would consider myself to be subpar at best. I'm a slow clock scrambler, and I never practise it so I'm a slow solver too (which is necessary when I inevitably scramble it wrong). Trying to scramble for 20 people by myself will take a very long time (as is what happened a couple of years ago (although I had a couple of helpers back then, they were worse than me!))


Tomas scrambles quite quickly, and I can scramble maybe sub-14ish on average, and I'm sure we'd both be willing to scramble. I still respect your decision though, since you obviously know much more than me about organising competitions.


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## cubizh (Aug 13, 2016)

Dene said:


> Anyway, hopefully that gives you a bit more insight (although my vague responses may have left you with more questions than answers


No, some of your replies and answers were informative and to the most part understandable from an organizational point of view. I wish you could have made some of them sooner or right off the bat, so it would prevent some of the ensuing replies that were made in this thread.


Dene said:


> The problem is we have a history of problems with the event. In short, the responsibility of scrambling has tended to get dumped on me, and I would consider myself to be subpar at best. I'm a slow clock scrambler, and I never practise it so I'm a slow solver too (which is necessary when I inevitably scramble it wrong). Trying to scramble for 20 people by myself will take a very long time (as is what happened a couple of years ago (although I had a couple of helpers back then, they were worse than me!))





Dene said:


> Oh btw, what made the competition a couple of years ago so heartbreaking to me was that I had invested many hours of my time making these awesome clock covers which have never been used since because I was let down by the so-called clock lovers.


This is undoubtedly one of the worst feelings an organizer can get and it does make one angry and upset with people, wanting to never hold certain events again. It's really not easy when you're pressured with time and have responsibilities towards the venue and having to carry the whole thing. Only when you endure it, you really know how hard it is to manage. I have felt this myself, not exactly with Clock, but with other events, so I perfectly understand where this comes from.
However, I think it should be fair to point out that it's not ideal that future competitions and competitors should always have to pay for mistakes made in the past, without any chance for redemption and to do things right on a bigger competition like the Nationals. I am not saying this should be done right now, but it's something to always keep considering and re-evaluating. I have had some success in the past in this regard.


Dene said:


> Clearly what you're saying is void because we had registration available for clock (fyi 20 people registered; 10% of the total competitors). Also if that was the reason, we wouldn't do skewb or 2x2 either. And it's not due to lack of popularity, because we're holding less popular events. In short, what you're saying just doesn't make any sense.





Dene said:


> (...) because we have a small, yet dedicated community here that have proven their commitment to those events over the years. The same can't be said for the clock "community" (which appears to be one person).


Unless I am missing something you are not saying, given that, as you said, 20 people registered for this event, it's very strange that you are reducing these 20 people to only 1 actual person. How are you measuring this? Is it because how vocal they are for missing the event or that they are not generally fast enough? Or are these other people that registered known for not helping out and have a general feel of disregard for helping procedures of the event?
If the latter is the case, and if you want to reduce people registering for events without any care or desire to help out, I would like to suggest that you could, at event registration, for all or just certain events, where you have witnessed this in the past, you create a checkbox saying something like: By registering in this event, I am fully aware and familiar with the current WCA notation and know how to scramble with it for this event, and understand that I can be disqualified from the competition if I am called and can't properly scramble (by 1f2)).
If people are made aware that they must know the notation and scramble before they register for the event, given the history, and that notation information is given to them, it could deter people not really interested enough in the event or helping out with scrambling to not register for it at all, and if they still do it, I don't think it's infeasible to start applying 1f2) in this case.
Even if you don't hold the event, it can probably give you a more precise indication of how popular and how committed people are in having the event than a feeling that may (or may not) be accurate.

Of course, it's just an idea that the organization team could possibly introduce in the future to make things more clear and minimize the development of negative interactions and comments regarding certain tough choices that are made by the organization and more easily answer some of the natural questions that inevitably always appear about them, without letting posts escalate into people potentially thinking that delegates/organizers are biased, and competitors asking questions just being annoying little kids that can't shut up about it.

The last point I would like to reiterate is that people should really get motivated to help judging and learn how to scramble well for the events they participate in and use them while practising. It is proven that with hand scrambling only, you end up not doing a really good job at it, and you don't get the proper distribution of cases that a random state scramble can give you, so technically you are missing out on some of the fun by only hand scrambling.


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## OLLiver (Aug 13, 2016)

@Dene slightly unrelated to aus nats (which look real good btw), but I have secured a venue for a Christchurch comp in december, its a really good venue. you choose the weekend in december and we can make this comp happen. I think you'll have to be the delegate as alex is vary busy till next year.


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## Dene (Aug 14, 2016)

@cubizh I don't think anything I said to you is new to Tomas, who's the only one whinging about the lack of clock.

And you're right that the reasonable thing to do is to give peeps another chance, hence my seeking scramblers! As you can see for yourself, that didn't go well at all. It also isn't helped by Bryson's piece of evidence that things didn't go well during clock at a recent competition.

The reason I'm referring to a one-person clock community, is because there appears to be only one person who strongly cares about it. Of course there could be others who aren't on the forums, but to the best of my knowledge we haven't been flooded with e-mails from people outraged at clock being excluded.

However I love your suggestion about putting a message next to the event in the registration process. That's a great idea and I'll certainly look to use it in the future, thanks!

@OLLiver you're right, this absolutely isn't the correct place. Can you e-mail me and the other NZ delegates about it?


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## peterkip (Aug 23, 2016)

I have uploaded some photos from the comp which include pics of most the presentations https://www.flickr.com/photos/[email protected]/sets/72157671599034600/


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## Dene (Aug 23, 2016)

Cool thanks!


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## KamoCubes (Aug 24, 2016)

Is there going to be a thread for Canberra Spring 2k16 ? And also why clock instead of 2x2 (as 2x2's a more popular event but i know it does draw the noobs in)


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## FastCubeMaster (Aug 24, 2016)

KamoCubes said:


> Is there going to be a thread for Canberra Spring 2k16 ? And also why clock instead of 2x2 (as 2x2's a more popular event but i know it does draw the noobs in)



Why don't you make one and ask there?


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## RhysC (Aug 24, 2016)

KamoCubes said:


> Is there going to be a thread for Canberra Spring 2k16 ? And also why clock instead of 2x2



Clock > 2x2, also Australia almost always has 2x2 and almost never has clock soooo


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## megaminxwin (Aug 24, 2016)

RhysC said:


> Clock > 2x2, also Australia almost always has 2x2 and almost never has clock soooo



<3

wooooo clock


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