# How I Learned F2L



## Lucas Garron (Dec 5, 2010)

When aah staahted cubin', in the good' ol' days, we didn't have no fancy tools for learnin' to get fast. And when we wanted to laahrn F2L, there wa'n't no good place wi' good, printable algs. Aah had to make mah alg sheet mahself, so aah went ove' ta good ol' Macky's site, copied his F2L page inta Word, and made mahself an alg sheet.

And back then, we di'n't have silly distinct'ns like "intuitive" and "algorithmic" F2L. Ya just learned ta do it, plain an' simple. Aah printed out that sheet, kept doin' the algs there oveh' and oveh' until aah memorized 'em, and then understood 'em. It was real work, kiddos, finding out what ya had ta learn, and HOW ya were supposed to learn it. None a' this "wat do i do next, plz hlp" bizzness.

Anyhow, hope that helps y'all understand a bit a' what i' meant to be a cuber in those days, and whaa we don't take too kindly to y'all bein' too lazy to do ya' own work.

Anyhow, aah recently found that old alg sheet o' mine on mah hard drive. I know I still got that phys'cal copy lyin' around in an old book, but aah thought ya might appreciate ta know what it looked like, so here's a PDF: http://archive.garron.us/pdf/2006/how_lgarron_learned_F2L.pdf (Aug. 15, 2006)
(Tha's right, it didn't even have mah own _color scheme_. Ya had to be flexible those days ta learn from a Japanese site.)


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## Chrish (Dec 5, 2010)

Dear jebus

link doesn't work for me btw


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## Ranzha (Dec 5, 2010)

Link doesn't work. 403 error when I try the root directory.


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## blah (Dec 5, 2010)

Now if only you actually talked like that in real life with your half-German-ish accent.


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## Sa967St (Dec 5, 2010)

Ohey that's how I learned F2L too , except I used algs from cubestation.co.uk instead of Macky's site.


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## Edward (Dec 5, 2010)

Not exactly how I learned (using intuitive) but I certainly wasn't being lazy and just asking D:


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## cmhardw (Dec 5, 2010)

Aah learned mah F2L algs from the source


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## Tyjet66 (Dec 5, 2010)

Lucas Garron said:


> When aah staahted cubin', in the good' ol' days, we didn't have no fancy tools for learnin' to get fast. And when we wanted to laahrn F2L, there wa'n't no good place wi' good, printable algs. Aah had to make mah alg sheet mahself, so aah went ove' ta good ol' Macky's site, copied his F2L page inta Word, and made mahself an alg sheet.
> 
> And back then, we di'n't have silly distinct'ns like "intuitive" and "algorithmic" F2L. Ya just learned ta do it, plain an' simple. Aah printed out that sheet, kept doin' the algs there oveh' and oveh' until aah memorized 'em, and then understood 'em. It was real work, kiddos, finding out what ya had ta learn, and HOW ya were supposed to learn it. None a' this "wat do i do next, plz hlp" bizzness.
> 
> ...


 
I was unable to finish reading even a 1/4 of this post...


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## Cool Frog (Dec 5, 2010)

Tyjet66 said:


> I was unable to finish reading even a 1/4 of this post...


 
Ditto
All I was able to read was the link and the title. Intuitive F2L... I wonder if they both take the same amount of time to learn?


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## StachuK1992 (Dec 5, 2010)

Heck, even ~3 years ago when I started, you had to look around to get good sources.
Personally, I used the link Chris provided, and then only later on was able to switch to "intuitive" F2L. Nowadays, one can just go on the wiki, type in F2L, and have F2L provided on a platter for them.
It's fantastic in some ways because newcomers can learn faster, but also comes with the price of not getting that satisfaction of discovery when YOU "figure out" how to do a certain case without some fancy schmancy algorithm.

I still have the majority of the papers I used, about F2L, OLL, PLL...actually, I have some CLL and ELL sites printed out from 2007!

As cubing progresses, there will always be those who ask and those who find; I'm sure back in the early cubing days there were those that simply swooped onto the Yahoo! group and asked away as many of us did?

-statue


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## Joël (Dec 5, 2010)

cmhardw said:


> Aah learned mah F2L algs from the source


 
That's where aaah started tooo! With the algs "upsahde-down"!

And yeah, intuitive vs algo F2L is the biggest BS going on on this forum! Well spoken.


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## Evan_Frame (Dec 5, 2010)

Let me get this straight, 'Back in the day' you went to some other guy's site and "copied his sheet"? Then repeated and memorized the algorithms?

Wow. That's impressive. Totally not like it is now, where you go to someone else's site, copy their algorithms and do them over and over till you have them memorized. 'Back in the day' sounds cool.


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## Deleted member 2864 (Dec 5, 2010)

Go vets.

I had badmephisto, so it was easy for me.


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## Kirjava (Dec 5, 2010)

websites are for noobs, I taught myself.


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## Chrish (Dec 5, 2010)

Kirjava said:


> websites are for noobs, I taught myself.


Mhmm


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## MichaelP. (Dec 5, 2010)

Kirjava said:


> websites are for noobs, I taught myself.



Sick bro.


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## Kirjava (Dec 5, 2010)

Chrish said:


> Mhmm


 
hm?


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## cmhardw (Dec 5, 2010)

Evan_Frame said:


> Let me get this straight, 'Back in the day' you went to some other guy's site and "copied his sheet"? Then repeated and memorized the algorithms?
> 
> Wow. That's impressive. Totally not like it is now, where you go to someone else's site, copy their algorithms and do them over and over till you have them memorized. 'Back in the day' sounds cool.


 
It's funny that you mention this, because we second generation cubers got the same reaction from the first generation cubers who started in the 80's. Most of them discovered or invented _all_ of their algorithms either alone or in working with only a handful of other people. The fact that we second generation cubers learned off their websites was seen as a hack way to approach it even back then.

Lucas' comment, if I may infer and Lucas please correct me if I'm wrong, is mostly directed toward the way that the questions coming out on the forum tend to reflect a person having done little or no work at all to "look around" the cubing world and see what is out there. Questions are of the format "Make me faster PLZ. Where do I go to become awesome?" not "I have tried Website X, Website Y, and Website Z. I like some things from each, but where do I go to learn more about steps 1 and 2 from website A, etc..."

Thoughtful questions will more often than not bring thoughtful answers. And to answer your questions, some of us asked the same kinds of stupid questions back in the day and were berated by the first generation cubers for it *raises hand*

@Joël: Completely agree. I learned F2L algorithmically first, then later came to an understanding of the algs. As far as I can tell I haven't yet burst into a firey ball of failure raining sadness, baby tears, and cubie pieces all over my computer keyboard.


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## Erik (Dec 5, 2010)

Oh the good old days *dream dream* you could be world class with just sub-20...


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## BigSams (Dec 5, 2010)

Erik said:


> Oh the good old days *dream dream* you could be world class with just sub-20...


 
I lol'd.

I remember learning stuff from cubeloop and "the source". Man that stuff feels outdated now.
@cmhardw even the first generation had outside resources, it's not like they were all brilliant from the start. Fridrich herself said on her site that her method was published in its entirety in a magazine and that certain champs back then learned several methods.


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## irontwig (Dec 5, 2010)

I learned F2L from this: https://twistypuzzles.qwknetllc.com/solutions/3x3x3-01/3x3x3-01-step2.shtml


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## LearningCode (Dec 5, 2010)

I remember learning F2L on my own.. <.<
I used to get sub-50 solves and it was the fastest of anyone in my school xD

I was still using the beginners' method.
I then saw that one of my slower friends was using a method different from mine.

I asked and he explained the gist of it. (Keyword: Gist)
From then, I continued to practice solving using F2L and never referred to an algorithm or web-page once! ^^

It made me go real slow, like, took me 3minutes to solve the cube ><
But after a lot of practice, my times went down all the way and I take about 28seconds to solve the cube now =x


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## TheMachanga (Dec 5, 2010)

I saw a youtube tutorial really quick without paying attention, and just clicked a random part and saw ~5 or 6 seconds or the guy saying "Put the corner with the cross color sticker facing the top using the empty slot". I spent an hour figuring it out, and that was my method. Getting cross color corner on top, but if it pairs with the corresponding edge while doing that, I used my own way of separating that. Once separated I pair like this (R U2 R' U R U' R'). I solved on white only for the first day, but (not knowing any other cubers at the time) thought that was stupid, so I just started solving on any colors.


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## Lucas Garron (Dec 5, 2010)

cmhardw said:


> It's funny that you mention this, because we second generation cubers got the same reaction from the first generation cubers who started in the 80's. Most of them discovered or invented _all_ of their algorithms either alone or in working with only a handful of other people. The fact that we second generation cubers learned off their websites was seen as a hack way to approach it even back then.


I suppose I was at the beginning of the third generation of cubers. Alg sites were being established, but it was all still a bit of a tentative feel; I don't think anyone took them for granted yet.
It's interesting that there have been some significant paradigm shifts, but even some people in this thread can't even have seen it, because our sport is so young and progressing so fast. Not to pick on Evan in particular (thanks for actually pointing out the obvious, Evan), but you pointed out exactly what has been superficially similar since then. But the whole attitude has changed. And as Chris points out, there was a time when it wasn't like that.



cmhardw said:


> Lucas' comment, if I may infer and Lucas please correct me if I'm wrong, is mostly directed toward the way that the questions coming out on the forum tend to reflect a person having done little or no work at all to "look around" the cubing world and see what is out there. Questions are of the format "Make me faster PLZ. Where do I go to become awesome?" not "I have tried Website X, Website Y, and Website Z. I like some things from each, but where do I go to learn more about steps 1 and 2 from website A, etc..."


Actually, the only reason I made that post is because I came across my F2L sheet for the first time in 4 years; I had searched for it before and I thought I had actually lost the file. So it was one of many recent mild moments like this; this is *why* I am the cuber I am today.

I agree that the level of spoonfeeding requests, even when appearing to be phrased pretty well like in Chris's example, can be hard to take. I think it's okay in the beginner's subforum, but it spills over. I actually find it remarkable that the advanced members here haven't been fully taken over by people-like-you syndrome.

I like to tell people that when M2 came out, I spent _months_ trying to understand it correctly by myself (with several false attempts to explain what to do with the M-slice). If your response to that would be "lol" instead of respect and appreciation, I'd say that's part of your problem.



cmhardw said:


> @Joël: Completely agree. I learned F2L algorithmically first, then later came to an understanding of the algs. As far as I can tell I haven't yet burst into a firey ball of failure raining sadness, baby tears, and cubie pieces all over my computer keyboard.


I don't think "intuitive vs. algorithmic" is necessarily a bad thing to ask, but I think most people who are concerned with it don't understand it right. It's one of those "not the right question" things.



Erik said:


> Oh the good old days *dream dream* you could be world class with just sub-20...


Oh, the things you could do with a time machine.


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## MTGjumper (Dec 5, 2010)

Heh, I learned from Macky's site too. I actually bothered to copy and paste the images into paint and then manually alter the colour scheme before pasting the pictures and algs into Word to learn from


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## Dene (Dec 5, 2010)

Anyone else figure out CE pairing by themselves because it's an obvious step up from LBL?

*high five*


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## D4vd (Dec 5, 2010)

Dene

*High five*


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## maggot (Dec 6, 2010)

haha. algorithmic f2l is such a waste. use brain power. 
here is my corner. here is my edge. how do i make a block? break cross, fix cross. ok, this corner has cross sticker on top.... hide edge, place corner above it to make pair. sticker on right, same or opposite color? edge is stuck in slot? 
it was not hard. just time consuming.


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## shelley (Dec 6, 2010)

Dene said:


> Anyone else figure out CE pairing by themselves because it's an obvious step up from LBL?
> 
> *high five*


 
*high five*

As far as how someone discovered this next step up, this is one of the most entertaining stories I know.


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## waffle=ijm (Dec 6, 2010)

Kirjava said:


> websites are for noobs, I taught myself.


 
<3


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## o2gulo (Dec 8, 2010)

I learned f2l almost by myself (although i sometimes check websites for help) then i learn it slowly it took me about 7 months but worth it. now im averaging around 18 seconds!


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## Carson (Dec 8, 2010)

When I learned to cube, Youtube did not yet exist. I got all of my algs from Bob's site. Thank you Bob...
Does anyone remember trying to navigate around the yahoo group? That was painful...


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## shelley (Dec 9, 2010)

Yeah, that Yahoo Group was painful. The new kids who have only known Speedsolving don't know how good they have it.


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## ~Adam~ (Dec 9, 2010)

I watched Lance's video on F2L just to see the 3 cases and then turned it off and started learning intuitive F2L with no prompting.
I really wish I hadn't. I watched it for only a couple of mins to see each case performed once and he said to use the same colour cross each solve to make F2L easier.
I was colour neutral at the time and if I had just figured it out for myself I would still be CN now.


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## yockee (Dec 9, 2010)

Sa967St said:


> Ohey that's how I learned F2L too , except I used algs from cubestation.co.uk instead of Macky's site.


 
I learned from cubestation too!!!! I used to think you had to use those F2L algs to do F2L, and whenever I'd do F2L, I'd look at the case I had and think to myself, "Ok, this is an R4 case." and remember which alg R4 was. Hahahaha.


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## yockee (Dec 9, 2010)

cmhardw said:


> Aah learned mah F2L algs from the source


 
It's funny how the "source" has the worst algs and teachings of F2L possible. Does anyone actually do F2L upside down?


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## Escher (Dec 9, 2010)

yockee said:


> It's funny how the "source" has the worst algs and teachings of F2L possible. Does anyone actually do F2L upside down?


 
Rawr



The Source said:


> Before we start, let me emphasize that performing the algorithms with the first layer on the top (cross on the top) is probably the worst option! The images below seem to suggest that you should be performing them this way, but this is not true. When I made this page back in 1997, I thought that showing the cube in this view would give me the best position for the algorithm description and NOTHING else. I perform the F2L algorithms with the white cross in my left palm and heavily use finger shortcuts for the moves. Other cubists proposed to put the cross on the bottom, which is also a good idea. The point is - use whatever seems right for you, but stay away from the cross on the top. This is not a good option.


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