# Ur Rubik's cube life



## Dcuber (Jan 6, 2008)

hey all, I've decided 2 create a thread of ppl's life of a cuber
WRite yours in this format: beginning(ur begining of cubing), learning, and lastly ur future "dreams" simple 

I'll start off

I was on the bus, riding on a field trip. I see my friend solving a rubik's cube with some piece of paper (We called it the cheat sheet). I asked him for a match of speed (i didn't have a clue on how 2 solve 1). So i rushed 2 my dad and he bought 1. From there, i learned the basic LBL method

After about a week or so, I got rlly fast. I mean like 2min.s fast! I was so proud of myself back then But then i went online and saw ppl like badmephisto and thrawst solve it in like 18 seconds. I was so amazed! who would've guessed it could be solved that fast. I came 2 realized that they were using the fridrich method. I studied it, first I learned sune for oll, and some ppls. Later i learned all Plls and all F2ls. But i still use 2-look oll unless i know the Oll directly. I was then averaging 35 (Now it's 23 

I wil 
Try 2 average sub 20
Get a record time under 14 (my fastest is 15.56)
get silicone ( I use this white powder/grease thing)
Get more cubes XD
And show off 2 my friends and family 

Ok... that was kinda long
urs doesn't have 2 be that long Have FUN!


----------



## badmephisto (Jan 6, 2008)

although i'm honored you mentioned me as an inspiration of sorts, I must say that there are plenty people even on these boards that are much faster than me, so you just haven't seen the most impressive videos yet  look up Harris Chan or Nakaji, i know both of those at least have videos on Youtube.

I was riding a streetcar and i saw a guy solve the cube in like a minute. I wanted to try and solve the cube before, but i kind of forgot about it, and that reminded me of it. That same day right after school I went to the nearest mindgames and bought my first rubik's cube  I learned the beginners method the next day almost entirely. Little did I know how invested I would actually get into the Rubik's cube in the coming weeks/months.
And I must say when i saw videos of Harris solving the cube on Youtube, I too couldn't believe it could be done so fast. (its 9 months later now and I'm still impressed )

I will
Try to get sub15 average
get my OH solve below 1 minute (yes i know its terrible )
possibly look into BLD solving (but im not that impressed by it for some reason)


----------



## darkzelkova (Jan 6, 2008)

One day, I went to school, and this kid there had a cube and he was solving it in about 40-45 seconds I believe. Then a friend of mine got a cube, so I was like what the heck and went out to toys r us to get one myself. I learned a beginner method in about an hour, and had memorized the algorithms by the next day. About two days after that I was averaging about 1:50. I then reduced my time over a period of a few weeks to around 40-50 (still using the beginner method) and got my best times. After that I lost my cube, so I didn't cube for about a month. Then, about a week or two ago I went and got another one from toys r us, and now I am learning the fridrich method. So far I have only learned f2l though lol. My best time with fridrich f2l is 46.36, best average about 57 seconds.

Actually I forgot to mention the I bought a lot of other cubes (square 1, megaminx, 2x2, 4x4, 5x5) and learned how to solve those as well lol.


----------



## CorwinShiu (Jan 6, 2008)

How I started was because it was a trend in the high school (was in 8th grade last year), and my brother started to learn. I thought it was very cool, and decided to learn it. My goal for the Rubik's Cube was 1 minute, believing I could not do it any faster. Sub-Minute was very hard for our school at the time, and only two people were able to do it. I got faster and faster, and here I am now a year (and exactly 10 days) later and I am a sub 17 cuber, and the ability to do blindfold. I would have never believed myself back then if I knew I was going to be one of the "crazy pro's". 

So for my goals right now would be sub-2 minute blindfold, and sub 15 MGLS solver .


----------



## HelloiamChow (Jan 6, 2008)

A lot of my friends did it, and I thought it was pretty cool so I decided to try it. I thought a time under 3 minutes was incredible. I put a lot of time into it my first summer, but I've slowed down a bit. Almost 2 years later I'm at a sub18 average, but I still choke in competitions. Maybe someday I'll average sub15. Who knows.


----------



## alltooamorous (Jan 6, 2008)

One day some guy at school had a Rubik's cube with him and he solved it a few times. I was like wow a Rubik's cube. Lol. Then my friend had one and he didn't solve it yet, but he was learning from a friend of his. I decided that I should be able to do it to. I was hoping to just have some fun with it and I learned. I used a thing online that had the cube, since I didn't have one with me. I said to myself, if I can't solve this one, I won't waste my money to buy one. But I solved it and the next day I bought one from Walgreens. I took another day to memorize the algorithms (basic LBL). I started timing myself and what not. After maybe a month and a half I got under a minute and yeah. So here I am, about 3 months later and I average in the mid 30's using the fridrich method, intuitive F2L and 4 look last layer. 

My overall goal is to average sub 15. And to be able to solve it blindfolded. I don't think I will reach my goals anytime soon, just hoping I will.


----------



## abbracadiabra (Jan 6, 2008)

In the early '80s my sister and I were both in college in neighboring cities. One day when I was visiting her she showed me a brand new Rubik's cube, which she claimed to be able to solve. They were the latest rage - several of my friends had purchased cubes, but none could solve one. I certainly wasn't about to call my sister on it, though, because there was no way I was going to let her demonstrate a skill that I couldn't match or beat. Back in those days I guess I was pretty competitive. I am no longer.

I picked up a cube of my own on the way home that night, and spent all night trying to solve it (with no luck of course). I cut my classes the next day, totally engrossed in the cube, but not coming any closer to a solution. Back then there was no internet, so an online solution wasn't possible. 

Over the course of the next couple weeks I stopped going to school, I stopped seeing my friends, even completely blew off my boyfriend. I was completely consumed with this damned puzzle, and was getting nowhere. 

Finally, one day in total frustration I threw it against a wall and it broke into little pieces. I swore that I was done with the stupid thing. But as I was sweeping up the parts and pieces to put in the trash I looked at the internal mechanism, and all of a sudden it dawned on me that the center pieces never moved in relation to each other. 

Within an hour I was back at the store buying another cube. I would like to say that was the last cube I broke and discarded, but that wouldn't be the truth. Not being smart enough to put the parts and pieces back together I kept throwing them away and buying new cubes. I would also like to say that I went back to my classes and resumed seeing my friends, but that wouldn't be the truth either. I spent a solid month ignoring just about every other aspect of my life trying to solve this puzzle. 

When I finally did arrive at a solution, I took my cube with me to my sister's house. Casually, I mentioned that I also could solve the cube. My sister started to laugh. She said, "I knew if I told you I could solve it that you'd learn how, and then you would teach me!" This story perfectly illustrates which one of us is the smarter sister, and it certainly isn't me. 

Epilogue: I flunked several classes and wound up on academic probation, although I eventually redeemed myself. Once my sister learned to solve the Rubik's cube she quickly lost interest. I eventually resumed seeing my boyfriend. We got married, had three kids, and got divorced. Now I complain about my son's computer game addiction, and wonder where he gets it from.


----------



## jackolanternsoup (Jan 6, 2008)

Interesting life-story abbracadiabra....

One of my friends wanted a cube really badly and told me loads of stuff 50% of which i didn't understand. so last August i dusted off my fake cube and started trying to solve it.. 

read what you're supposed to do to solve (LBL) but not the algs and i managed to solve the first two layers with my own homemade algs. Then i learnt the last layer from somewhere.

A couple weeks later (once i got my 2mins 30secs times; 2min pb) my fake cube broke and i was rendered cubeless.

Then my maths teacher showed me his 4x4x4 cube and thought me the LBL way of solving it. found it incredibly fun. Though it took me 7 hours (whole school day) for me to learn all the algs and everything i loved it. 

So on the tenth day of the tenth month. i went off to buy a 4x4x4. woohoo.. lol and up to 2/1/08, I've been cubing on that 4x4x4 and tellin myself I'm gonna be a pro at solving 4x4x4 and one day get sub-1min (delusional i know...). But on 2/1/8, the core broke and i only had a 3x3x3 keychain cube to cube with.

So now my aims are:
Buy a real 3x3x3 cube,
Somehow get a core from cubesmith..

Then learn all the OLLs by June 

and

achieve sub-40 PB for the 3x3x3 by year-end

and

achieve sub 2:30 PB for 4x4x4 by year end


----------



## Lofty (Jan 6, 2008)

Last school year as a senior in high school I was very bored in class. Being seniors we didn't want to do any work or pay attention to the teachers. A friend brought in his Rubik's cube which he could solve in about 40-50 seconds and the cube craze began. Soon enough there was 10-20(initially way more but most soon quit) people all with cubes everyday. I dusted off my old cube i had recieved for Christmas years before and joined them.. After a few hours at home i figured out how to solve the f2l using LBL and spent loads of time practicing it. Over the next week a friend taught me 4 LL algs to solve the LL whenever we had a break in class. That was March 2007 I learned to solve it with my first timed solve that day at 2:20. Two weeks from that I was under 60 secs and by AP exams that year I was sub 60 OH and around 35 2H as the fastest cuber in the school. The kid who initially brought the cube told me to look up fridrich and I found speedcubing.com and the chat where I learned all I know. 
Somehow I got completely addicted to OH solving and have practiced that almost solely since last summer. Now I average sub 20 2H and 23 OH.
My long term goals are the OH WR, and possibly full ZB optimized for OH. I already have COLL optimized for OH tho I haven't yet memorized the sune/antisune cases.


----------



## tegalogic (Jan 6, 2008)

In July 2006, I went on a trip to China (from the USA). Out of nowhere, I was like "Mom, can I buy a Rubik's Cube?" She bought one of the crappy tiled ones, and it was a picture cube (Teenage Mutant Turtles, which I don't like). I tried for like 5 hours to solve it, but I only solved a "side".
In October, I ripped off all of the stickers from the cube (took like 3 hours) and taped on construction paper so it would be a color cube. I learned to cube from Thrawst on YouTube and got a first time of 22 minutes. I showed my parents and they bought one for me from Toys 'R' Us in November as an early Christmas present. I got like a 2 minutes 40 seconds average until I found out that a friend could lubricate my cube. After a while of practicing, I got down to 48 seconds. (May 2007) I set the cube aside for a long time, but picked it up soon. I learned F2L (Sep. 2007) and got down to around 40 seconds. This is when (Oct. 2007) I learned that a kid from my school solved the cube in sub-30 times, and also another from a rival school. I learned all PLL (early December 2007) and started learning OLL. I beat both of their times with a 19.56 sec solve, and I now sit on a 27.xx second average.
I plan to learn OLL, and maybe MGLS or last layer edge control + CLL + EPLL.


----------



## SkateTracker (Jan 6, 2008)

It started when I was on a skateboarding forum, someone posted a thread in Off-topic section with a video of a 3 year old solving the rubiks cube in a little over a minute. I was like, no way, if that little kid can do it, so can I. So, I remembered that I also had a rubiks cube laying around the house somewhere. After two days searching, I found it. What a piece of junk though, not knowing anything at the time about rubiks cubes, as I began to turn it, I thought it was only supposed to turn one way, because it was too jammed to turn the other way. Anyway, even though I thought it was odd, I went on with that cube. I tried to solve it many times, and failed. So, I thought to my self, there's gotta be a way to solve it! So, I went online and found Dan Brown's LBL method tutorial. An hour later, my first cube was solved! Took about 25-30 minutes. Second time, about 10 minutes. A week later, I was averaging about 3 minutes, still with that cube though. 3 weeks later, the cube breaks, no, it didn't pop, it BROKE, the core just literally fell apart. Forgetting that I could have just ran down to the store and gotten a new and a whole lot BETTER cube, I went online and found gabbasoft. Which I used until about 3 months later, when I finally got another cube. I got my first sub-minute on gabbasoft though, it was a big break though for me. As the months past, I kept getting better times. (note: with regular cube, no gabbasoft) Now, 6 months later from when I started, I have had my first sub-30 solve. I'm now using intuitive F2L and the beginner's method LL. Now, off to learn Fridrich and hopefully get sub-20 before the end of the year!


----------



## Tomarse (Jan 6, 2008)

I've always known about Rubik's cubes since i was a small kid, i first saw one when i was about 5 years old or something, i picked it up and just started moving it and stuff, having no clue how to solve it, then about 11 years later, (march 2007) i saw Beauty and the Geek, and saw Tyson Mao solving the cube on tv i was like "Ahhh those bloody things, so there is a solution" i ran down to HMV (local music store) and bought one, and didn't realise it came with a solution so i was playing around with it for hours and hours and managed to make one side, and then i spoke to a friend and he could solve in about 1 minute and he explained the basics and stuff, things like Notation and how the cross has to match the side colours and things within 24 hours i had solved it through my friend helping me and my own knowledge after that i spent 3 weeks getting faster and faster, learning it by memory watching videos and learning more things about the cube and i spoke to people like dan harris, and Erik A (sorry cant spell his name) who gave me info things i should work on and general help and answered my questions to the best they could, so that brings us to where i am today, Averaging 23 - 26 seconds, nearly know full pll of the fridrich system, using a 4 look last layer, still got a few algs to learn, then i know the lot  Thats my story. 

Also, Does anyone else get called a geek and abused because we know how to solve it? Thanks


----------



## darkzelkova (Jan 6, 2008)

Tomarse said:


> Also, Does anyone else get called a geek and abused because we know how to solve it? Thanks



At my school, solving it is still sorta cool lol


----------



## Tomarse (Jan 6, 2008)

I just get abused for being a "geek". Wow, i don't play football or go out beating people up, yes cos that makes you cool anyway, i hate stereotypical people, but most of the people who call me a geek for that are like Chavs and fit the stereotype of someone who goes around bashing people


----------



## badmephisto (Jan 7, 2008)

i beam when i get called a geek  I'm a proud geek; We geeks are cool


----------



## Lotsofsloths (Jan 7, 2008)

I have always had a "cool and funny" reputation at my school, so that was good, when I learned how-to solve it, it just made me more awesome, even though people call me geek, there like:
"You're a geek!
like in a good way!"


I was always interested in the Rubik's Cube, and I thought solving one would be pretty hard, but I knew one could do it.
I always used to get one side a lot, maybe thats why when I did my first solve it was pretty fast(1:43). I kept on progressing, I learned Sune, I learn to do the entire OLL with FRUR'U'F/FURU'R'F+Sune. I learned the edge PLLs(The Lars Petrus Ones), I learned some corner PLLs, just the clockwise cycle..
After a while I learned complete 4 look, then I learned the PLLs, at which I am now..
So thats my speedcubing life since July '07(when I started) 

So I learned how-to solve it, and people who really pushed me on to get faster would probablly be Badmephisto and Harris Chan..Both of whom are my speedcubing idols.
Now I'm just a regular 12 year old.... that can solve the cube on average of 24 seconds


----------



## slncuber21 (Jan 7, 2008)

i began just in November of 07 so i am pretty new but i got started by just looking around on youtube and i saw all sorts of amazing vids of people solving the cube in about 20s or less, so i started to get back into it ( i had a old cube and i basically messed around with it, only solving one side at a time lol)
i soon learned the LBL method and practiced and practiced and practiced.

i now am averaging 1m 18s (still with LBL)

i will try to:
get sub-minute average by at least March
learn Fridrich
get new cubes
go to a competition soon (hopefully)
make cubing a lifetime hobby


----------



## darkzelkova (Jan 7, 2008)

I bet you will get sub one minute this month. Easy peasy


----------



## 4GO57O (Jan 7, 2008)

I started just around half of November and/or during the start of December when the rubik's cube craze was revived in our school....other just learned how to solve it w/o being serious...well the craze was most likely started by my friend...when I saw him solve the rubik's cube... I remembered that I tried to solve it before but only reached up to 2 layers intuitively...I saw that he could solve all layers already and I was kinda jealous but excited to start again and get a faster time than the best time in the WHOLE SCHOOL...which is 14.00s I then bought NBS magic cube which sucked cause it kept on popping but I reached times of up to 2 minutes with it...very stiff too..

my future dreams are
-beat the school record
-get to sub 30 already

my current best time is 51.75 using basic LBL where I did 5 look but fast enought to beat my four look record


----------



## jonny guitar (Jan 9, 2008)

okay..this thread has prompted me to stop lurking and finally join.

In 1980 I was grade 8 and was a "cool" leather jacket wearing-tough guy jock (grew up watching Fonzy ya know). There was a guy in both my comp sci and french class who was learning the cube (he was also making his own Apple computer clone in his garage and was very bright dude). I was enthralled with it and purchased a Magic Puzzler Cube the next day -- lubed her up with vasoline and was ready to go.

Together we figured out how to do the darn thing using both level by level and all the corners first methods. We were quite the Odd Couple; me with my leathers and him with his fully buttoned dress shirts with pocket protectors. I don't recall anybody else in the school ever doing the cube except for me, Steve and one other guy in comp sci in our grade. Spent hours working on the mechanics of it and eventually we were beating the 1 minute mark which was pretty fast back then. My girlfriends brother gave me a Revenge when it first came out but I just couldn't get a handle on it....Alexander's Star was a success though.

anyway, did the cube enough over the years to remember how to do it. Fast forward 26 years and I was still using the SAME CUBE!!! Vasolined for 1/4 century and still going. Stickers are all still intact and it pops maybe every 5th solve (slow solves don't pop much).

Found the friedich site when I was looking for some info for my nephew to learn from and save me writing it all out. I decided to learn a new way after all these years. Shortly after, I found this site and discovered the burton method of oll pll's, found out about dyi rubiks cubes, etc. 

So now I am a 40 year guy who is cube crazy again...three months with the new method (and three new diy cubes) I am down to 45 average of 15 on my first ever timing with several around 37-40 and a few 55's (I figure I was just panicking due to being timed). Goal is to get myself to 30 seconds which I believe is achievable. I know all the Pll' and about 45 of the Olls so it is just a matter of time. Broke out the 25 year old Revenge and figured that out a while back too but I pretty darn slow at it...will work on the speed of it later.


anyway....thanks for the inspiration though most of you make me feel really old


----------



## Jilvin (May 30, 2011)

I remember my start thoroughly. I had been over at a friends house and I saw that he had a Rubik's cube (Wal-Mart brand). He could solve one face of the cube pretty much at will and I became angry that I couldn't even solve one face of the cube. So, I borrowed it and I looked up an online tutorial on nerdparadise.com (it was a horrific tutorial in retrospect, with no proper notation and strange orientation although it did teach a layer-by-layer method). After becoming disgruntled with this tutorial, I went to the website of Lars Petrus. After failing there (LOL I SUCKED) I ran across Tyson Mao's layer by layer video tutorial and mastered each step of all the videos. After this, I completed my first solve at my dinner table in front of my parents. It was about 5 minutes long. With mere practice I grew to the point where I could get about 2:30. At this point, I decided it was time to learn more steps. I replaced the cumbersome "1-middle layer edge at a time" with the "keyhole" method of edge insertion (which, actually, every beginner should be taught...) and then only used the edge insertion algorithm for the final middle layer edge. After this, I learned the 7 OLL algorithms for cases where all edges are solved. The "keyhole" step got me to about 1:10 (a very frustrating period, when one is trying to get their first sub-minute solves!), the 2-look OLL algorithms got me down to the 45-50 range. I won a pretty fun little competition at our middle school with this time (by far). By this time, I had already put silicon lubricant in the cube and had replaced the stickers with CubeSmith stickers. From there I practiced an intuitive F2L. From then on, my speedcubing time has been almost directly proportional to how well I execute the cross+F2L step. I am now down to the 18.xx. I plan to learn full OLL this summer (since I am already pretty close).


----------



## emolover (May 30, 2011)

Nice bump!


----------



## JLarsen (Jun 1, 2011)

Invalid URL. 

HOW DARE YOU BUMP TEH THREADZ THIS IS SRS BUZNISS! WTF! OMG! NICE BUMP YA F***IN NUBCAKE


----------



## gundamslicer (Jun 1, 2011)

Lol how often does a thread get bumped? Once every 3 days?


----------



## bluecloe45 (Jun 1, 2011)

42 minute bump


----------



## iEnjoyCubing (Jun 1, 2011)

Last year I saw one of my friends solving it, I always thought it looked neat so I decided how to solve it. Learned how using beginner's method (learned from pogobat on YT) and enjoyed it. Then I stopped for awhile due to lack of interest, stopped for a few months, but now I'm back into it and am current learning fridrich (got a decent base in F2L, know 2 Look OLL and currently learning full PLL). In the future, my ultimate goal is to have an average of sub-15 with a PB of sub-10 (plus knowing full fridrich). I'm hoping to achieve this by the end of the next school year or so.


----------



## Lochran (Jun 1, 2011)

Hey This is how cubing came into my life

In spring( in australia) 2010 my team was playing soccer and it was half time and my friend peter was showing people him solving the cube he was fast i think 25-30 secs so around 2 weeks later my to good friends ben and steven got a rubiks brand and did dan browns method it was very interesting to see them doing amazing fingertricks and a month after my two friends did the freidrich and got sub 25 then to sub 20 then is was our school fate 3 months after and i won a dollar store cube was was crap xD but i took it home and learnt dan browns method which took me 3 days and i showed it to my friends then i try to get a good time but the cube was letting me down. My friends each got a guhong so i bought one because i dont want to go through the rubiks brand stage. I got my cube near christmas and when i did my first solve my times was dowm massively. With the dollar store cube it was 2mins and the guhong was 52 secs . i thought this was good so i cubed and cubed. I then saw some other variations of cubes so i bought alot during the holidays. i think i bought 20 cubes in the 2 month time period( now i have 43 and still buying  ) I then learnt 2 look pll and oll by using badmephisto video. this got my times down to 40 secs and it is still 40 secs but i achieved 24 secs with an oll skip and a easy pll. That was my LONG story

I will 

Learn fridrich and get sub 20
Keep buying more cubes
BUy LUbix


----------



## Linalai66 (Jun 1, 2011)

lol


----------



## rubiksarlen (Jun 1, 2011)

.i think i bought 20 cubes in the 2 month time period( now i have 43 and still buying  I then learnt 2 look pll and oll by using badmephisto video. 

u r rich man. no offense, but u don't have to buy soooo many cubes like lubix to get fast times. even if u mean cubes ranging from 2-7 it still is a lot.


----------



## Lochran (Jun 1, 2011)

rubiksarlen said:


> .i think i bought 20 cubes in the 2 month time period( now i have 43 and still buying  I then learnt 2 look pll and oll by using badmephisto video.
> 
> u r rich man. no offense, but u don't have to buy soooo many cubes like lubix to get fast times. even if u mean cubes ranging from 2-7 it still is a lot.




Yeah thanks for the advice


----------

