It is perfectly possible to solve a Rubik's Cube in under a minute using the beginners' algorithm on the official maker's website - Solve It - although you might need to be lucky and get mostly best-case positions.
I say it is possible because I have seen other people do it. I never managed to get under a minute myself using that technique... although I did get close a few times.
To go really fast you probably need to learn one of the modern speedcubing methods. There are several to choose from, the most popular being CFOP, but I am going to advocate an alternative which I think suits the older cuber.
The ZZ method has the potential to be very fast (with lots of practice) but you can "get away with" learning fewer algorithms than you need for CFOP and some other methods.
If you are already convinced :) then head over to Conrad Rider's text ZZ Tutorial website or watch Phil Yu's video ZZ Tutorial on YouTube. If not, then read on.
The "problem" with ZZ is that at first it looks really complicated. All that stuff about edge orientation at the beginning makes it look a lot harder than just making a cross (the C in CFOP). But edge orientation isn't really very hard to understand - you will soon get it, I promise - and the advantages of "fixing" the edges at the start are huge...
1) When solving the first 2 layers. If your edges are all oriented then you have half as many different edge-corner cases to deal with. Because normally you could have corner + oriented-edge or corner + misoriented-edge. But with ZZ you only ever have corner + oriented-edge.
2) Orienting the last layer. Because the edges are oriented, you always get at least a cross on the top when you have solved the first 2 layers. So instead of having to learn 57 cases, you only need to learn 7 cases for full OLL.
The other "problem" with ZZ is that "all the best solvers use CFOP". But that's just historical and self-fulfilling ... if people only learn CFOP because other people use CFOP, then CFOP will always be more popular. And there are great solvers that use ZZ - Phil Yu has regularly gone sub-10 in competition and done a 8.93 second solve using ZZ.
ZZ is popular as a one-handed (OH) method with many "top" cubers using it rather than CFOP for that event.
Bob Burton's cubewhiz site http://www.cubewhiz.com/f2l.php has 41 cases for the first 2 layers. Only 20 of these cases have oriented edges, so those are all you need to be aware of for ZZ solving.
ReplyDeleteBe careful though. Some of the algorithms on Bob's site make bad edges, so you should avoid them. I will post an article on F2L with the "ZZ safe" algorithms on later.
Eddie