9-year-old Yiheng Wang (China) has yet again broken the record for the fastest average time to solve a 3x3x3 rotating puzzle cube.
He achieved an astonishing time of 4.48 seconds, beating the 4.69-second record he set earlier this year, in March.
World Cube Association events follow the ‘average of five’ format, whereby the average time of a competitor’s five solves is calculated, excluding the fastest and slowest times.
Over the course of five solves, Yiheng registered times of 4.72, 4.72, 3.99, 3.95, and 5.99.
No other speedcuber has ever recorded more than one sub-4-second solve over the course of five consecutive solves in WCA competition.
This makes Yiheng the first person to have a sub-4-second solve counted in competition, five years after Feliks Zemdegs became the first person to have a sub-5-second solve counted.
Yiheng broke the record during the final of Singapore’s Mofunland Cruise Open 2023, which, as the name suggests, took place on a cruise ship. Yiheng beat second-placed Tee Kai Yang’s average time by over two seconds.
There have been 14 sub-4-second solve times recorded by the WCA, and Yiheng is responsible for five of them, which is more than anyone else.
Veteran cuber Tymon Kolasiński (Poland) has three, whilst two belong to Max Park (USA), who recently broke the iconic record of fastest time to solve a 3x3x3 rotating puzzle cube with a time of 3.13 seconds.
Before Yiheng initially broke the average-solve record in March (as seen in the below video), it was jointly held by Tymon and Max with a time of 4.86 seconds. In the span of three months, Yiheng has shaved almost half a second off that time.
Yiheng is sponsored by cube manufacturer GAN, and he is a member of the GAN Gurus, a team comprised of the best speedcubers from all around the world.
He has participated in nine WCA competitions so far in 2023, winning eight of them. He placed second in the Hong Kong Small Cube Day event, behind fellow Chinese cuber Ruihang Xu.
Although Max Park holds the single-solve world record of 3.13 seconds, 14-year-old Ruihang has actually solved it in a faster time of 2.68 seconds, as seen in the below video. However, as this did not occur in an official WCA competition, it cannot be recognized as the official world record.
Regardless, Ruihang has proved that a sub-3-second solve is humanly possible, and now every elite speedcuber is undoubtedly gunning to become the first one to do it in official competition.
Will it be Tymon, Max, Yiheng, Ruihang, or someone else? Watch this space!
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