My report of the European Championships 2006 in Paris.
Friday 22
The day began when my alarm clock woke me up at 5:45. After 2.5 hours in the train I arrived at Rotterdam Centraal where Jaap was waiting. Maarten Stoelhorst canceled cause he had to play on a concert.
We began our long trip, and stopped when we were 10 min in le Francais for a break where we cubed some cubes. Jaap showed me a little trick to flip all corners very quick. Then after a total car trip
of 4 hours we saw Paris. You'd think we were there but Paris is not very nice to go to by car so it took us another 1.5 hours to park the car near the Hotel. We went to Site de Science to check out the
competition area, register and meet some cubers. There were some Hungarian guys who were pretty cool. Gilles van den Peereboom was there too, I was staying at Gilles's dad's place. Alexander got me some
speedstacking cups, which I tried immideatly, thx Sander! We registered (I registered almost for every event) and got some cool goodies. We cubed some cubes
and were allowed to check out the main stage for a while after Ron, Ton, David and others set it up (good job guys!), and then I lost my OH cube :( We (Gilles and myself) said goodbye to all cubers. We
went by metro to the place which takes about an hour. I found out that the subway in Paris is more than just a subway, but I didn't like it a lot. We had a good diner, cubed some cubes. Gilles has became
very fast in OH cubing. Best avg below 30 sec! Gilles also fixed my magic, which was unwired (again), thx Gilles! And we got to bed.
Saturday 23
We woke up at 6.10 and had some nice coffee to get realy awake. We went with the metro again to the site, during the trip we cubed a lot of cubes to get warmed-up, we raced some OH but Gilles has become
way too fast for me. We arrived at the site and warmed-up further. I also played with my cups which helps for warming up too. Then I saw Joel with his girfriend, the first thing Joel said was: what the hell
are you doing?? That's no cube... The first thing on the program was the first round of the OH. I still had not found my OH cube again. My main 3x3 speedcube is too stiff for OH sadly, but Guus Razoux-Schultz
was very kind and let me use his normal cube which was a bit looser than my normal one, thx Guus! I got a 45 and a 50, which were enough to make it to the final. Joel set the best OH time with an amazing 25.28
which was a new Dutch Record. Gilles did well too with a best time of 28.84. The next event was the first round of the 3x3. I started fairly good with a 17.66 then a 19.33 and then 18.69. My huge problem in
competitions is my nerves so I was very pleased with setting the 17 :) Of course this was enough for the semi-finals.
Then it was time for a side stage number, the magic. I can do magic fairly well, but because it is unwired 95% of the time, I can't practise it a lot. My first time was very good 1.49. My 2nd time was
amazing 1.32 which was the same as the Dutch record. Then I got 1.32 again, but the last move didn't go well so it was DNF, after this I rushed and got 7.31 and 2.62 which lead to a miserable 3.81 average and
the 21st place. But still I was happy with setting a Dutch record. Gilles did pretty good with a 4th place and Alexander ended in a shared 1st place together with Henrik Buus Aagaard. There was a break somewhere
too about now and we are some junkfood at the restaurant of the site the science. After we were all stuffed, it
was megaminx time. I like this puzzle a lot cause there are almost no algorithms to learn so you are very free. It was a mean of 3 so any DNF will cause no average. Stefan Pochmann is da master at megaminx,
we raced some minx' befor the competition and I found out I wasn't a lot slower than him, only my last layer is very sloppy (and my first needs some work too). Joel has got the Dutch record of 2:26 which I was
kind of sure of that I'd gonna break that. I hoped I could do a sub-2. My first time was 2:06.82+2 which was a Dutch record :) 2nd time was was not very good 2:14.47, the 3rd was better 2:04.88NR this caused
an average of 2:09.39 and the 2nd place. Dan Harris got a nice time of 1:59.79, but Stefan broke his own World Record with a time of 1:29.05 and finished 1st. After this it was time for 4x4. I can do 4x4 in
about 1:30 so nothing special. 1:25 was enough for the finals, but I got a 1:44 and a 1:35. Annoyinly I got both times 2 parities.
Now it was time for the 5x5, my worst puzzle, sometimes I manage a sub-4min, but I got a 4:27.78 and a 4:47.23 and swore I would practise 5x5 more. Then there was the puzzle I had trained so much for, the 2x2
I was glad to have the unofficial world record for 2x2 (on average of 12) which was 3.99 back then. But Gunnar Krig is a big opponent and Milan Baticz also. This was only the first round so I could see what
I could do in an official competition. I practised a lot of official style solves with Guus (thx Guus!) and also some solves at the official stage. Then my first solve was there. I saw the scramble and thought
o my god! It was a horrible scramble for my method. I saw some setup moves to get one of my least favorite cases. Fortunatly when I performed the setup moves I saw the case a bit better and it was a special case
I had practised so I could do the 1st and 2nd step at the same time. Then it was a normal end algorithm and I stopped the timer at 4.04 which I was very happy with! After this I got a reasanoble time of 5.63
which was caused by a lockup on the end caused my nerves. This was of course enough for the finals, Gunnar and Milan also qualified and took it easy with best times of 6.46 and 6.98 I was very reliefed. Then
the final number was there, I only do it for fun, the 3x3 with feet. I got a dissapointing time of 3:22.73 and was 5th, which was not enough to make it to the finals, but because there was some trouble with
a pop form Gunnar Krig, I was allowed to compete in the finals.
We searched for some resaurant and ate some meal and cubed some cubes. Gilles and myself got back by metro and went to bed fairly early.
Sunday 24
We woke up at 6:10 again. This time we had to bring all our luggage with us because we would leave after the tournament was finished. I was a bit happy to leave the metro for the last time and we were checked
again for our bags (which was about the 3rd time), they must be afraid of some terrositic asault or something.... The first thing on the program was the first round of Blinfold solving. I can't do it yet, only
the edges so I focused on only doing the edges. Gilles is pretty good in blindfold sometimes he gets good times below 3 min! As I suspected I got 2 DNF's, the 2nd time I only had 2 edges left which needed to be
swapped. Next up was the semi-final of the 3x3. We calculated it would require an average of about sub-20 to proceed. The first 2 attempts were horrible, I messed up doing my cross moves twice! I got a 22 and a
23, after this it went wetter with a 19, a 16 and a 18. But because of the first 2 solves I had a ***** average of 20.36. Now was the big moment I had been training for so hard. The final of the 2x2 cube. I only
cubed at the same table again which helps me a bit with my nerves, don't ask me why... I found out that I couldn't handle the pressure very good. I got a 5.96, a 9.01!!, 5.26, 6.09, 6.64 which is horrible avg
6.23 :( still this was enough for the 2nd place. Milan was 1st with 5.92 and Gunnar 3rd with 6.32. 2nd place is still very good but I had the feeling I could've ended 1st fairly easy, but then again a competition
is a whole other story than relaxed cubing at home. Then there was the Fewest moves, which I have never tried ever. It is hard to do the scramble correct :P I was pretty pleased with a 48 move solution :)
We had some lunch at the resaurant again, this time I chose some food which was a bit more helthy and tasted better too. We had some discussions with Guus and
Alexander about a lot of things, but mainly about the fewest moves. Both Guus and Sander got 36 moves. After lunch it was time for the clock, which I can do in about 12 seconds on average so I had a fairly good
chance cause Stefan didn't compete for a reason I don't know anyway he scrambled the clock which is a good job. My first attempt ruined my chances immediatly (18.09). The other 2 were ok, 14.87 and 13.15.
The young Matyas Kuti won with a very good average of 11.81. Now there was the 4x4 final which I didn't make we made some fun with Henrik Buus Aagaard, Matyas Kuti and another Hungarian guy of who i've forgotten
his name. We magiced and it was allowed to put your wrists on the timer and the magic already in our hands. We did some sub-1 solves with it :) Unfortunatly Ron ended 4th on 4x4 with 1:17.88 on average. Jean Pons
won with a new WR average of 1:02.40. Now it was time for the OH final, David the cool organizer found my OH cube so my goal was to set a sub-40 time. I was close with 40.15 but didn't succeed on that. Gilles won
The OH event with a new ER average of 29.09! (including a 26.53 and a 55.81) Joel ended 3rd with a dutch record average of 32.77. Now it was time for 5x5 in which I didn't compete of course, but I watched it for a
while and also scrambled some 5x5's. After scrambling Sander and I raced cupstacking. And I set a new PR of 18.xx and we had a lot of fun doing it blindfolded (best time about 45) and doing it OH! The 5x5 results
were there and Ron won with an average of 2:09.57 :) The blindfold final was after this, unfortunatly Gilles had 2 DNF's. The event before the big event (3x3 final) was the feet final. I was happy to end 3rd with
a (Dutch Record) time of 2:25.03. Of course Anssi won with an amazing time of 1:25.63. Now it was time for the 3x3 final. Both Joel and Ron were in the final. Unfortunatly Ron is a bit too nervous in finals of 3x3
and got an average of 18.27 which is not good for him. Joel, who set a new ER of 11.26 in the semi's won with 14.97 on average! Congratulations!
Now it was time for the prize ceremony and we cheered a lot for everyone especially for the Dutchies. I received 3 of the same nice trophy's and a cheque for 2x2 of 250 Euro's :) We went to the 'after party' after
this. There were nice snacks and some drinks there and Guus let all cubers think for this one: you have the digits 1, 3, 4 and 6. By dividing, multiplying adding and the other thing of which I don't know the english
name whe had to make 24. We didn't got the solution and it was time to get in Jaaps car and headed back for home. Gilles and Thomas Kohn were driving a large bit of the trip with us. We said goodbye to everyone and
headed for the Belgium border. Thomas left the car about 75 kilometers from the Belgium border and continued his trip by hitchiking. Gilles left the car at Brussels. Now it was the question if there still was a
train I could get to get to my city. Unfortunatly it was too late for that, but Jaap said I could spend the night at his place in Delft, thx Jaap!! The next morning I left and said goodbye to Jaap. The first thing
when I left the train again at my place was to go to my school which is close to the station and where I had parked my bike. After doing a bit of school I searched for my bike and it was stolen!!!! :( a bad ending
of a nice weekend... I'm still happy with setting about 6 Dutch Records and 3 top 3 places :D !!