I arrived early Friday morning at Ron's house, and took the chance to have a little snooze before starting the day. For the best part of Friday and Saturday, Ron and I practiced lots, not only on the 3x3x3 but also the 4x4x4, the Magic, and the Clock, and Ron showed me that I have to get much faster on the Clock before August!

We raced lots too, both having good and bad periods. Ron regularly achieved 15's and 16's and I was satisfied to put in many 18's and 19's. We also exchanged tricks and algorithms, and Ron was kind enough to watch me solve many times and help me find areas for improvement. This is all brilliant practice for the upcoming European championships!

The highlight of the visit was the puzzle party organised and hosted by Ton Dennenbroek. I got to meet many of my Dutch friends again (Jaap Scherphuis, Peter Jansen, Ton Dennenbroek, Koen Heltzel, Ruben Geels), and also meet a couple of new faces, (Joël van Noort, Stefan Bayens). Jaap showed me a new method of solving the Magic (new to me) and then showed me how to set very fast times even on the StackMat! I also got to discuss new moves with Joël, Koen and Ruben, try out the huge variety of twisty puzzles that Ton owns, and there were plenty of really fun cube races with everyone too!








Later on in the day, we all took part in a 3x3x3 competition. Championships rules applied, the winner would be decided on the best average of 5 cubes, with the fastest and the slowest being discarded. A handicap based on the competitors current average was also added, to boost everyone's average to 30 seconds. My current average average is around 21s, so my handicap was +9s. The competition was really good practice at trying to keep your cool under pressured conditions. I was fairly pleased with my solves, I managed to stay cool and not rush myself, and as a result most of my solves were fluent with no mistakes. However, I still made the odd terrible mistake, which cost me quite dearly! My best solve was 20.78s (my first cube), and my worst was 25.96s (my 2nd cube, where I think I relaxed a bit too much after the 20.78s and lost concentration).



The same rang true for the other guys, in fact only 3 of the 9 competitors managed to average better than their current average under the conditions.

Second was Ruben Geels, who also got off to a slow start with a 57.72s, which is indicative of how much pressure there is on the first solve! He managed to hold back the nerves though, and averaged fairly close to his normal average, being only 4 seconds slower than normal.










Ron van Bruchem was 3rd to compete, and pulled out all the stops with his first solve of 15.18s, which was to also be his best time of the day. All his cubes were under 20s, except for the last one where a mistake in the cross and a bad lock-up saw him turn in a bad time of 27.46s. Even the greats feel the pressure.








4th was Jaap Scherphius, who despite getting off to a slow start with a 53.86s, also upped the pace with a third cube timed at 36.36s. His times were all in the late 30's/early 40's, and he was the competitor who came closest to his actual average at the end of the competition.








I was 5th on the list, and made it my main aim to stay cool and relaxed, and to not rush any stage of the solution, right from picking it up to making the last move in my permutation. What little nerves I had were quickly settled when my first cube came in at 20.72s, but then reappeared again when I tried to go too fast and had hesitations in my F2L, the result of which was a 25.96s time. But at the end I was quite happy with how it went, and also pleased at the improvements that I had made both mentally and technically since the last time I competed, at Dutch Cube Day 2003.








Joël van Noort was 6th, and at first glance appeared to be very nervous. He has a very quick snappy style of cubing, which can make it quite difficult to perform especially if you are nervous and your hands are shaking! He started with a respectable 32.71s, but got better and better as he relaxed more, and improved all the way to 23.20s. He finished 2.5s slower than his actual average, still a great set of results for someone who does not have that much experience in the world of competitive cubing!








The 7th competitor was Ton Dennenbroek, who appeared very determined and focused when he inspected his first cube. This seemed to work for him, he started off with a 26.30s, and made a last big push at the end with his best cube of 24.67s. Ton's times were consistently around 26s, and he finished up with an average almost 2 seconds better than his current average, and therefore was deservedly the best cuber on the day. Congratulations go to him, and also thanks for hosting the puzzle party!








8th was Stefan Bayens, who is recently coming back into cubing after a long break. He is already improving quickly. Starting off with a 33.08s, which is more or less his current average, he made two more solves of around 33s. Unfortunately for him he seemed to get more tense towards the end which slowed him down, one can speculate that maybe he was trying to go faster because he knew he had to beat 33s twice to be in with a chance of winning.










The final competitor was Koen Heltzel, and after seeing the other guys solves, he knew exactly what he had to do. He started very well with a 23.69s and a 22.69s, but lost his cool with a bad time of 32.69s in the middle. He got back on track with two more solves of around 24s, but we asked ourselves would it be enough to beat Ton's excellent efforts?



Although it was only an informal competition, there was still quite a tense atmosphere in the room!



When the results were collated, Ton Dennenbroek emerged victorious with an adjusted average of 28.18s, with Koen Heltzel narrowly missing out by 0.68s, taking 2nd spot. I took 4th place with an adjusted average of 31.48s. I was even more pleased to see that I finished 2nd overall before adjustments, with an absolute average of 22.48s. Ron was easily faster than the rest, with an average of 17.83s, but his large handicap meant that it was a struggle for him to get anywhere in the handicap competition. For the full results, and videos from the puzzle party, see the bottom of the page.

To finish off the day, we all had a Chinese takeaway and chatted in Ton's living room, and then there was just time to pack everything away before I had to be going to be in time for my coach back to England.

It was a great weekend, as I expected it would be going to see such great friends who all share the same passion for puzzling! Thanks to Ron and Monique for yet again being such great hosts, I hope it will not be the last time that I come to stay.

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Full Results of the Puzzle Party competition

Participant	Handicap (seconds)	Time (seconds)						Best	Unadjusted average	Handicapped average
		Cube 1	Cube 2	Cube 3	Cube 4	Cube 5	Extra Cube
Ton Dennenbroek	+2.00	26.30	25.44	26.80	28.47	24.67	N/A	24.67	26.18	28.18
Koen Heltzel	+5.00	23.69	22.69	32.69	24.35	23.54	N/A	22.69	23.86	28.86
Jaap Scherphuis	-12.00	53.86	45.65	36.36	40.60	37.61	N/A	36.36	41.29	29.29
Dan Harris	+9.00	20.72	25.96	21.49	21.28	24.66	N/A	20.72	22.48	31.48
Ron van Bruchem	+14.00	15.18	18.46	18.11	16.92	27.46	N/A	15.18	17.83	31.83
Stefan Bayens	-3.00	33.08	32.60	33.58	38.00	39.89	N/A	32.60	34.89	31.89
Joël van Noort	+6.00	32.71	30.61	23.20	23.29	25.67	N/A	23.20	26.52	32.52
Ruben Geels	-5.00	57.72	33.99	39.28	41.09	37.70	N/A	33.99	39.36	34.36
Peter Jansen	+6.00	36.82	20.15	31.94	31.34	DNF	N/A	20.15	33.37	39.37

Koen Heltzel took amongst other things some nice videos of some of the cube races

Everyone involved in a giant cube race - (2.09 MB AVI)	Dan Harris in a race with Joël van Noort - (5.77 MB WMV)	Dan Harris solving in 20.21s in practice - (4.20 MB AVI)

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Thanks to Koen Heltzel and Ron van Bruchem for their kind permission to use their pictures on this page