13-year-old Charlie Eggins from Forest Lake State High School recently broke the Continental and Australian records for solving a 3×3 Rubik’s Cube while blindfolded for both a blind 3×3 single-solve and in a 3×3 “Mean of 3” blind solve.
At the July 10 event held in Melbourne at the Abbotsford Blind Challenge, Charlie’s average time of 17.84 seconds ranked him 3rd in the world for the “Mean of 3” 3×3 Blind Solve, with the current world record at 15.27 seconds.
His fastest attempt also ranked him seventh in the world for a single blind solve, with a time of 15.78 seconds. The world record currently sits at 14.51 seconds.
The contestants who came 2nd and 3rd in the 3×3 Mean of 3 Blind competition at the Abbotsford Blind Challenge event received a best time of 20 seconds and 22 seconds.
“It was pretty fun,” Charlie said.
“They were all faster than me a few months ago, but I’m catching up.”
Charlie competed against 9 other contestants in 3 events including 3×3 Blind, 4×4 Blind, and a MultiBlind event.
He solved 11 cubes during the MultiBlind event, which requires contestants to memorise as many cubes as possible and solve them all in a row while blindfolded.
Charlie Eggins breaks the Australian and Continental records for “Mean of 3” 3×3 and Single 3×3 Rubik’s Cube blind solve at the Abbotsford Blind Challenge in Melbourne. Video available on Charlie’s Youtube channel: “Swift Cubing – Charlie Eggins Speedcuber” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zOureSuDdc
Two weeks later on July 23-24, Charlie also competed at the Queensland Open Speedcubing Event at the Morayfield Sport and Events Centre, where he came 1st in the 3×3 Blind, 4×4 Blind and 3×3 events.
“It was pretty crazy because I really didn’t expect to win the 3×3 especially … there were a lot of people there who probably would have beaten me, but I got lucky,” he said.
Charlie, who is in Year 8 at Forest Lake State High School, first learned how to solve a Rubik’s Cube in 2019 and recently became more serious about cubing.
He started flying out to compete at events at the start of 2022 after fine-tuning his blindsolving skills.
“Whenever I time myself and I get a score better than my personal best, it just feels really good to see my times going down,” he said.
“The community is so good – I have so many friends in cubing.”
Charlie at the Queensland Open 2022 with a new personal record of 5.59 seconds for a single 3×3 cube solve.
Charlie’s mother Hayley Eggins said cubing had been a great hobby for Charlie to get involved in.
“It’s pretty phenomenal to watch how quickly he picks it up – he only started blindsolving [3×3 Blind] last year, and he started 4×4 Blind at the beginning of this year, and he’s already in the top 5 in Oceania,” she said.
Charlie said there was a common strategy that most cubers, including himself, use to memorise and perform each step needed to complete a Rubik’s cube while blindfolded.
“There are two types of pieces on a [3×3] cube, which are corners and edges,” he said.
“You look at one piece and where that piece has to go, and then where the piece that’s there has to go and so on, all the way around.
“You turn the locations that those pieces have to go to into letters, and those letters allow you to turn them into words – so you can basically just remember a story.”
Charlie completing 9/9 cubes in a Multiblind challenge at a competition in Brisbane earlier this year.
On September 24 Charlie will be competing in another “Please Be Quiet” blind speedcubing competition held in Brisbane.
He will then compete at Nationals in Perth on September 30–October 2 before tackling the Oceanic competition in Melbourne on December 15-18.
Links to Charlie’s Facebook, Instagram, Youtube account and World Cube Association statistics can be found on his webpage https://swiftcubing.com/.
He also has his own “Swift Cubing” brand, and funds raised go towards helping him fly to competitions.
