World Record Rubik's Cube and Fastest Serve Tennis

World Record Rubik's Cube and Fastest Serve Tennis

Rubik's Cube - A Perfect Brain-Twister

Invented in 1974 by a Hungarian architect and sculptor Erno Rubik, the Rubik's Cube has been gaining popularity ever since. It has turned into an icon of an intellectual game, which is widely known all over the world. People of any nationality can play this game, as it doesn't require the knowledge of any specific language. Besides, it has a handy and bright design. Amazingly, but according to the statistic figures, more than 350 million Rubik Cubes have been sold since the start of the mass production. This toy always finds its place among the bestsellers and never falls out of the fashion.

Feliks Zemdegs Cube

Speedcubing is an international game that has no boundaries. The mature players can participate in regular world and local contests. There is no age or gender limit for the competitors - anyone can participate in the championships. There has been established the World Cube Association, which holds various speedcubing competitions. The first championship was held in 1982 in Budapest. Nowadays, it takes the true masters only several seconds to solve the Cube puzzle. The top three champions in 2011 according to the WCA are Feliks Zemdegs from Australia, Mats Valk from the Netherlands, and Nipat Charoenpholphant from Thailand.

The Rubik's Cube Variations

The 2x2x2 Cube (also known as Pocket or Junior Cube) contains 8 corner pieces and has more than 3,5 million positions. Christian Kaserer is the world champion who solved this kind of Cube in 0.69 seconds in 2011.

The standard 3x3x3 Cube has 6 centres, 12 edges, and 8 corners and can have more than 4.3x10*19 positions. The holder of the world record in the 3x3x3 Cube solving is Feliks Zemdegs.

The 4x4x4 Cube (also known as Master Cube) comprises 24 centre pieces, 24 edge pieces, and 8 corners. It has 7.4x10*45 positions and there are no fixed centres in its structure. Mats Valk (the Netherlands) is a holder of a world record (30.02 sec.) set in 2011.

The 5x5x5 Cube (also known as Professor's Cube) has 6 fixed centres, 48 centre and 36 edge pieces, and 8 corners. This variant of Cube has 2.8x10*74 positions. The abovementioned champion F.Zemdegs solved this Cube in 56.22 seconds in 2011.

The Pyraminx is shaped in a form of a tetrahedron. It has 4 axial and 6 edge pieces, and 4 trivial tips. It can have more than 900 thousand positions. In 2011 Yohei Oka (Japan) solved the Pyraminx in 1.93 seconds.

The Megaminx is shaped in a form of a dodecahedron. It contains 12 face centre pieces, 20 corner pieces, and 30 edge pieces. The number of positions escapes the imagination. The Swedish genius Simon Westlund solved the Megaminx in 42.28 seconds (2011).

The master solvers can take part in the so called blind competitions, where the puzzle is solved by memory. Moreover, the Cube puzzle can be solved not only with the help of fingers but also with the help of toes. There are even special contests among the people who can do it in such an extraordinary way.

As you can see the tendency of world record setting reveals that every year there appear Cube players who can solve the puzzle faster than their forerunners.

At the standard competition the time is limited to 10 minutes. There are two kinds of Rubik's Cube timers: the Stackmat (measures the time under the 10 min. limit) and the stopwatch (measures the time that exceeds the 10 min. limit).

Fastest Serve - Maximize the Potential and Power of Your Tennis Serve

There are many contributing factors to maximize the power of your serve and I have narrowed it down to my top 9.

In this article I will take you through 3 fundamentals to get you started.

Roger Federer Fastest Serve

1. LEG DRIVE: This is the first component of the serve sequence and also a very important factor for maximising power in the service action.

Let's consider the 2 types of service actions: the step up serve (where the back foot steps up to the front foot) as used by John Isner and the drop & drive serve known as the platform serve (where the legs bend and drive up to the serve with no step) as used by Roger Federer.

I have never seen any studies that have proven one method better or more effective than the other. It should be noted here that each individual may feel more comfortable doing a particular serve style and this should be the basis to work off.

To gain maximum power from your serve the knees should bend directly over the toes of each leg to a level that can be handled by the player. The bigger the knee bend, the bigger the drive and therefore more power! Each player should find a level that works and practice. If you have a very minimal knee bend try and gradually add a little more at a time to develop this part of your serve. The aim of the leg drive is to push up (and out a little) to the contact point. When done correctly and to your full potential you should be making contact with both feet off the ground!

Remember Newton's Law? For every action (force) there is an equal and opposite reaction (force). So in essence the more you push into the ground as part of your knee bend... the more power you will get driving up to the ball!

You will be amazed at the difference it will make to the speed of your serve!

2. SPAGHETTI ARMS: Before the start of the serve as part of your preparation try to completely relax your shoulders, arm and wrist. By doing this you will vastly increase the elastic energy of your motion and will gain valuable power to your serve.

Think of your arms as a cooked piece of spaghetti (pasta). Do you serve like dry uncooked stiff spaghetti or nice floppy cooked spaghetti?

It is a common mistake to try to muscle the serve to generate more power. Try a few shadow drills (service motion) without a ball and feel how relaxed your shoulder and arm should be! Remember... Spaghetti Arms!

3. UP: As part of my other 6 fundamentals I constantly mention going up to the serve!To maximise power you simply must drive UP to the ball and this should be part of your thinking before every serve! UP, UP, UP!!!

Use the shadow drill technique and listen for the sound your racquet makes through the air. If you are doing this correctly you should hear the noise up at the contact point... not down at your eye level!!

To check out the rest of the tips on fastest serve and get some great advice from Sam Groth, the current world record holder of the fastest serve at 263km/ph follow these links and register your details.

As a bonus you will get some footage of Sam Groth's world record breaking technique!

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