Becoming Faster; Best things to learn after 2-Look CFOP

Becoming faster with your solves is not always just practice, while it can be helpful to practice, improving can be sped up by learning new things. This article covers the best algorithms and methods to learn to make your solves faster. 

                                              Full Pll

The first and best thing to learn is definitely full PLL. Full PLL is an algorithm sub-set that moves permutes all the corners and solves the last layer of the cube in one step. Learning full PLL is pretty simple as it only has about 21 algorithms. This may seem a lot, but if you learn one alg every day, full PLL can be learned in about three weeks.  

                                           Keyhole

The second thing to learn is a way to solve f2l without rotations. It’s called keyhole. Keyhole is a way to insert an f2l pair when 1 out of 2 pieces of the pair is already solved. There is intermediate and advanced keyhole. Everyone should know intermediate keyhole, and as the name suggests, the advanced keyhole is a little more difficult and is mostly recommended for experienced cubers.

The intermediate method is mostly intuitive and doesn’t have many algorithms so it’s pretty easy to learn. 

Speedsolving Wiki – Credits: Speedsolving Wiki 

                                     Lookahead 

Lookahead is one of the most useful things when it comes to solving under 20 seconds. Lookahead is planning future stages of a speedsolve whilst executing moves to solve the pieces of the current stage. Lookahead is planning future stages of a speedsolve whilst executing moves to solve the pieces of the current stage. 

One of the best implementations of lookahead is predicting the first f2l pair solution in inspection. This means that there is no pause between finishing the cross and the first f2l pair because everything is planned during inspection. 

Lookahead can be difficult to understand and is tricky to learn, but once it’s mastered, solves will become much faster and fluent. 

Practice Things Individually 

This is especially useful for people who use csTimer . In csTimer, you can change the settings to generate scrambles with different things like edges only, easy cross, last layer, etc… Here are some of the best ones:

• Cross solved (good for practicing f2l)
• Easy cross (good for practicing cross)
• Last layer (good for practicing OLL and PLL)
• Edges/Corners only (good for practicing keyhole)

                           Planning Cross in Inspection

Planning the cross in inspection is extremely important because it means that you can focus on f2l while doing the cross. The best way to get better at planning cross is to scramble the cube and try to predict the cross solution and then solve it with your eyes closed. 

At first, it may be tricky but after a while, it becomes easier.