Yiheng Wang (王艺衡) set a new Rubik's Cube average world record with 4.48 seconds, breaking the previous record he set in March at 4.69 seconds. The 9-year-old Chinese speedcuber broke the record on the Mofunland Cruise Open 2023 competition, held on a cruise ship, departing from Marina Bay Cruise Centre Singapore.
Rubik's Cube Single vs. Average Records
In official cubing competitions each competitor is given 5 scrambles. From the solution times, they drop the fastest and slowest and they calculate the average of the remaining 3 times. This means that Yiheng Wang didn't just make a lucky solve, instead he set the average record.
The current fastest single solve was set just 2 weeks ago by Max Park (3.13 seconds). Max's best average reult is 4.86 seconds which makes him rank second in this category.
Max Park breaking the "single" world record just 2 weeks before.
The Solutions
In the record breaking round Yiheng registered the following times 4.72, 4.72, 3.99, 3.95, and 5.99.
This was the first time someone managed to accomplish two sub-4 times in 5 consecutive solves. In 2016 a Feliks Zemdegs was the first to reach a sub-5 result in an official competition and in 2018 Yusheng Du was the first to do the first sub-4. And now Yiheng Wang makes two sub-4's and two sub-5's in 5 consecutive solves which is truly amazing.
In total, there have been only 14 sub-4 solves recorded by WCA, Yiheng being responsible for 5 of them.
The Scrambles
- 4.72 (45 turns) – R2' D' R2 D2 R2 L2 D' L' B' D2 F' D U2 B' R U' F B2
- 4.72 (61) – B2' L2 D2 R2 B2 U L2 U R' D U2 R B2 R2 D2 F D U' R F'
- 3.99 (49) – U L2' B2 L2 D' R2 U' L2 B' L' F' U R D R2 B' R2 U F U'
- 3.95 (best) (48) – U2' F2 U F2 U2 R2 D2 U' L2 F D' B2 D R B U2 B2 D' R' U
- 5.99 (worst) (61) – F2' D L2 B2 U2 R2 D R2 B2 D2 F' R B2 D2 L' D2 L U R' U2
Yiheng used the CFOP method and the "GAN12 Maglev" speedcube to accomplish this result.
Other Records
Yiheng's WCA profile was registered in 2019 when he was 5 years old. Looking at his statistics we can notice that besides the 3×3×3 cube he holds the continental and national record for the 2×2×2 cube as well.
Yiheng Wang's WCA statistics
Despite his young age he currently has 20 gold medals and he broke the world record twice.