Speedcubing makes its Billings debut

Billings, Montana – The sport of speedcubing involves trying to solve Rubik’s cubes and other like puzzles in the least amount of time. And the rapidly expanding competition had its Billings premiere on Saturday.

“I just thought it was the coolest thing, I had never seen a cube before, so I just wanted to learn how to solve it. Then my older sister had a Rubik’s cube in her room, so, I picked it up and went on YouTube and learned how to solve it,” said Speedcuber, Colton Hulin on Saturday.

His tale of how he got into the sport is not unlike many of the people who were there.

“I got into it during Covid. There was nothing to do, so I just learned how to solve a Rubik’s cube,” said Speedcuber, Brody Daniel on Saturday.

46 people competed in the first-ever Speedcubing competition, which was hosted at MetraPark’s 4-H building.

Tate Ackerman, who competed on Saturday, developed a passion for the sport two years prior. Having been to an event in Helena the previous year, he was keen to bring one to Billings. Thus, with his mother Kim’s assistance, it came to pass.

“I kind of got started with my cousin giving me a cube and I messed it up. I liked it, but it’s more that I just got linked to it, but I want to just keep getting faster and faster until I can’t get faster anymore,” said Tate on Saturday.

All ages were welcome to compete, and some of the state’s top cubers were there.

The top scores in each event were calculated by averaging the middle three scores obtained by competitors after they completed nearly a dozen distinct puzzles five times apiece.

A group of people completed the problems using only one hand, and another group used blindfolds.

While it took longer to complete the blindfolded portion, many of the contestants completed the problems in a handful of seconds.

These competitors frequently completed a task that takes the typical person-hours to do in a fraction of the time.

“They go on and learn all these algorithms and so, it’s a language, these kids talk in their own speedcubing language and learn all these different ways to solve it,” said Kate Ackerman on Saturday.

For the competitors, it was a chance to improve not only their puzzle-solving abilities but also make new friends.

“It’s cool because you get to cheer each other on and it doesn’t matter if you win or lose, everyone is just happy about what they get,” said Tate Ackerman.

“You can always get better with it. There’s never an end-point on how good you can get with it and you increase your speed with solving every cube because there’s a bunch of different puzzles, it’s just a fun challenge,” added Daniel.

“It feels good when you solve it, you feel proud of yourself, but the other part isn’t even the cubing itself, but all these great people around here that you get to meet and talk to. Everybody’s really nice,” Hulin added.