Despite my terrible sleep - the whole three hours after waking up 5 times during the night - I made sure to get to the venue before 8. Which ended up being a lifesaver because as soon the doors opened there was a mass rush to get in and grab a table.
I went in and found a place but saw a girl setting up on her own - in another attempt at being social, I asked to sit with her, and she said that was fine. She had friends coming as well. We didn’t really talk all that much, but having someone else on the table while I warmed up - and to watch over my bag when I went to scramble and run - was handy.
I did get around an hour of warming up. My hands felt clammy, the cube felt slippy. I think the downside of UV cubes is that handling them too much does make them feel sticky and weird. I kept wiping it off (ew) on my hoody, which helped. I think having a microfiber cloth or something would be ideal for the next comp. For the cube and my hands.
I was down to scramble for the first round of 3x3 - which didn’t go as badly as I expected. I wasn’t the worst scrambler!
I was also pretty pleased because Nevins (delegate for a lot of the North West Comps) came over, and I just heard him say ‘you’re Faye aren’t you?’ and I was like ‘yeah!’ - and he made a comment about my application (which I assume was the one I put in for the UKCC to volunteer - which I didn’t get) being very good. And then confusingly, that he hadn’t heard about the results - which I think I brushed off because I could tell him the result, I didn’t get it lol But again, like with Katie yesterday, it was nice just having a brief connection with someone in the cubing world - and hopeful that maybe next time if I volunteer, I’ll get it. I do like Nevins - he’s always really friendly.
I ran the cubes for the second round and then got my head down into warming up again. I was in round 7 which was the last round so, I had time to practice again. I got a few sub-30s in the warm-up, but I knew going into my round that my goals were:
1. No DNF
2. At least 1 sub-40 solve.
The first two solves felt shaky. I hit 40+ on both of them. I did feel like my initial cross solving was alright, but the nerves just got to me. The third I think was heading in a better direction.
The last two were the sweet spot. I came out and hit a 39.22 - one goal done! I felt good when I’d ticked that off. I just needed one more good one, ideally better than a 39 because then that would count towards the average.
The cubing gods smiled at me. 34.45!
I beat my previous time - set last year at the same comp - by 1.17 seconds. I think I shocked the judge a bit when I hit the timer to stop because I saw him jump, haha. Really pleased. I know that most people would think, but Faye, you were hitting 20+s in practice!
Yes, but consider this - I’m always nervous as fuck when solving in a comp, so you have to take that into account when you think about your times. Everything added up to a 41.77 PB Average as well! The PB streak is kept alive. I ended up being 430/466 which, in comparison to last year, is an improvement as well.
All this is confirming is that if I keep up with the hour of practice every day or so, the Liverpool competition will be even better.
I hung around for about half an hour after I finished. I think I briefly entertained going to get food and come back to judge, but then my heart was set on coming home. I called dad and updated him, let him know I was driving back, and he said both mum and him were feeling under the weather. I did want to go and see them, but that’s not a good idea when I have a busy week next week.