How to Reduce Cube Rotations

1. Introduction: Hi, my name is Byron. I've been solving competitively for well over a decade and have been a Rubik's Cube instructor for years with having successfully taught over 400 students. This course will be targeted at those which already have at least an intermediate knowledge of the three-by-three Rubik's cube and wish to learn how to lower their times by reducing cube rotations. If this course is a good suit for you or not, I highly encourage you to take a look at the mini courses I offer here on this platform. I'm sure you will find a course that suits your needs. This course will be very focused on the topics at hand with clearly explained practical examples. We've got this whole pair right here, so we can knock that out. Then we got this right here is afterall case which is handled like this. Our u prime, R prime. This is just a case that seems like everyone has a problem with faster. It looks like this. I look forward to hearing from you at the end. And with that being said, let's get started. 2. How to Look for Pieces: The first thing I would cover when it comes to reducing cube rotations is probably the biggest culprit of many solvers is rotating the entire cube to look for F20 pieces. If you don't initially find one, a lot of people will usually rotate the cube until they find something. This is fine given that you've exhausted every other situation. But usually just doing a u or u prime in this instance would save a key rotation. And you'll usually find the piece that you're looking for. For instance, in this example, we have this green and orange piece and we don't immediately know where its edges located. A lot of people will rotate and realize that it's actually in the top layer. When being in this position from the get-go, all you had to do was you and you would have noticed or even a u-prime and you would've seen it as well. And you would've known that that was the correct piece. This same thing when it comes to not rotating is especially important when it comes to old El and PLL. In either case, if you know all, all PLL or even to look, you should never be rotating the cube in order to solve any of those cases. For instance, here this is an OH, ALL. Usually I see some people that if they see it from this angle, they'll do a Y2 in order to perform the algorithm for it. But if you happen to get it in this angle or this angle, just do a U instead, execute the algorithm. And then whenever you run into some kind of Appeal, just execute that without a key rotation unless it's required by the algorithm itself. 3. What to do After Solving a Pair: This next issue is something that I'm guilty of as well. So I'm sure I'm not the only person out there. But once you solve an F2 L pair, for instance, this one right here, lot of people will solve it. And because they're being timed and they're in a rush, they'll immediately rotate the cube to help scan and look for pieces. And I know this kind of touches on the same thing I was talking about earlier, but this is especially important for those that try and do it. I would say habitually or if not instinctively. So the second you solve a Perrier like jump and you don't even take a second to look and see if you had to rotate the cube in the first place. That will cut some time down. If you're able to solve a pair and stop and look. Here's an example on how you can exactly improve on that. Honestly, you want to stop timing yourself for just a little bit when it comes to working on this and actually solve a little bit slower and make yourself stop. So that way you can look and make sure you have to turn a cube before you actually do it. So for example, I have this piece and this piece. If I insert that, stop right here, don't move the cube. Just look around and see what you can work with. We got this whole pair right here, so we can knock that out. Then we got this right here. Now this requires a rotation unless you are talking about more advanced algorithms. And then we're going to look at this piece here. We ended up saving a lot of rotations out of habit and by slowing down and taking a second, now, incorporating that slower motion into your everyday solves will come in time. You just have to become more disciplined with it in practice and you can slowly migrate it into your regular solving. 4. How to Handle the Hardest Case: Now I've brought this up a number of times in my courses. And this is just a case that it seems like everyone has a problem with this. Usually I see people solve by taking this out, like this, rotating the cube, pairing up and inserting. But believe it or not, there is a much better way to go about it. For one, you can solve it this way instead, and this will just cut a rotation out. You can do a sledgehammer which is a r prime, f our f prime. You're presented with this F20 case, which is handled like this. Our u-prime R prime U R u prime R prime u2. And then you insert that pair with an r u prime, R prime. So doing the algorithm a little bit faster, looks like this. In other way to handle this case is just strictly algorithm based. And you would start by doing a regroup here, and you would do a R2, U2, f R2. Use your ring finger for a f prime. U2 prime, u r prime. I'm not too bad not doing this one a little bit faster. It looks like this. 5. Rotationless Cross Solution: One case that trips a lot of people up, including myself, is this one. Of course, assuming that you solve the cross on bottom, I have a white cross that's almost finished here. And we have one edge that's flipped, but in the right spot on the side. This is a case that is very troublesome for a lot of people and there's a very simple solution that I use in almost every solve. You should be able to easily cut out some cube rotations because usually the way that I see people handled this case is they will do an R2 rotate and then they will bring it down like this or something to that effect. But there's an easier solution that looks something like this. No key rotations required in order to perform that move. All you have to do is have the piece you need flipped on the right side like this. And you're going to do re grip. You're gonna do a r prime, lowercase u, r prime, lowercase u prime. And that will flip that edge and keep the rest of your cross intact. This is a very versatile move because you can do it in almost any cue position. Even if the pieces over here, if the pieces all the way back. If the pieces all the way up top. Even if the piece is all the way back here. You can simply mirror the algorithm on the other side for when you get that case, try incorporating this trick into your solves. And I think you'll be pleasantly surprised. 6. Update Your Algs: This is gonna be a workload on some people, but you want to go through the algorithms that you already know. Find the ones that have rotations are the ones that you really don't like that take you a long time and find new updated algorithms that work better for you. For instance, this case, this old case that I have here, I used to do a rotation whenever I did this algorithm and it was not fun, it wasn't easy, and it was definitely took some time out of my solves. Now I don't have to worry about that rotation in the middle of the algorithm. And I have a rotation list option for this case, I'm able to keep my hands for the most part and home grip and end in home grip and I have no rotations to speak of. Definitely a good update. Go through all the algorithms that you know and make sure that you check the ones that you don't like or that include rotations that could possibly be eliminated with more updated outs. 7. Edge Position Dictates Rotation: I know some of you may be asking how can you look at the case and know if you have to rotate or not immediately. Well, there's a very easy trick to know, assuming that you're not using advanced SQL algorithms. This is a really cool trick. So I got this handled where the cross is already done. And we're just going to kind of go through it. So for instance, let's look at this case here. Looking at this case, let's bring them both to the top layer. If you look at this edge piece, the edges green and a side color is green, it doesn't have to match exactly. I could have it over here like this. If green is on the side with that color that it matches is on one of the sides. There is no rotation that needs to be had. For example, this is green. Green is on one of my side colors, so I don't have to rotate. So I should be able to solve this case without a rotation. That's one. Let's look at another case. Let's go with this one. And I believe this is its pair back here. We'll get that out. Let's take a look. The side color this time is red. Does read match. One of the side colors, green on this side, blue on this side, it does not match. So that's telling me I'm going to have to rotate. You can rotate anywhere you want. But seeing that the slot is here, I want the slot to be in the back as much as possible. Instead of rotating here and putting the slot in the front, I would rather rotate here, so that way it's in the back. So then I can solve this case. Just like this. Without rotation. With rotation because it had to. Now that that's solved in the back, I'm open to more options here and I don't have slots, a whole bunch of slots filled up where I can't really see the whole cube. So always try putting solved, solved slots in the back or solve pairs in the back. So that way you have some more open up options. Let's check, Let's take a look at another one. So there's this one and this one, psi colors blue, but blue is in the back, so I'm going to have to rotate. So let's do it this way. If I rotate this way, I'll have the next available slot right here. Let's pair these two up. Now we have this one. There is a special case for this one because if you did take it out, this would not match aside color. It would match the front or the back, which means it requires rotation. But for this purpose I'm going to do it this way. So you know, it does require a rotation. So just remember the orientation of that edge. If it lines up with a side color, matches aside color no rotation is needed. But if it matches the front or the back, you're going to have to rotate. Do this slowly at first and over time it's going to become second nature and you're going to notice it in an instant. 8. Wide "d" Moves: There are some people out there that when they run into a case that requires rotation, they heard from someone that you're not supposed to rotate. And so instead they tried doing a wide D move or D prime. This is a horrible way to negate doing a cube rotation because it requires you to adjust your grip to do that movement and then readjust again so that way you can get back into your Solve. Honestly in a key rotation in many cases is better than that. Or you can figure out different ways to insert that case. For instance, we have this red and green case, right in green here. We can pair them up like this. And usually they will regroup, move it, and that way they can insert it without a cube rotation. The best way to go about this particular case is to use your pinky to support the middle layer and perform it this way by doing a f prime, f L prime. It's completely rewritten. This doesn't require a cube rotation and you're able to maintain home grip just about the entire time. So we'll try incorporating that instead. And if you're doing any wide D moves, cut them out of every single algorithm you have. I have not come across a single algorithm where it's beneficial, but I could be wrong. There might be some where it really works well for you. And if that's the case and you test it side-by-side with a different option. If it's better, it's better and you should keep it. But for the most part, they have no real place when it comes to solving. Under time. 9. Back Slots: There are many of you that most likely already know this, but I'm sure that there are some people out there that need to hear this when you're doing your F2 L, I have the cross already solved here. And this is the SQL case that I'm talking about right now. Just as an example is this orange and blue case and the orange and blue edges there. If you catch it from this angle and it's a simple three move insert. There are some people that will do an E2 in order to insert that three move case. However, you want to be able to do this case from the back if it's a simple three move insert and that doesn't require a rotation, which in the previous video, like I showed you, if the edge matches aside color, regardless if it goes in the back slots or the front, no key rotation is required. In this case, it would be the same thing. Simply like that. This case, for example, would need a key rotation because red matches one of the colors that are in the front or the back. We would rotate. And you always want to try and insert your slots in the back. Just like this. We have this case here. And this one does not require a key rotation because the edge matches that. In this case, what I would do is do a U2 L2 to pair it, inserts, go down and overshoot to put that pair back. Notice how, when I'm going through these solves, I'm making sure that I solve in the back or I don't rotate unless I absolutely have to. Here's another case here. I would rotate in the back or you could rotate in the front since this is the last slot. But keep in mind, any of these that I'm solving do not require a Y2 which is moving it two times. If rotation is needed for any of these cases, it would only be one rotation per case. You should never have to do a y2 because that would mean you would have been able to solve the case from the beginning. 10. Some Rotations Are Acceptable: Now, even though we're working on eliminating cube rotations as much as possible, sometimes doing a rotation list solution is highly inefficient and not recommended. I just want you to keep in mind that doing rotations in a lot of cases are totally fine and you don't want to eliminate them completely unless they are easy and efficient to do so. For example, this case here, if you separate it like this, you are left with this case. A rotation would be completely fine in order to solve that case. However, when it comes to all L and PLL, like I mentioned earlier, do not do a cube rotation for those or y 2s. There is no need for it unless it's in the middle of the algorithm. So keep that in mind. Rotations are fine. And make sure that the rotation list algorithms or cases that you're handling are more efficient than doing a cube rotation. 11. Closing & What Next?: All right, You guys, that's the end of my course. I hope you've found this entertaining and informative. I will close with one more tip and I highly recommend. What will help you get better is by watching example solves. I have a course up on skillshare already showing some examples, solves that you might be able to pick up on some tricks and some tips from there as well that will help incorporate a lot of the aspects that I was teaching in this course. Go ahead and check out that video. And keep in mind that everything that I have here on this table, all these puzzles in the back, including the one that I'm using, are available down in the course description. So you guys can pick some of the stuff up for yourself. And with that being said, it's been a pleasure teaching you guys this course. I hope you enjoyed it. Don't forget to review the course. Let me know what I did good, what I did bad. That way I can help improve my content in the future. But I'll see you guys in the next one.