Chennai
Shreevatsh was just like any other teenager — playing video games and watching TV after school hours. But the Rubik’s Cube changed his life. “During my 10th standard, I saw a Rubik’s Cube lying around, gathering dust. I decided to solve it and got hooked to cubing. That was a turning point in my life. I ended up spending hours – watching Youtube and learning how to solve the cube within an hour. My sister’s friend, Winfred Michael, an avid cubing expert himself, suggested that I try my hand at speed cubing. So, I worked hard and reduced my average speed from five minutes to 20 seconds, within a year. I even attended a speed cubing competition during my board exams,” laughed the youngster.
Shreevatsh added that watching his friend Winfred, who had earlier entered the Guinness Book of World Records for most number of Rubik’s Cubes solved on a bicycle, inspired him. “He set the record by solving 700 cubes in six hours and 28 minutes. I was really happy for him and I also wanted to try my hand at it. This is my last year of school and I wanted to do something before I graduated,” he added.
The 12th grader at Abacus Montessori School tried his record-breaking attempt on June 19, which ended in failure. “I was doing quite well but my bicycle hit a chair and I ended up touching the ground to steady myself – which was against the rules. I was so disappointed,” explained this teenager, who had trained hard for the event. “For two months, I used to jog and work out for five hours, to build stamina. I had to cycle continuously while solving the Rubik’s Cube,” he revealed.
In retrospect, the failure helped him do better the second time around. “I tried again on August 7 and this time, I felt I was in control. I started solving the cubes from 7.50 am and I broke the record at 751 cubes. To verify my attempt two witnesses named Vivek Prasad Mada and Pavan Kumar Akula were present. Once I broke the record, I jumped with joy before collapsing out of sheer exhaustion and dehydration. But, it was the most memorable day of my life,” he concluded.
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