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Sliding controversy continues

Sliding controversy continues

There continues to be significant controversy in the cubing community about people sliding the timer during solves, this was first brought to attention 3 months ago when YiHeng Wang got a 0.78 2x2 average which beat the world record by a significant margin. 

The controversy was that he slided on the timer so that he actually made moves to the cube before the timer had actually started, but the trouble is that it is impossible for someone to spot this in real time. The WCA guidelines say that they will not take slow-mo video footage into consideration as they consider that would be unfair.

Hassan Khanani decided to launch a protest against it by deliberately sliding at a competition, his average was subsequently disallowed by the World Cube Association. Hassan Khanani argues that if his average was disallowed then YiHeng Wang's average must also be disallowed.

Other proposals have been made which include switching over to 4-Pad mode on the Speedstacks G5 timers, this move was made by the World Speedstacks Association a few years ago and they even reset all their world records with the new regulations, however, this is a very radical solution and would probably draw significant anger from other top cubers.

Another interesting solution proposed is to put double sided tape on the timer sensors as the friction from the tape makes sliding impossible, it would be very funny if this was actually implemented and delegates started taping all the timers at competitions.

But maybe it is time that we changed the guidelines to allow reviews of slow-mo footage and maybe even force top cubers to film their solves so that they can't just refuse to film them in case their solve is questioned later. They already check for mis-scrambles and have disallowed world records on the basis of them even though that has nothing to do with the competitor.

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