The Al Rayan International School in East Legon, Accra hosted Ghana’s second-ever speedcubing competition over the weekend. 

The competition dubbed EduLearn-ARIS Ghana Championship was put together by EduLearn Ghana in partnership with the World Cube Association (WCA) and with support from the Hungarian Embassy in Ghana.  

The two-day event brought together 83 cubers overall representing 16 different nationalities and 10 schools. 

“This year’s event has been nice and overwhelming. We had some good competition, the score has definitely gotten better than what we had last year and I’m hoping next year will be much bigger,” said Mrs Pooja Gokaldas who is Director at EduLearn Ghana.

Mrs Pooja Gokaldas

She added: “I hope to cross 100 next year, hopefully.”The cubers competed in eight different categories; 3x3x3 cube, 2x2x2 cube, 4x4x4 cube, 3x3x3 blindfolded, 3x3x3 one-handed, Megaminx, Pyraminx and Skewb.

Nigerian Arinze Owoh, who is a student at Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, dominated as he won five categories overtaking last year’s winner Krishang Agarwal who won three categories. 

"I think Nigeria was introduced to speedcubing a little before Ghana so I have always been ahead of him [Krishang Agarwal],” he told Joy Sports. 

Arinze won the 3x3x3 cube, 2x2x2 cube, 4x4x4 cube, 3x3x3 one-handed and Megaminx. 

Indian Krishang Agarwal, who is a pupil of the Roman Ridge School, took home the first prize in the Pyraminx category. 

Wyatt Idell of the United States of America and Indian Akash Rupela won the Skewb and 3x3x3 Blindfolded categories respectively. 

Hungarian Ambassador to Ghana, H.E Andras Szabo

Speedcubing is a sport involving solving a variety of twisty puzzles, the most famous being the 3x3x3 puzzle or Rubik's Cube, as quickly as possible. The Rubik's Cube was invented in 1974 by Hungarian professor of architecture, Erno Rubik.

The Hungarian Ambassador to Ghana, Andras Szabo who was the special guest of honour said he was impressed with the level of competition amongst participants.