As the 2009 World Memory Championships are currently underway, I thought it would be fun to see just how good the competitors are…

Memorising a single deck of cards in the fastest time:

In July 2009, Ben Pridmore became the first person to memorise a deck of cards in under 30 seconds (26.28 seconds).  In August 2009 he broke that record again to set an astounding time of 24.97 seconds.

To put that into context, here is a brief explanation…

1. You are giving a single deck of shuffled cards.
2. Against the clock, you look through the cards, with the clock stopping when you put the cards face down (that establishes your time)
3. To test that you memorised the order of the cards, you are then given a new deck of cards.  You have to place these cards in the order of the deck you just memorised.
4. The judge / arbiter then checks your original, memorised deck, against the pack you have just placed in the memorised order
5. If you get this correct, your original memorisation time (step 2) is approved.

Makes sense?

Well with that in mind (no pun intended) have a look at this video of Ben Pridmore setting the World Record.  And no, it is not speeded up in any way.  Yes, he is scanning the cards that quickly!

[vimeo]http://www.vimeo.com/6270043[/vimeo]

Would you like to learn how to improve your memory?  Then take a look at the Mind Maximiser course.