In the time it takes you to write on your own Facebook wall, Harvard chemistry graduate student Thomas M. Snyder can complete the average Sudoku puzzle—and he has an entry in the Guinness World Records to prove it.
Snyder also had about this amount of time to dwell on his victory in the final round of the World Sudoku Championship, held two weeks ago in Prague. With just over a minute left on the clock, Snyder sat back while his contenders struggled away, and mused, “Wow, I’ve just won the championship.”
The puzzles Snyder faces aren’t all the one-minute-in-heaven 9x9 squares students toy with in boring lectures. At the World Championship, Snyder explains, there was a puzzle that was “nine Sudokus connected to each other,” creating a super-sized Sudoku with 729 number blanks.
Sound intense? It is. “You can certainly go to bed with the numbers one through nine haunting you,” he says.
But the sleepless nights come with perks. In addition to badass Google-logo jackets that come with being a member of the U.S. Sudoku Team (yes, there is one), Snyder found some birds of his feather. “We’re sort of those aficionados that can pick out these little subtle flavors and really enjoy a puzzle,” he says.
“Lots of people do puzzles, but no one takes it up to his level,” says Sun H. Chung, a fellow chemistry grad student.
Hardcore though he is, the Sudoku World Champion tagline might take some getting used to. Snyder maintains that he hasn’t used it as a pick-up line—”yet.” But not to worry, there’s no box he can’t fill.
