REXBURG— Lisa Benson has always been fond of puzzles. A year ago, Benson happened to stumble across what is called speed puzzling. Her competitive nature drove her to learn more about speed puzzling and how to form a team. She even learned there’s a national competition. So, Benson called the most competitive person she knows, her sister-in-law, Kanani Hepworth, and The Puzzle Pals was formed.
Competitive speed puzzling is fast paced. Participants are rarely given the puzzle in advance to practice, so they are seeing the pieces for the very first time as soon as the timer starts.
“Competitive puzzling is more than just puzzling,” Benson said. “If you're doing a 500 piece, you're done in an hour. So, it goes fast. You're basically there in and out pretty quick. Everyone’s puzzling the same puzzle and you don't know what it is. Until they say go. And then you see your puzzle, and then you start puzzling.”
Like everything else, strategy plays a big role in speed puzzling.
“Lisa's our edger, so we'll kick them all out to Lisa,” Hepworth said. “And as soon as we have everything flipped over, she will start edging. And then that's how we started off. And then I will start on a different part of the puzzle, and we go from there.”
After a great year of puzzling locally, Benson and Hepworth are taking their skills to nationals, which will be held in San Diego, California, where they hope to qualify for the finals.
“Our goal definitely is to make it to finals, and that's what we're going for,” Benson said. “We've worked really hard because we do want to at least make it to finals.”
The competition starts on Saturday, March 23. If the Puzzle Pals advance to the finals, they will compete the following day on Sunday, March 24.
The Puzzle Pals are now looking for new puzzlers! For more information on how you can join the Puzzle Pals team and to get updates on their journey to nationals, you can follow them and send a direct message to their Instagram, which you can find here.