There are some world class puzzlers worthy of competing in the olympics if there was such a genre of competition.
People have been puzzling for more than 200 years and its natural that tournaments exist for each game genre. For example we have crossword tournaments, like the Boston Crossword Tournaments, there is Tetris tournament a very fast paced competition but there is also a Jigsaw Puzzling Competition that is held on Madrid, Spain – where people from more than 750 countries participate.
Who organizes the event?
World Jigsaw Puzzle Championship was created in 2019 by the Spanish Alfonso Ossorio – who was on a mission to create a tournament that would bring together all speed puzzlers wordlwide. The event has always taken place Valladolid, Spain. To know more about World Jigsaw Puzzle Federation (WJPF) you can visit worldjigsawpuzzle.org or go to their youtube channel via this link https://www.youtube.com/@worldjigsawpuzzlefederation.
What it looks like?
If you are curious about what it actually looks like for a player to do the speed puzzling take a look at the video below.
Notable Puzzlers
A notable puzzle champion is the LA resident Karen Kavett, she is a popular figure sporting over 250 thousand subscribers on her youtube channel named “Karen Puzzles”. For Ms Kavett puzzling is no longer a past-time venture but a full-time job that earns her living. She says that streaming her puzzling activities on her channel allows her to connect with her audience and feels proud of the community she has been able to build during all these years (since 2018). Puzzling is no longer an “alone time” activity for her.
She will participate in this years WJPF event in August and has been practicing for a while, instead of finishing the puzzle in her bedroom she will now be able to play it live in front of a broader audience an bigger hall.
More than 3000 players would participate this year, this is a record number and shows a steady year to year growth comparing it to the 500 participants in 2019.