Timofei Tarasenko set a 1:36.80 World record 7x7 Mean and 1:31.63 European record 7x7 Single (ranked 2nd in the world) at Hanoi Big Cubes 2026 in Hanoi, Vietnam.
Tarasenko improved his Personal record mean by 1.28 seconds, beating his 1:38.08 set at Kuala Lumpur Cubing Challenge 2026, and the World record by 0.06 seconds, narrowly surpassing Max Park’s 1:36.86 set at Nub Open Trabuco Hills Fall 2025, almost a year ago.
Tarasenko improved his Personal record single by 2.79 seconds, beating his 1:34.42 set at Kuala Lumpur Cubing Challenge 2026, and the European record by 1.06 seconds, surpassing Tymon Kolasinski’s 1:32.69 set at Elmsford Extravaganza III 2026. Tarasenko is now only 1.04 seconds away from Max Park’s 1:30.59 World record single, set earlier this year at the North American Championship.
These records come after Tarasenko’s first big cube World record, a 1:03.63 6x6 Mean set at Kuala Lumpur Cubing Challenge 2026. The 7x7 Mean is his second big cube World record, though he also has 6 more World records in Megaminx.
Tarasenko is a Yau user. Historically, big cube world records were set with the method called Reduction (Redux) where the solver would reduce the big cube into a 3x3, first by solving the centers, then the edges, then after the reduction, would solve the cube like a 3x3. In Yau, however, after two opposite centers are solved, 3 cross edges are solved next to the cross center, then after that, the last 4 centers, remaining edges, then the 3x3 stage, with cross already done. Tarasenko achieving the World record mean with Yau is significant as it is the first 7x7 World record mean to be done with Yau and is yet another category World record achieved with Yau. The only category remaining to have never been set with Yau is 6x6 Single.
Another significant result from the competition, also from Tarasenko, is another sub-1 6x6 single. Earlier this year, at Paradise Place Thailand Cube Open 2026, Tarasenko was the second person in the world to ever get a sub-1 single in 6x6… and he got 2 at that competition. Now, with a 59.93, he adds another sub-1 single in 6x6 to his belt.
One more significant result from the competition, this time by Đỗ Quang Hưng, are Vietnamese National records in 7x7: a 1:33.75 Single, and 1:41.29 Mean. On the world stage, these records improve his ranking from 11th, to 5th, and 12th to 7th respectively.
At the comp, Tarasenko won 4x4, 6x6, and 7x7, while Hưng won 5x5.
