Card deck memorisation - post your times here!

General Memory Chat
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I know it’s cool man. When I heard journalist Joshua Foer 2007 Amer Champ’s story, that he learned mental athletes were NOT savants after interviewing them, trained for a year and won the next year, I couldn’t believe it. If there’s any skill that will hold my interest, I really hope it will be this one. When I tell people about what I can already do, and that I’ll teach them to do it too, and they don’t respond with shock, excitement, and thanks, Or even take me up on the offer, I am frankly confused by it.

Ok, about the journeys: I have 4 17 loci journeys for cards. For me, that is enough, even if I make 30 or 40 memory attempts in a day. Why? I never am able to remember a deck from earlier in the day. Why? Here’s a quote from Foer’s book.

“The art of speed cards lies in finding the perfect balance between moving quickly and forming detailed images. You want a large enough glimpse of your images to be able to reconstruct them later, without wasting precious time conjuring any more color than necessary.” I take this to heart.

At your best, your fastest, your images will be like this. That is why I decode the cards, see a flash of the image, and move on. Often this is not good enough, which is why I started using those intermediate images. I can actually practice over and over in the same path without any problems. You and I are both practicing the opposite sides of the spectrum, but neither of us have balance yet. If images stuck in loci can throw you off over an hour later, you are either using too much time visualizing or too much time reviewing. Just like I will need to start slowing down a bit, you will need to start speeding up to get closer to that balance. When you start to push it a little more, and risk failure a little more, your loci will stay clean even if you have only 4.

Edit: when it would be wisest for you to speed up is another matter of course - who knows? Ben Pridmore (deck time 21 seconds) trained Foer. He told him that he needed a dozen palaces just to begin training. His advice is probably good, so we might consider making a couple more anyway…

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I do know what you mean. The brain is probably the most amazing and complex thing on the planet, so to not feel any desire to push it to new levels strikes me as peculiar, but then I guess everyone is different!

That quote is probably right on the button, as is your analogy of the difference in our styles. Although as previously mentioned, I have tried to go alot faster, but just got frustrated when I came across blanks and 8 minute recalls. I think this is what has driven me to slow it down in the hope that the times will come and so far my theory is working.

Maybe my growing familiarity with the cards is what is leading me to visualise and move on that bit quicker. Eventually I will hit that perfect balance.

I think that the main thing slowing me at the moment, is re-visiting previous locis. I am also hoping this will eventually fade to the point where it is not necessary, but for now it keeps it in my head. :slight_smile:

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I’m on it. I am currently half way through making my 5th loci. :wink:

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Heh, yeah I just made another, too. Tried it out and recalled correctly at 3:19, but one of the loci images I formed wrong, which is really sad. It’s a local bar; a fun path.

Edit: another thing you can do that will reduce the need to revisit locis, though it is hard for me I do usually try, is to view your images from angles that allow you to see the other nearby images that you have put up. Not easy.

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Congrats on your new time! Will bust that 3 minute barrier soon. :slight_smile:

I do occasionally do something very similar (though not quite the same) where the person from one loci is looking forward and laughing/pointing/throwing something at the person in the next loci, which can sometimes help. I find it helps more if they are people that know eachother personally (say my brother and sister), rather than fictional characters!

First target of beating 5 minute barrier reached this morning - 4:57.

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Feel good? :slight_smile:

Funny you say that - the day before yesterday I think (stayed up all of last night practicing on my front porch: beer in one hand, cards in the other) I dropped about a minute - and it happened when I was absolutely hammered. Drunk as I was, each character was showing off to me. Bugs bunny looked me in the eye, thinking, “You won’t believe how far I’m about to hit this ham sandwich with this golf club.” And recall was so easy for that exact reason - it’s like I felt real social pressure because they were so interactive…

That’s similar… But now I’ll introduce them to each other.

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Yeh, it does actually.

I guess now you realise why I take that extra bit of time installing the images. I find I get more of a buzz by recalling the deck with speed and ease than I do, by going a minute or two faster then struggling to recall.

I have yet to use an actual deck of cards yet! All of me experience has been via my iphone app! :confused:

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Get a deck!! It’ll be surprisingly different at first, but you may surprise yourself - I find my times with that app so slow that I can’t bear to use it! (I prefer to see the PAO all together, so I can learn to read it like a sentence in time). As a magician, card handling is very important to me, too. So I will be spending much of my training time learning to slide exactly three cards, nice and neat, and then getting them out of my line of sight again. But that’s just me :)! And memorizing the actual pasteboard has a more legitimately nerdy feel, which is nice. Actually, maybe technology is nerdier. Hmm, it’s kind of a nerdy task any way you slice it…

Little update: just did cards once, timed at 3:25, and will be pulling an all-nighter just really getting to know each card for the next ten hours or so. (The 7’s and 8’s alone add a minute to my time - I NEVER remember those). Even after no sleep, my time should be much better by this afternoon. Seeing the image from the card without saying the name - without even bothering to recognize what suit it is - that seems like the ultimate goal.

Edit: actually, that brings a question to mind:
The AmeriMemoChamp page says that the order of the memorization of the cards is predetermined - either face to back, or back to face. I suppose that means a ribbon spread is an illegal method: is that so?

Edit: Ok, I spent about 2.5 hours so far getting to know the cards. I decided to test my time again and punched the clock at 2:42 I made errors, but I felt like I had it memorized at 2:42, which is 30 seconds faster than I have ever punched the clock, so just visualizing them that quickly is improvement nonetheless. Will try again after a few hours of intimate 1 on 1 with the characters and update. Also going to watch a few youtube videos and take note of nuanced or idiosyncratic mannerisms.

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DH, the app that I use allows you to view three cards at a time, so I can still read them all in one place for each loci.

That is commitment, but be sure to give your brain a rest from it. You will be surprised how much it can help! Also, you will be less likely to get bored of it so quickly. :slight_smile:

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You’re right on both counts…it’s true.

What’s that app called? I need it!

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Hey guys, DH, I’ve been reading about your training program.
It’s insane, unhealthy and I get envious of it. Awesome job being able to memorize 40 decks a day. I always use each journey one time which makes me stick at about 7 decks on days I practice (every other day mostly, preferably every day).

But anyway, I think that you are doing amazingly well. If you can keep this up, it’ll be quite interesting to see where you are in a year (if you keep working on it) I really understand how you feel about quitting things no one else does. It was one of the main obstacles of signing in on this forum. There are so much basic questions I didn’t want to answer and so many things that were just uninteresting.

But this, your timing, your training, that’s interesting. I made this account just to be able to respond to your post over here.

My times of today were.
2:40
2:50
2:08
2:03
2:03
2:07
2:08

03 is my record and I was really glad with the steady performance around the 2:05 after warming up. A few days ago I had a 2:09 but it was only a peak and my steady times were around 2:40.
Now I think I can peak at around 1:40 or 50 and have a steady performance under 2 minutes in a few days.

Double Helix, I know that you will outrun me within just a few days because I can only spend 1 hour a day at memorizing but I think I can learn a lot from you.
Can you make a topic in which you explain carefully which method you use and give an example of at least half a deck of yours with your thought process?
I saw that you are using 1 image but does that mean one PAO combination or just one card?

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DH,

The app is called “icue”. It has a couple of bugs like sometimes when you are recalling it doesn’t allow you to select certain cards, but I have found a way around this by selecting the correct suit then selecting 4 preceding cards leading up to the one you need, so for example.

If the card you need is King of spades, you select spades as your suit (then ocassionally it will not let you select the King), so you just select the 9, then the 10, J, Q and finally the King works.

You will know what I mean once you have it. Other than that, it is a very good app which times you very efficiently on both memorisation and recall. :slight_smile:

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Wessells, your comment made me feel great! And I appreciate the vote of confidence because those are some fantastic times you have. I hope you’re right.

Unhealthy is right, - I slept 16 hours yesterday because I practiced for about 30 hours straight the day(s) before, even spreading the cards in front of me in a ribbon while eating. Honestly, I don’t think I improved too terribly much in that time - the mind stops learning if you don’t give it breaks…but I hate taking breaks because I just spend the time thinking about memorizing. However, I decided today from now on I’m forcing myself to stop for at least ten minutes for every hour I practice. I’ll send you a pm to talk about the rest.

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Hey guys,
mighty pleased to be posting on this thread because, let’s face it, it means your times are going down :slight_smile:

I have 10 days of practice under my belt now, and the reason for this posting is I just dipped under the 5 min barrier with a sneaky little 4:52.
I’m thinking I should be quite pleased since that is only about 10 proper attempts, as I struggle with ghost images if I redo a deck the same day. I found the comments just above in this thread very relevant to this issue re: seeing just enough of your image but not too much. I’ll try and work on that.
So, target of 2 min by end of March.

Paul

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Or…March 16? :slight_smile:
Good job on your times.

I have a question for everyone.

It’s really, really hard for me to quickly form images if I am actually looking at the cards. I have half a mind to train myself to learn to read the blurry cards while looking past them - it’s night and day. And this is nothing unexpected; research has consistently linked eye direction and focus with different mental states. Think the sounds and emotions the last time you were on the beach.

I’ll bet you didn’t look up.
Now try to recall the order of the last deck you memorized. Then, you very likely would tend to look up. I bet if anyone else has the same problem as me, they don’t tend to look below the cards when forming images, but above them. Am I right?

These things are also easier when you gaze into a distance. I guess that’s because there isn’t an object of focus in your line of sight. Does anyone else have this problem? How have you tried to work past it?

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I used to close my eyes but that didn’t work. When I kept them open I gained about 30 seconds.

I don’t know, maybe I have a good imagination but I don’t have much problems with visualizing the cards. Sometimes I already put the three cards in my hands away and get the next three. In the time between I quickly form my image.

Also…

1:56 new personal best.

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W00t! 2:00 is the true test - congrats!
I have made myself not touch cards (or the app) for a full day. I just tried to think up strategies that should improve the time. read almost all of Ericsson’s articles insteadAlso giving up on Pao for digits. Sucks having to practice 52 different images, but within the first week I could already form those images so much quicker than I can with cards in spite of a much, much greater amount of practice. It’s because the major system registers as quick as letters, and it is so so much easier to see them than cards. Will test my time on the tenth ( can’t memorize effectively after night of drinking), which I am doing at a bar right now :).

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Hi Guys,

Not practiced much the last couple of days. Got drunk and got my phone wet, and it now won’t charge so have been waiting for my new phone to arrive!

Although I did practice a bit on my ipad and changed my tactics (out of curiosity) by doing just 17 cards, one person, one loci (as opposed to my normal system of PAO 17 Loci)

I found that I got 55 seconds with an easy recall, so went for 34 cards (again, one person, one loci). and again, got quite a good time of 2:40, so tried a full deck thinking I could possibly get under 4 minutes…didn’t happen! Seems it works well for a shorter number of cards, but not the whole deck! In my case, at least.

So, it looks like I will persisting with the PAO system that got me 4:57, but we have to try these things, I guess!.. :wink:

Wessells - What system do you use? 17 Loci PAO or 52 Loci, 52 People/Objects?

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Huggy, I was just Doug something similar. I felt that I should get away from cards for a few days and just basically auto-pilot-percolate. So I’ve been working on digits instead. I am very happy with every image, and can read them very quickly, but so far if I do more than 80 digits in 5 mins I start to lose some images - and I see no pattern to which ones are being forgotten! Argh!

Sorry for the digression. I just decided to pick up the 26 black cards for the first time in two days, doing PAO and PA on the last two cards, and got 'em in 1:05 with a perfect (no second deck used) recall. I am pleased with that time, and will probably ‘master’ the black cards before working with the reds again. Probably won’t do a full deck for about a week. Everyone who buys a guitar wants to learn G,C, and D major to strum their favorite tunes. Those who first work on scales and picking precision are bound to impress in the end…

Edit: you might want to split the difference and play with PA, Huggy. It’s really easy to make clear logical images, but to me it feels like I have to keep switching gears and think really quickly so it’s been slow for me.

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Thanks DH,

Also glad that you have decided to give yourself a well earned rest from the cards! :wink:

I am happy to keep trying different things until I find my favoured system. I havn’t tried just PA over 26 loci as yet. Will give that a go soon, but like you, I also want to get moving on my 00-99 images soon.