I still remember my first solve of under 10 seconds, and what a moment that was.
It was January 15, the day after my birthday, and I was at my desk as usual. I looked at the scrambled cube, and the cross (the first step of solving) looked great, so I planned that step’s solution before starting the timer.
I put the cube gently on my desk, started my hand timer, picked it up and started solving. The five moves I planned were executed in one second, and the next step of solving the first two layers (F2L), very luckily, was easy to do.
It’s as if the pieces for simple cases revealed themselves to me directly, and I solved them quickly. I felt butterflies in my stomach from how good the solve was going, not wanting to mess it up.
A lot of luck went into it, but I finished the solve and slammed my hands on the timer to stop it. It read “9.843”, my first sub-10! I was unbelievably excited, since sub-10s are a big feat for a cuber.