Interviews

For today’s interview we visit the Netherlands to talk to Willem Bouman, a human calculator with more than 7 decades of experience with numbers! We first met in the 2012 World Cup in Gießen, and more recently while teaching at the Junior Mental Calculation World Cup in Bielefeld. At age 81, he is still active … Read more

Our guest today is Wenzel Grüß, a 17-year-old Math prodigy from Germany. In the last 2 years he has achieved gold medals in the Junior Mental Calculation World Championship (JMCWC), Mental Calculation World Cup (MCWC) and the MSO World Championship, making him one of the most brilliant and well-known mental calculators of 2020. He has also … Read more

Mohammad El-Mir (representing Lebanon) is one of the top Mental Math prodigies of the past few years, winning his age category in the Junior Mental Calculation World Championship 5 times since 2014, often by hundreds of points! In this interview we catch up with him soon after his first appearance in the 15+ age category … Read more

Jeonghee Lee is perhaps the most accomplished soroban expert in the world, and the only master to have achieved the 11th-dan level at the apparatus. Originally from South Korea, she lives in New York and is currently running Abakidz, a tactile learning center. In addition to her many medals at Memoriad and the Mental Calculation … Read more

Marc Jornet Sanz first competed in the Mental Calculation World Cup in 2010, winning the overall silver medal. In 2018 he is stronger than ever, winning gold for calendar calculations, silver for multiplications, and 3rd place for the standard tasks. We interviewed him at the 2018 World Cup soon after he set a massive new … Read more

Nodas Boukovalas is Greece’s top mental calculator, and one of the most enthusiastic participants in the scene since 2010. Today we talk as he prepares for his 5th Mental Calculation World Cup. How did you first get involved in Mind Sports? It started in High school in the late 1990s in Greece. I participated in … Read more

In 2010, 11-year-old Priyanshi Somani amazed everyone when she won the Mental Calculation World Cup, setting a new world record at mental square roots in the process. She was the first competitor to achieve such success as a child, but since her victory many other young competitors have followed in her footsteps. Priyanshi retired from mental calculation in … Read more

Multiplication record holder (2012-2016), winner of the Memoriad Trophy for the world’s fastest calculator in the 2012 Mental Calculation World Cup, gold medallist at multiplication at Memoriad 2012 and MCWC 2012, and world record holder in 2010 for calendar calculations, Freddis Reyes from Cuba has joined us to discuss his experiences competing internationally. How did … Read more

Today we’re talking with Andy Robertshaw, an International Master at Mental Calculations with a career spanning over 12 years, winning medals 7 times at the World Championships, and in 2012 recognised at the World Cup as the “3rd most versatile” calculator. He works as a credit risk manager, living with his wife Nadia. So how … Read more