Puzzle Me This! Competitive jigsaw puzzlers raise funds

Intrepid puzzlers recently gathered for a sell-out online jigsaw puzzle speed solving competition, all to raise funds for Walking With The Wounded.

Competitive jigsawing is a popular pastime and really came to the fore during the Covid-19 lockdowns and the UK Jigsaw Puzzling Association (UKJPA) is an active and well-supported group. Although many of their competitions still occur in person, remote online versions allow people from anywhere to compete together. An identical 500-piece jigsaw puzzle is distributed to all competitors beforehand, but it must not be unwrapped before the start time. When the competition starts and the jigsaw is unwrapped, everybody discovers the image to be completed at the same time and away you go.

Gibsons Games generously donated a 500-piece puzzle to this event with a peaceful painting of a rural village, a canal lock and a canal boat to every competitor. When the starter went it took just a remarkable 23 minutes for the fastest to complete, but most people took quite a bit longer. Everyone agreed how enjoyable it was too.

WWTW Events Manager Martin Lynn gave the challenge a go and really enjoyed it. Martin did admit that it took him a little longer to complete the puzzle: “I finally finished five hours and 17 minutes after we started! It’s still a personal record, and it’s probably the most focused I’ve been in years! It was such good fun and it was a really social activity actually, which I was quite surprised by. James Nickells who organised it and 'compered' did a brilliant job, time flew by. This is an activity anyone can do, competitively or otherwise, it’s great for mindfulness and takes place in the comfort of your own home – what more could you want!”

A big thank you to James and the team at UKJPA for choosing WWTW as the charity to support for this event, and we look forward to working with them in future.