Ben Pridmore (born October 14, 1976) is a former world memory champion,
memory sport
Memory sport, sometimes referred to as competitive memory or the mind sport of memory, refers to competitions in which participants attempt to memorize then recall different forms of information, under certain guidelines. The sport has been formall ...
competitor and
accountant
An accountant is a practitioner of accounting or accountancy.
Accountants who have demonstrated competency through their professional associations' certification exams are certified to use titles such as Chartered Accountant, Chartered Certifi ...
.
Achievements
Pridmore is a three-time World Memory Champion winning the title 2004, 2008 and 2009. From
Derby in the
United Kingdom, Pridmore achieved this by winning a 10-discipline competition, the
World Memory Championship, which has taken place every year since 1991. He has also earned the prestigious title of
Master of Memory.
He held the official world record for memorizing the order of a randomly shuffled 52-card deck, and has memorised a pack in a time of 24.68 seconds on television. This record was beaten in 2010 by German memory athlete and lawyer Simon Reinhard. Pridmore's victory at the 2009 World Championship was his eighth consecutive memory competition win since coming second at the 2007 World Championship. He is the title holder for the UK Memory Champion for the years 2007–2011 and 2013 and Welsh Open Memory Champion 2009–2012 and 2014.
Besides memory sports he is famous for his
mental calculation skills and took part in the
Mental Calculation World Cup The Mental Calculation World Cup (German: Weltmeisterschaften im Kopfrechnen, or World Championship in Mental Calculation) is an international competition for mental calculators, held every two years in Germany.
Mental Calculation World Cup 2004
T ...
in 2004, 2006 and 2010. He has also won several medals at the
Mind Sports Olympiad including becoming the 2001 World Champion at the ten disciplined mind sport competition the
decamentathlon The Decamentathlon is a multi disciplined games event that was created as part of the first Mind Sports Olympiad. It was founded to try to find the best games all-rounder in the world and hence possibly the best games player. It was given a prize fu ...
including also
chess and
reversi.
[Mind Sports Olympiad page on the Decamentathlon http://www.boardability.com]
He also participated in the Memoriad World Mental Olympics in the year 2012 in
Antalya and won one gold medal with the title "Memoriad Speed Cards World Memory Champion".
He is thought to have an
IQ of 159 putting him in the genius range. He was prominently featured in the music video for
DJ Shadow's single "Scale It Back".
Method
Like most memory experts, he creates a mental story, comprises a sequence of images in a variation of the
Mnemonic Major System. In Pridmore's system for cards, two cards are represented as a three-letter word by the first consonant derived from the suits, the vowel from the first card's number, and the final consonant from the second card's number. For example, an ace of hearts and a two of clubs = "fan" with his predetermined letter associations for a total of 2704 unique images. Numbers are represented similarly with the first digit a consonant, vowel, and third consonant respectively meriting 1000 images; binary is the same with chunks of 4 numbers being given a single letter representation and used in the same fashion.
Using these words, Pridmore often creates a story using his old school,
Queen Elizabeth's Grammar School, Horncastle as the framework for these memory sequences.
"Memory Champion's secrets"
BBC News, 7 April 2009 This style of memorizing is known as the method of loci, sometimes known as a memory palace
The method of loci is a strategy for memory enhancement, which uses visualizations of familiar spatial environments in order to enhance the recall of information. The method of loci is also known as the memory journey, memory palace, journey m ...
.
References
External links
Profile at World Memory Championships website
MEMORIAD – World Mental Olympics
{{DEFAULTSORT:Pridmore, Ben
Reversi players
British accountants
British mnemonists
Living people
People educated at Queen Elizabeth's Grammar School, Horncastle
1976 births