Sudoku is one of the world’s most popular puzzle games, but many Sudoku players might be wondering, “who are the best Sudoku players in the world?” Out of all of the millions of people playing Sudoku on their morning commutes or at their desks or on their phones, how do the best of the best rise to the top? Where are they from? What do they do for a living? What did they study in school?

In the previous article in this series on how to solve Sudoku puzzles, we solved 1/3 of the grid using process of elimination and paying attention to which numbers were missing, and then tying up the loose ends and finishing up where our thought process led us. Now it’s time to look to some different parts of the grid and see what we can see.