Neelakantha Bhanu Prakash is the 20-year-old young man from India who can solve math problems as fast as 26 seconds. He is known as the "world's fastest human calculator" who has won countless mathematics awards since he was a child.
The Limca Book of Records said that Bhanu could process numbers in his mind at an average speed of 12 per second or ten times faster than the average mind. Limca Book of Records is the Indian equivalent of Guinness World Records.
Bhanu explains that he uses "structured practice" in solving math problems. It is a brain optimization technique wherein he optimizes the methods and makes it better than before.
On August 15, Bhanu became the first Asian to win the gold medal for the Mental Calculation World Championship at the Mind Sports Olympiad (MSO) held in London. He also won the title as the first non-European to win the contest in the 23-year history of the event.
He was able to beat 29 opponents from 13 different countries. Despite his success, he does not consider himself as a prodigy. According to Bhanu, that term does not capture his efforts and experience, but it only describes a state that is gained out of nowhere.
He noted that everything could have been different when a life-threatening injury happened 15 years ago.
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Being Hit by a Truck
At age 5, Bhanu was hit by a truck while riding his cousin's scooter. He banged his head on the road, which caused the fracture on his skull. It required 85 stitches, multiple operations, and a medically induced coma before he got better.
However, the doctors told his parents that he might develop a cognitive impairment due to the accident. For the next year, he was bed-ridden, and to keep his brain active, he decided to engage himself in playing chess, solving puzzles, and eventually solving math problems.
Bhanu said he can still remember the pain vividly as it was the most traumatic experience he had. Since he cannot go to school for a year, he relied on getting better at numbers and puzzles.
Although the accident left him with an ugly scar, Bhanu was determined to see beyond it and knew in himself that he is good at something greater than his scar.
Two years later, Bhanu joined in a sub-junior category at a state-level speed arithmetic competition in which he got the third place. At that moment, Bhanu realized that he was able to move his father into tears, making him proud.
In 2011, Bhanu had won in the National Speed Arithmetic Competition and has since then won many awards. At the age of 13, Bhanu started representing India in various international competitions and broke four world records as the "fastest human calculator, power multiplication, super subtraction, and mental math: powers of 2 and 3."
Bhanu said that solving math problems quickly makes him feel like a superhero, such as the Flash.
Eradicating Math Phobia
Bhanu said that he is strongly passionate about eradicating math phobia, a feeling of being fearful in mathematics, which leads to its avoidance and situations that might need calculations, which negatively impacts a person's life.
He founded Exploring Infinities in 2018, which aims to change the image of math into something cool, challenging, exciting, and immersive. The educational organization now has more than 500,000 subscribers, and before the pandemic hit, it has established math boot camps in Bangladesh and Indonesia.
Bhanu said that his debut in MSO might be his last as he wants to focus on his organization's philanthropic work. He said he does not want to be the face of mathematics but rather the face against math phobia to inspire others.
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