Crossword SNITCH

A quantitative guide to the degree of difficulty of the Times Cryptic Crossword

Times Cryptic Crossword 29226

Date 10 May 2025
Number 29226
Day of week Saturday
NITCH 67
Count of ref solvers 42
Ref solvers excluded with errors 0
Link to crossword View Crossword*
Times for the Times Link 29226

* Requires access to the Times Crossword Club

Detailed solving results

 

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Reference, Tracked and Blog solvers with error-free solutions to this puzzle are shown below.

We also show the solver's Personal NITCH, which is their result on this puzzle compared to their average time, and the Wavelength Index of Times Cryptic Hardness, the WITCH, which is the Personal NITCH compared to the SNITCH.

Name TfTT Name Average time This time Personal NITCH WITCH
Nathan Panning 05:52 05:19 90 134
Paul Gilbert 05:54 03:11 53 79
cmjhutton 05:56 03:52 65 97
Magoo 06:02 04:42 77 114
Jason 06:20 02:49 44 65
verlaine Verlaine 06:25 03:55 61 91
mistigris 07:28 04:18 57 85
HoneyBadger HoneyBadger 08:29 09:24 110 164
Umpire 09:01 06:27 71 105
AlanS 09:35 07:51 81 120
Legbiter 09:42 05:46 59 88
Icarus 09:43 09:19 95 141
markdobell 09:54 06:05 61 91
Ciolf 10:09 07:25 73 108
DennisO 10:31 07:52 74 110
Kinghedger 10:44 08:52 82 122
Deane Short Deane Short 10:47 07:12 66 98
lickert 10:51 06:37 60 89
chindit 10:54 09:33 87 129
neilr neilr 11:12 10:04 89 132
Tom Stubbs Tom Stubbs 11:30 11:40 101 150
Heyesey 11:37 05:51 50 74
MikeOsborne mikeosborne 11:44 06:56 59 88
Amoeba89 Amoeba 11:45 08:30 72 107
Topical Tim Topical Tim 11:57 06:29 54 80
tilbee 12:08 09:48 80 119
Brian Girling 12:10 08:23 68 101
Sheapey Sheapey 12:16 07:24 60 89
Freemers 12:22 11:01 89 132
aphasic 12:28 10:59 88 131
Silva 12:50 09:59 77 114
JimboFS 12:54 11:41 90 134
d.middleton 12:57 11:39 89 132
Groucho 13:02 10:06 77 114
Secondbass 13:08 09:09 69 102
7dPenguin (KenG) 7dPenguin 13:17 09:56 74 110
Stavros Stavrolex 13:21 07:23 55 82
March (JeffCollins) mch1 13:39 07:04 51 76
Adelaider 13:39 08:44 63 94
LouWeed LouWeed 13:47 08:46 63 94
Ed freshpot Ed Freshpot 13:48 10:12 73 108
EricK 14:06 11:02 78 116
Ben Staveley 14:06 08:22 59 88
GeorgeTz 14:11 11:28 80 119
Semillon 14:20 07:51 54 80
Rinteff Rinteff 14:26 13:18 92 137
TonyN6 16:03 05:06 31 46
phthisis 16:23 08:24 51 76
Valance 16:43 07:59 47 70
rrricharrrd 17:07 11:36 67 100
Achernar 17:18 10:49 62 92
Crossiant 17:25 10:37 60 89
tds 18:05 11:25 63 94
LJCN 18:14 10:35 58 86
SeamusX 18:32 11:11 60 89
Kevin Gregg Kevin Gregg 21:26 14:16 66 98
James P Special_bitter 22:10 11:22 51 76
vinyl12345 vinyl1 31:41 37:39 118 176
WordPlodder BletchleyReject 37:16 22:00 59 88
Dr Dolittle 38:46 06:09 15 22
MartinP MartinP1 50:24 37:54 75 111

A guide to the solver status

Legend
 Reference solver used for SNITCH
 Other Reference solver
 Tracked solver
 Blog solver

Blog Solvers

Blog Solvers are those who have allowed their times to be taken from the Times for the Times blog.

Notes for Blog Solvers:

  • the most reliable format for reporting times is with format "mm:ss" or as "x minutes" in the title or at the start of the entry
  • only the first main comment for each blogger is used; responses to other comments or a second comment is ignored
  • to report errors, include "n errors" just after the time
  • If you just have a time it is assumed you have no errors unless you mention DNF or pink squares or giving up, etc, in the text
  • Examples of good time notifications are "38:30, 0 errors" and "39 minutes, 0 errors" in the comment title or as the first part of your comment

Notes

The definition of Reference and Tracked solvers is described on the Neutrinos page.

The results for Reference solvers are normally used to calcuate the SNITCH. When this happens they are shown in the list with a solid blue line to the left. In the previous SNITCH results listing for each crossword, these were the only entries shown.

The most common causes for Reference solver results not to be used are: (a) that they did not meet the criteria this month to be used as a reference (e.g. they may not have completed enough puzzles on each day of the week) or (b) they have been pushed out of the top 100 on the leader board. In these cases, the results are now shown, but their data is not used for the SNITCH calculation.

Where there is data for Tracked solvers, I show them also in this table. The solving data is not always available, as the Crossword Club site only shows the top 100 solvers to everyone. Logged-in users get their own leaderboard position and those around them, but this is not available to everyone. So the SNITCH site only gets data for those who have made the top 100 in the leaderboard at some point during the day.

As a result there are a few geographically advantaged solvers; those of us who solve early in the day (e.g. we in the Antipodes, those in Asia and those staying up late in North America) are more likely to hit the leaderboard even with slower times. Solvers who are just as capable but solve later in the UK day might not make the top 100 and I have no way to capture their results.

You may wonder why there are Tracked solvers (in red) with low average solving times, mixed in with the Reference solvers (in blue). These are usually those that, while they don't seem to be Neutrinos, are not well aligned to the SNITCH. So I don't use them as Reference solvers in the SNITCH calculation, but still show their overall results.

You might also notice that there's some inconsistency at the tail end of the Reference solver list. My cutoff point is an average solving time of 45 minutes. But if someone around this mark is chosen as a Reference solver, their next month's results might end up being over 45 minutes and they will still be used. Alternatively, a Tracked solver might creep in under 45 minutes on the next calculation, but didn't make the cut for the prior Reference list. It's on the to-do list to see if I can make this a bit more predictable.

Stored SNITCH Values

Here are the SNITCH values (stored on the day) from the crossword.

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