Im sorry if my post came out unintended. My intention was not to sideline Kishore. Of Course it is a team effort and congrats to both of you. It is just that I have gotten so used to your style of creation, that it was easy for me to relate to and identify your puzzles . :)

this SM3 round not gone well to my expectation.may be due to my over confidence on varients.I would have practiced atleast IB before do the competition. I have finished all the puzzle which are left in the competition. My favorite is True or Lie then coded sudoku.Thanks for Aashish and Kishore for creating very good puzzle for this round. But one thing i want to say here is too hard puzzle in classic will demorale the budding players in LMI which is unwarrented.Top players have places to compete on hard puzzles.Here we have to bring lot of players who are only know classic to lmi contest. we can train those who are capable to compete in the higher level.It is my view

Thanks kumaresan for your valuable feedback. We will look forward to your suggestions which seems valid and will surely see to it that we feature some easy puzzles too.. thanks.

What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles?	Too many hard puzzles
What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test?	Fairly Nice
Which set of puzzles did you like the most?	Odd Even Count Sudoku
Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did the point values reflect the difficulty?	Many puzzles were worth too much or too little

Thanks LMI for extending the test based on my request. Travelling and fatigue took a toll on me in this test. I pesonally found most puzzles harder or rather I got stuck/broke in most puzzles. Other than that, the test is pretty good or may be of a regular LMI monthly test standard than an SM. Thanks Ashish and Kishore for the puzzles.

What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles?	Too many medium difficult puzzles
What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test?	Very nice
Which set of puzzles did you like the most?	2 Odd 2 Even Sudoku
Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did the point values reflect the difficulty?	Most puzzles were worth the right amount

Congratulations to Hideaki Jo, Jakub Ondrousek, Tiit Vunk and Tantan Dai for taking the top four places.

Amongst Indian participants, Congratulations to Rohan Rao, Rishi Puri and Shaheer Rahman for completing the set and taking the top 3 places.

Of the 291 participants, 95 were from India, 31 from Japan and 22 from USA. Philippe Meyer (France) was the first to start the test while Priyam Bhushan (India) was the last participant to start the test. 25 participants completed the set within the allotted time. The median score of the test was 42.

Thanks Ashish Kumar and Kishore Kumar for the puzzles!

Participants may share feedback on the results page and rate the puzzles on the contest page.

Before, I add a little about the contest, I would like to clarify a few things.I don't have any enmity that's being harboured for a long time towards detuned and whatever were stated were said spontaneously.Given that I hardly know or talked to @detuned in person, it makes no sense to have an animosity over a period of time.I would also like to point to one of the posts which indirectly suggests that I am not aware of what detuned does with respect to sudokus and their definition, to an earlier post wherein I had stated I am a regular of the uk puzzle association which is the centre point of definition related discussion and what encompasses a sudoku.Further, I also think that decorum needs to be maintained from both parties involved in discussion and it's not one way.

Having said that, it doesn't feel right to me that detuned decided to stop posting here because of my replies since whatever were mentioned in some of my later posts were solely my opinion and is no way related to what others may or may not think about him here.I apologize if my tone had been scathing on occasions and if it's of any little use, I will refrain from involving myself in queries that detuned may raise in future.He's in no way unwelcome here.

Now, about the contest, as feedbacks from many have indicated, this is indeed a difficult set.Thank you for all those who gave their feedback ! The idea behind the test was to create a hard set which is challenging to complete.Since scores are normalized anyway and it's best 4 of 6 episodes, I think it's fine if 1 or 2 contests become outliers.The original versions where were submitted had lesser givens and clues were added in the following sudokus to achieve a balance in difficulty :
Coded 9X9 is solveable without R2C1 and R8C9
TOL is solveable without R1C9 and R9C1
OEC is solveable without R4C6 and R6C4.On a side note, one of the classics also got replaced with a relatively easier one for being on the harder side .

Originally coded pair sudoku and not coded was created for SM3 and was scheduled to occur in this episode but we were surpised when it became a variant in the previous episode and so the sudoku created for contest was decided to be posted as a practice here : http://lifeinsudoku.blogspot.com/2019/01/coded-pairs-sudoku-by-gues...

Congrats to all top solvers : international as well as India. Finally, I thank Ashish for his valuable feedback in my creations and for being tremendously supportive whenever the quality was not good in creation.I hope I get to co-author with him sometime in future too and a big thanks to LMI for organizing this contest.

What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles?	Just right
What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test?	Very nice
Which set of puzzles did you like the most?	Odd Even Count Sudoku
Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did the point values reflect the difficulty?	Most puzzles were worth the right amount

will we get current standings while the SM online rounds are going on ?

Thanks everyone for your participation. Congratulations to all the top solvers.

I would like to Thank LMI for giving me an opportunity to co-author an SM round.
I would like to thank Rakesh Rai for helping us in maintaining the difficulty of the set ( was tough previously ) and making all the eps work and pdf work. It is the most difficult and important task and i always admire him for his selfless effort in everything.

I would like thank kishore who helped me create such sudokus which came out to be good enough for a set. His suggestions helped me to understand a solvers point of view too.

At last i would thank each and every participant who took time to solve the set. It was indeed still a difficult set and there is always a way for improvment. I would thank everyone who gave feedback and helped us get an idea for future sets.

Thoroughly enjoyed..... Solutions booklet link please.

Solution Booklet: http://logicmastersindia.com/lmitests/dl.asp?attachmentid=769

After the completion of PR4 (around March-end), current standings for SM and PR will be made available.