Mental Feats: The 2015 USA Memory Championships

For 18 years now, the USA Memory Championships have challenged competitors — “mental athletes” — to stretch the limits of their minds to memorize and recall names and faces, random digits and words and decks of cards. Each year, competitors break each others’ previous records, and the competitive air is almost palpable. But what’s at stake in memory competitions anyway? Who goes to them, and why? Katherine Foley reports.