Mr. Feyer went to Princeton, majoring in music. He did crosswords from time to time over the years, but he didn’t get hooked on them until he saw the 2006 movie “Wordplay”, a documentary about crosswords, the tournament and Will Shortz, the New York Times puzzle editor and the founder and director of the tournament.

“I didn’t realize this whole puzzle world existed,” he said.

He bought a book of crosswords, and then another, and began following crossword blogs and downloading puzzles. Before he knew it, he had become one with the puzzle people.

In 2008 he entered his first tournament, in which hundreds of people in a hotel ballroom race to finish a series of puzzles. He had found his niche: the sound of 700 people turning over a piece of paper at the same time thrilled him. He finished “50-somethingth,” he said. But that put him at the top of the rookie division for which he had qualified. The following year, he finished fourth. This year he won, beating many veterans, including Tyler Hinman, the champion of five previous tournaments.

His brain is jammed with factoids: the names of songs and rock bands that lived and died before he was born, far-flung rivers and capitals, foreign sports equipment, dead astronomers, fallen monarchs, extinct cars, old movies, heroes of mythology, dusty novelists and the myriad other bevoweled wraiths that haunt the twisted minds of crossword constructors. He has learned their wily tricks and traps, like using “number” in a clue that most people would take to mean “numeral” but that really meant “more numb.”

He was almost stumped recently, by a clue asking for a type of wheel. The answer: wire spoke. “I had a heck of a time with that,” he said. Cruel? Maybe so, he said, but he shrugged and added, “That’s what Saturday is for.”

Each morning, he finishes a half dozen newly published puzzles and a few more from the trove stashed in his computer. The easier ones take him only two or three minutes. He does puzzles while riding the subway and while watching TV. He may do a few before going to sleep and even take one to bed with him. He said he now spends about an hour a day on puzzles.