by Daniela Trinks, Korea correspondent for the E-Journal
Kim Hyemin wins 9th Daeju Cup
The Daeju Cup is a national senior tournament limited to male players above 50 and female players above 30 years. The 9th edition ended this year with an all-female final between Kim Hyemin 9p and Lee Minjin 8p. Both players are well known to be best friends, yet the final turned out to be a long intense battle. Kim Hyemin who was due to give birth to her second child ten days later, showed outstanding fighting spirit and won the 2-hour match after 226 moves. She took home 15M KRW ($11,600), while Lee Minjin won 5 Million KRW ($3,900).
Shin Jinseo’s LG Cup Victory NFT
In May, a limited edition of Non-fungible tokens (NFT) was issued to commemorate Shin Jinseo’s victory in the LG Cup earlier this year. In total, 361 NFTs were offered for sale on OpenSea. Lee Kyungho was the Korean artist in charge of transforming Shin Jinseo’s kifu into digital artwork. The first game of the finals was a dramatic comeback victory in which the A.I. had predicted a 1% winning rate for Shin at one point.
Number of KBA professionals reaches 400
The 57th women’s pro qualifiers took place in Seoul, and in the end, Ko Yunseo (18), Kim Heesoo (17), and Lee Nakyung (13) placed first to third respectively and became pro. With this, the total number of professional players affiliated with the Korea Baduk Association (KBA) increased to 400 (322 male, 78 female). Including retired and deceased professionals, the total adds up to 502. Since the founding of the KBA in 1945, the number of professional players has exceeded 100 in 1990, 200 in 2005, and 300 in 2015. In the past, becoming a pro was limited to two persons per year. However, with time this number has increased to 20 because the pathway to becoming a pro has expanded to include things like female qualifiers, country-side qualifiers, young talent qualifiers, and amateur results in international pro championships. However, this approach has raised a few eyebrows because most tournaments are won by the top 10 players, leaving a majority of the pros with no source of income. Therefore, most of them resort to teaching, broadcasting, coaching, refereeing, or publishing to make ends meet.
51st National Junior Sports Festival
The Go event of the 51st National Youth Sports Festival was held from May 28th to 29th in Gumi. It was organized by the Korea Sports Council and the Korea Baduk Association, with sponsorship from the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, the Ministry of Education, and the Korea Sports Promotion Foundation and hosted by the Gyeongsangbuk province. 17,889 participants from 17 cities and provinces across the country took part in 36 different sport events, 201 of them were Go players who competed in four divisions in single-elimination tournaments: male U16, female U16, male U13 and female U13. All the matches were 3-player team games. The time limit was 30 minutes, followed by 3 periods of 30 seconds byoyomi. The third place was not determined, so the losers of both semi-finals received a bronze medal each. In addition to the team medal winners, best player awards were given in each division.
Table: Final standings of the Go event of the 51st National Youth Sports Festival.
Shin Jinseo wins Sawpalcosanol League
The Sawpalcosanol Best Player Competition is a new league tournament which began in 2020 and named after one of the sponsor’s (Infobell) products. Besides the line-up of top players, the relatively long time limit is quite unique in Korea: each player had a basic time of 2 hours, and 3 periods of 30 seconds.
In the first edition, the top eight players in Korea contested. Shin Jinseo (6:1) and Park Jeonghwan (5:2) topped the league to meet again in the best-of-5 final, which Shin swept 3:0. In the second edition, there were qualifiers to determine four players, who joined four seeded players and a wild card to compete in the league. Park Jeonghwan swept the league 8:0 to become the title challenger. Shin Jinseo managed to defend his title narrowly by 3:2.
The third edition saw Shin Minjun and Byun Sangil finishing the league 7:1, followed by Park Jeonghwan, Kang Dongyoon, and the wild card Lee Changseok with a 5:3 result. In the title match, Shin Jinseo won against challenger Shin Minjun 3:1 to retain his crown, making him the winner of all three editions of the Sawpalcosanol League. The winner’s purse was 70M KRW ($54,000), and the runner-up received 20M KRW ($15,500).
Table. 3rd Sawpalcosanol Best-of-5 title match
Yoo Changhyuk wins 3rd Shinan International Senior Championship
The “1004 Islands Shinan Senior Baduk Championship” was played online this year. The Korean players travelled to the sponsor’s province Shinan, whereas the foreign participants played from their respective countries. While the first edition held in 2019 included team and individual competitions, after a break the championship returned in 2021 as a solely individual competition. The participation is limited to players above 50, however, this year each country was allowed to send one player above 45 (Lee Changho, Chang Hao, Takao Shinji) but none of them made it to the semi-finals. As you can see in the list below, the majority of participants are living Go legends who won domestic and international titles in their prime.
South Korea: Cho Hoonhyun, Seo Bongsoo, Yoo Changhyuk, Lee Changho, Choi Kyubyeong, Kim Soojang, Kim Chanwoo, Kim Yeonghwan
Japan: Kobayashi Koichi, Takao Shinji, Takemiya Masaki, O Meien, O Rissei
China: Yu Bin, Chang Hao, Cao Dayuan
The results of all three editions are shown in the table. Despite the new rule for the U50 wild cards, this year’s title match saw the same finalists as last year, and Yoo Changhyuk 9p managed to win the title two times in a row. He received 30M KRW ($23,300), while O Meien 9p got 15M KRW ($11,600).
Table: Results of the Shinan International Senior Go Championships 2019-2022.
Chinese dominate at World A.I. Go Championship
From June 18th to 20th, the 1st Gangwon Province World A.I. Go Championship took place in a hybrid format: 18 A.I. programs competed online, while about 100 human Go fans took part in face-to-face side events. This new international competition was organized by the Korean Baduk Association and sponsored by the Gangwon Province and Pyeongchang County. Among the 18 A.I. programs, 11 were from China, four from Japan, two from Korea, and one from Australia. Four Chinese programs advanced to the semi-finals, and YILEGO defeated ChaoRanGo 2:1 to win the title and prize money of 20M KRW ($15,500). The runner-up received 10M KRW ($7,800), and the joint third-placed WUWEIGo and DaPangGo took home 5M KRW ($3,900) each. More information on the championship results and A.I. developers can be found here.
17th Korean Prime Minister’s Cup announced
After two years of online competitions, the 17th edition of the Korean Prime Minister’s Cup (KPMC) will return face-to-face. It will be held from September 24th to 30th in South Korea’s six-largest city, Gwangju. Meanwhile, the Korean representative was chosen in a k.o.-tournament among 90 players. Kim Jeongseon, who ranks second in the Korean amateur list, will represent Korea.
