American Go E-Journal

An undefeated Jie Li 7D (r) topped a 58-player field to win the 37^th annual Maryland Open over the Memorial Day weekend. “Five 7-dans and two 6-dans  fought it out in a very strong open section,” reports organizer Keith Arnold, “but Jie Li emerged as the only player to finish 5-0 in the entire event.” “I am very impressed by the improvement of the younger generation of players, such as Eric Lui, Gus Price and Ricky Zhao,” Li told the E-Journal. “They played well.” The Empty Sky Go Club won the Greg Lefler Award and Kelsey Dyer 2k the Fighting Spirit Prize. Li is four-time US Open champion, has won the North American Ing and Toyota-Denso Oza three times each, and represented North America three times in the Fujitsu Cup. He’s also served as a board member at the American Go Association for the past two years and urges go players of all ages to join the AGA. “Members get a lot of benefits such as the free Yearbook and playing at rated AGA tournaments locally, or playing online in national tournaments,” says Li. Find out more and join online here. Sam Zimmerman directed. Click here for an album of photos from the MD Open.
– includes reporting by Keith Arnold and Zhiyuan ‘Edward’ Zhang; photo by Zhang
WINNER’S REPORT: Open Section: 1^st Jie Li 7d; 2^nd Eric Lui 7d; 3^rd Guthrie; Price 7d; A Section: 1^st Scott Waldron 4d; 2^nd Gregory Rosenblatt 5d; B Section: 1^st Keiju Takehara 2d; 2^nd Ed Downes 1d; C Section: 1^st Stephen Tung 1k; 2^ndst Stephen Allen 6k; 2^nd Ed Caldiera 7k; E Section: 1^st Justin Chiang 10k; 2^nd Jamie Birger 9k; F Section: 1^st Matt Payton 25k; 2^nd Deirdre Golash 13k. Joe Maia 2k; D Section: 1