by John Power, special Japan correspondent for the E-Journal
Kobayashi Koichi receives decoration: In the spring honors list, announced on April 28, Kobayashi Koichi became the 27th go player to receive a decoration from the Japanese government, being awarded the Medal of Honor with Purple Ribbon. Aged 65, Kobayashi holds three honorary titles, the Kisei, Meijin, and Gosei. He was a late starter, not winning his first big-three title, the Meijin, until he was 33, but he went on to win 60 titles, including the Kisei eight years in a row, the Meijin seven years in a row, eight times in all, and the Gosei six years in a row, nine times in all. His only major failure was not winning the Honinbo title, despite challenging three years in a row.
Go Seigen Cup: The first Wu Qingyuan (Go Seigen) Cup World Women’s Championship is a new tournament for woman players founded by Fuzhou City in Fujian Province in honor of its most famous son, at least in the go world. The rounds up to the final were held from April 26 to May 1. Twenty-eight players took part; of these eight were from Europe and American and they played a preliminary round, with the top four entering the main tournament. This was an irregular knock-out with five rounds, but with eight players seeded into the second round. The finalists are two Korean players, Kim Chaeyoung 3P and Choi Jeong 9P. The final will be held in July. Four Japanese players took part. Two reached the quarterfinals, but were eliminated there. However, Ueno Asami 2P will probably remember fondly her win against Rui Naiwei 9P.
Cho U retains sole lead in Meijin League: Some important games have been played in the 43rdMeijin League since my last report. The results are given below.
(April 16) Yo Seiki (Yu Chengqi) 7P (W) beat Murakawa Daisuke 8P by resig. Yo raised his score to 2-3 and Murakawa dropped to 1-4.
(April 26) Takao Shinji 9P (W) beat Shibano Toramaru 7P by resig. This was Shibano’s first loss; he lost his chance of drawing level with the league leader, Cho U, who was in lone first place with 4-0. Two players followed him with just one loss: Shibano and Hane Naoki 9P, both on 3-1.
(May 3) Cho (B) beat Shibano by resig.; Kono Rin 9P (B) beat Yo by resig.
(May 10) Murakawa (B) beat Takao by 2.5 points.
(May 24) Hane (W) beat Ko Iso 8P by resig. This game concluded the 6th(May) round. Cho U keeps the lead, on 5-0, with Hane in second place on 4-1. They are followed by two players on 3-2, Kono and Shibano. At present, it seems likely one of these four will be the challenger; the only other player theoretically still in the running is Yamashita on 2-3.
Part 1 of 4; tomorrow: Kisei S League starts; Xu of China wins Globis Cup; Yo keeps Honinbo seat; Shibano wins Japan-China Ryusei
