American Go E-Journal » Europe

Six European professionals fought for the title of a European Professional Go Champion February 8-10th in Saint-Petersburg, Russia. In the end, Ilya Shikshin (Russia, 1p) won the second European Professional Go Championship. Shikshin currently holds both European Champion titles (Open and Professional). In second was Mateusz Surma (Poland, 1p), while Pavol Lisy (Slovakia, 1p) was third. Fourth through sixth places were Alexandre Dinerchtein (Russia, 3p Korea), Ali Jabarin (Israel, 1p) and Artem Kachanovskyi (Ukraine, 1p). Click here for Marika Dubiel’s detailed report, which includes round-by-round reports, photos and game records.

photo: Ilya Shikshin (left) getting a bird’s eye view of his game with Mateusz Surma (right); photo by Mikhail Krylov

Once again this year, many go fans were reunited on the two weekends of November 26-27 and December 3-4, as for the fifteenth time the Paris Ouest Go Club hosted the 34th Paris Meijin tournament. Regular supporters Canon France, the Asahi newspaper, the Nihon-Kiin, Nippon Transeuro and the Association of Expatriot Japanese from the Fukushima Region all supported the tournament.

During the first weekend 59 players, with strength ranging from 20 to 5-kyu, entered into five rounds of competition. Each year it seems that the level of play is higher, perhaps because many players train on the internet. At the end it was 12 year old Vu Linh Tu (5-kyu, right) who was the victor of Section C with 5 wins out of 5, whilst Antonin Masseau won the 10-kyu category. See full results.

During the second weekend there were 64 players whose strength ranged from 4-kyu to 6-dan. Players above 1-dan played in Section A, whilst the rest played in Section B. Amongst the 34 players in Section B was Vu Linh Tu, who had qualified from the previous weekend, and he won this section too, beating Frédéric Berthomier (1-kyu) in the final. See full results.

In Section A, Jiaxin Gao (right), a visiting 6-dan student from China, emerged victorious over all his adversaries. Jiaxin is studying Computer Science at Paris-Sud University and hopes to take part in more tournaments in France. See full results.

Based on the original article in Revue Française de Go by Jérôme Hubert, translated by Ian Davis

The 2017 European Go Congress location has changed. Again. It’s now set for Oberhof, Germany July 22-August 6. Burhaniye, Turkey had originally been chosen back in 2014, but after the supportive local Mayor lost in local elections, the Congress was moved to Capadochia, Turkey. The ongoing conflict in and around Syria eventually led to a recent decision to abandon Turkey as a venue altogether. The Russian Federation, which had hosted the 2016 Congress, offered to step in and the European Go Federation’s executive board chose them as the 2017 hosts over a competing bid from Germany. This decision generated so much controversy that a new vote by the entire EGF was scheduled, with the caveat that both the German and Russian candidates would work together to run the Congress whatever the outcome. The EGF overwhelmingly voted — 47-9 — for Oberhoff, Germany, largely because of a preference for holding the Congress in a different country each year, and the EGF board concurred, finalizing the choice. Oberfhoff is normally known as a winter sports resort, but the nearby countryside ensures it still remains an attractive destination in summer. Click here to see a documentary about the Hotel Panorama, where the 61st European Go Congress will be held.

The third edition of the European Youth Go Team Championships (EYGTC) has begun. It’s once again taking place on KGS. The competing teams represent either individual nations, or a group of nations. For each match, the teams must field five players, one from the Under-20 age range, two from the Under-16 age range, and two from the Under-12 age range. The full details can be found here.

Round 1 took place on Saturday the 3rd of December. The scores were as follows

• Romania vs. Germany : 2-3
• UK vs. Serbia : 2-3
• Italy/Switzerland/Austria vs. Hungary : 1-4
• Russia vs. France : 4-1

– Ian Davis

The French Open Championship took place from August 26-28 in Grenoble. Motoki Noguchi, the 2015 champion, defended his title against a slew of tough opponents, including Dai Junfu, Thomas Debarre, and Tanguy Le Calvé. The tournament was held this year at the Minatec campus in Grenoble.

It was a vintage year with 32 participants, a number not seen since 2009, and a large number of dan players. The first day offered few surprises, with the top eight players (5-dan and above) alone ending unbeaten, thus promising a interesting fight for the second day.

The first big upset was scored by Tanguy Le Calvé, who beat Motoki Noguchi in the fourth round after a fierce game. In the fifth round the game between the only two undefeated players, Dai Junfu and Tanguy Le Calvé, took place. Despite some good resistance, Tanguy could not avoid defeat, and it was only Dai who ended the second day unbeaten.

Of course the championship was not yet finished, and Dai (right) had more work to do on the third day, beating Motoki Noguchi and Rémi Campagnie, before becoming the 2016 French Open Champion. At the same time, Tanguy confirmed his good form by beating Thomas Debarre by half a point. So in the end Tanguy took second place, ahead of his two unhappy opponents Thomas Debarre and Motoki Noguchi.

After taking into withdrawals, the eight players qualified for the French Amateur Championship are Antoine Fenech, Louis Dumont, Dai Junfu, Jérôme Salignon, Baptiste Noir, Jean-Loup Naddef, Denis Karadaban and Tanguy Le Calvé.

Thanks to everyone who helped organize the event. All the games which were broadcast on the server OGS (this was a first for us, and a success – there were more than 400 spectators for the game of Dai against Thomas) can be found here, you can also find photos here.

– Ian Davis, adapted from the original report by Simon Billouet in Revue Française de Go

When a player passes in go it’s an indication that the game is over. In Peter Zandveld’s case, he’s just marking the beginning of a new era for Schaak en Go winkel het Paard, the Amsterdam games shop specializing in go, chess, bridge, backgammon, puzzles and other games. Zandveld (right) started the shop — whose name translates as “Chess and Go Shop Keima” nearly 30 years ago with Marianne Diederen and Marieke Diederen, Marianne’s eldest daughter, will carry it on. Zandveld and Diederen built Schaak en Go winkel het Paard into “one of the largest game and thinking sport stores in the world,” the company wrote in an email earlier this month. “Peter’s knowledge and expertise of go books has been of immeasurable value to the world of go. It is not an exaggeration to say that without him there would not be as many great go books available.” Zandveld has decided that he wants to spend more time with his family, his job at the RIVM, the EGCC board and his huge stamp collection. “Maybe he will even have time to play some serious go,” het Paard’s email added. “I hope to help Peter decide to attend  the US Go Congress in 2017,” Marianne Diederen told the E-Journal.

Another two-week long European Go Congress has flown by quickly. Between hard go battles on the boards, participants at the historic 60th Congress could enjoy football, volleyball, basketball and table tennis matches, creative workshops, board games, exhibitions and more. Players and guests were especially amazed by the photo screen for instant photo printing provided by the Videofabrika company, enabling anyone to instantly print or email photos of themselves playing go or posing with props, or photos of pro guests who would then autograph the photos. Overall 984 people from 36 countries, including 27 accredited journalists, organizers and volunteers, took part in EGC 2016. 689 players competed in the Main and Weekend tournaments. Several EGC records were set, including the largest number of players in the Rapid Tournament (306) and Youth tournament (42).

The EGC’s Closing Ceremony featured live music, dance performances and a reception. RGF vice-president Vladimir Gorzhaltsan, together with Turkey’s Kerem Karaerkek, representing the EGC 2017 organizing team, started the countdown watch showing the time left till the start of the next Congress.

The main focus, however, was on the tournament winners. The winner of the main Congress tournament was unexpected. Before the last round the bets were on the recent European champion Ilya Shikshin and Chan Yi-Tien, the World Amateur Champion who also won the EGC Rapid tournament but both of them lost in the final round, so fortune turned her eye to Korean 7d Kim Youngsam (left), who had already won in several EGC events here including the Pair Go tournament with Manja Marz, the Weekend tournament, and the Lightning tournament. All the results can be found here.
– Daria Koshkina, special correspondent to the E-Journal at the European Go Congress

Ilya Shikshin 1P has won the 2016 European Championship title, defeating Ali Jabarin (1p, Israel) at the 60th European GoCongress in St Petersburg. This is Shikshin’s fourth European Championship and the win makes the Russian the third most successful European player, in terms of all titles won, behind Guo Juan and Alexandr Dinerchstein. Fan Hui had won the last three years but has been at the US Go Congress this week. Shikshin said he was “delighted” to reclaim the title, noting that “All the matches were memorable in their own way. I had to be enormously involved in my games and when you are involved, the matches become very emotional.” Lucas Podpera (Czech Republic) took third place, beating Mateusz Surma in the play-off.

Click here to see video of commentary on the final by Wu Hao 2P and Li Cong 3P with Vadim Efimenko 3d.

– Daria Koshkina, special correspondent to the E-Journal at the European Go Congress