Go News « American Go E-Journal

Andy Liu 7d Wins 1st Annual New England Open

Saturday March 19, 2011

Andy Liu 7d overcame Jie Liang 7d in the last round of the first Annual New England Open to emerge undefeated and take home the $250 first prize. The tournament was held on Sunday, March 6, at the MIT student center in Cambridge, MA. Forty six players competed across four divisions: 5d+ Open, 1d-4d Open, 1k-15k Handicap, and Beginner. Andy Liu will also receive an invitation to the North American Ing Masters tournament. The 1d-4d division was won by Ruoshi Sun 3d, the 1k-15k division by Yuan Kao 7k, and the beginner division by Qian Long 20k. “Congratulations to all those who participated,” says organizer Walther Chen, “there were a lot of very well-played and close games, and we hope to see you at next year’s tournament.”
Results: 5d+ Open: Andy Liu 7d (4-0), Yunzhe Zhang 7d (3-1), Jie Liang 7d (3-1). 1d-4d Open: Ruoshi Sun 3d (4-0), Micah Feldman 4d (3-1), Zhonggang Zhang 3d (3-1). Handicap Section: Yuan Cao 7k (4-0), Jingxiao Lu 3k (3-1), Peter Martin 4k (3-1). Beginner’s Section: Qian Long 20k (4-0), Neil Fitzgerald 17k (3-1), Carrie Liang 23k (1-3).

Categories: U.S./North America

Michael Redmond 9P OK in Post-Quake Japan

Monday March 14, 2011

“I survived the earthquake!” Michael Redmond 9P told the E-Journal on Friday from Japan. We’ve also heard from our colleague at Ranka, editor Ivan Vigano, who says “Everything is OK here (in Nagoya), just a very long shake,” though he adds that he’s very concerned about the rapidly-developing situation at Fukushima’s nuclear power station. Popular EJ columnist Kaz Furuyama say’s “In Tokyo we are not out of power fortunately… at least so far.” And on the day of the earthquake (March 11), Cho U 9P was able to capture his second Kisei title in a row against Iyama Yuta 9P, winning the series 4-2; see Cho U Wins the 35th Kisei in today’s World Go News section for the complete report. We’ll continue to post updates here and on Twitter about how the go community in Japan is managing post-quake; please email us your news at journal@usgo.org

Categories: World

Curtis Tang 7d Bests Tough Field to Win SoCal Tourney

Monday March 14, 2011

Curtis Tang 7d (8.32) weathered tough competition to take top honors in the 2011 Southern California championship, reports tournament organizer Kevin Chao. The overall turnout of 54 included five 7 dan players, including three with ratings above 8, and many 6 dan players. Tang (at left) was undefeated in the five-round tournament, held March 5-6 in Alhambra, California, at Mr. Abel Pa’s Southern California Chinese Broadcasting building. First prize was $600 along with a handsome trophy. The main event was followed Sunday night by a “youth mini-tournament” won by Ezana Berhane 5k.
Full results: Top three in the open section: Curtis Tang 7d (5 wins), Danny Ko 7d (4-1), Yixian Zhou 6d (3-2). Dan section: Yunxuan Li, 2d (5 wins), Andrew Okun 1d(4-1), and tied for third, Jerry Shen 4d (3-2) and Tim Chi 1d (3-2). High Kyu section: Preston Hutchins 2k (4-1), Alex Lee 3k (3-2), Jeffery Zhang 4k (3-2). Mid Kyu section: Andrew Hong 5k (4-1), Cyris Sargon 8k (4-1), David Baran 9k (4-1). Low Kyu section: Raymond Liu 10k (4-1), Jerry Lu 14kyu (4-1), Susanna Pfeffer, 13k (4-1).
photo by Andy Okun

Categories: U.S./North America

TYGEM Launches English Go Server

Monday March 14, 2011

The Korean go server TYGEM’s English version has been launched. It’s still in its beta stage, “so events and contests are still not that common,” reports Anthony Daniel Adria, who notes that “there will be many updates and eventually more events and contests down the line.” You can check it out – and download the client – on TYGEM’s English website.

Categories: Tools: books, software & hardware,World

Feasibility of 2012 Academic Conference on Go Explored

Monday March 14, 2011

Peter Shotwell and Paul Celmer are putting out a preliminary call “for contributors to a conference on the influence of go in international history, art, literature, philosophy, science, education, politics, peace, warfare and more.” The two say they’re “trying to determine the feasibility of an international academic conference at the 2012 Go Congress in North Carolina.” The conference would expand on the highly successful symposium held in Sweden in 2008. “We will be looking for sponsors, but first we need to know how many people would be interested in presenting papers if expenses were fully funded, partially funded or not funded at all except for room and board for the days of the conference. If interested, write pshotwell@gmail.com and be sure to mention possible topics and estimated travel expenses.

Categories: U.S. Go Congress,U.S./North America,World

WORLD GO NEWS ROUND-UP March 8-14: Park Junghwan Defeats Choi Cheolhan in Siptan; Cho U Wins Kisei; Rui Naiwei Wins Female Kuksu

Monday March 14, 2011

Park Junghwan Defeats Choi Cheolhan in Siptan. In a relatively short match, Park Junghwan 9P defeated Choi Cheolhan 9P by resignation after 133 moves in the quarterfinals of the 6th Siptan on March 12. Park now advances to the semifinals to face Kang Yootaek 3P. Park is the defending Siptan champion after he defeated Lee Changho in last year’s title match, two games to one. Cho U Wins the 35th Kisei. On the day of Japan’s strongest recorded earthquake (March 11), Cho U 9P (r in photo) was able to capture his second Kisei title in a row against Iyama Yuta 9P (l), winning the series 4-2. It was a close match with Cho defeating Iyama by only a point and a half. The match was played in the town of Izu in the Shizuoka Prefecture, which is south of Tokyo and a little over 500 kilometers from Sendai, the city closest to the epicenter and one of the worst hit areas. Rui Naiwei Wins Female Kuksu. Rui Naiwei 9P defended her title on March 8 by defeating Kim Yunyoung 3P by resignation in the 16th Female Kuksu. Rui swept the series 2-0. This is the third year in a row that Rui has won the title, which brings her career total to nine Female Kuksu titles.
– JustPlayGo; edited by Jake Edge

Categories: World

GO SPOTTING: Seki on Bar Karma, Triple Ko in Film Comment

Monday March 14, 2011

Bar Karma, a show on Current TV, mentioned seki and discussed it on a recent episode, reports EJ reader Laurie. And in the Jan/Feb issue of Film Comment, Bob Barber reports that a headline on page 8 that says “Triple Ko.” Although Barber says “I couldn’t make out the connection, I’m happy to see go terminology creeping into American English.”

Categories: Go Spotting,U.S./North America

Guo Juan Internet School Starting ’11 Second Term

Sunday March 13, 2011

Guo Juan’s Internet Go School is currently accepting enrollment for Group Classes for the 2011 second term, which begins April 9/10. The group class participants will also receive a 20% discount on annual membership for her Audio lectures. The teaching faculty includes Guo Juan 5P, Jennie Shen 2P and Mingjiu Jiang 7P. For details visit the Group Class website.

Categories: World

Tormanen & Wang Tie for First at Irish Go Congress

Tuesday March 8, 2011

The 2011 Irish Go Congress proved to be one of the biggest on record, with a total of 62 players in attendance. As with all Pandanet Tour events, it was truly a multinational event, clocking up a total of 11 different countries in play. At the top was one of Europe’s rising stars, Antti Törmänen 6d, who tied for first place with local hero Wei Wang 6d on 4 wins from 5. In joint third were Ondrej Silt 6d (l) and Pavol Lisy 5d on 3 wins. Full results. The Rapid tournament on Friday night was won by Irish President Ian Davis (at left rear, recording), in a noble effort to save the local economy. Click here for photos.
photo: Ondrej Silt 6d (l) play’s Finland’s Juri Kuronen 5d as Ian Davis records the game. photo by Tiberiu Gociu

Categories: Europe

Dinerchtein Reports on the Russian Pair Go Championships

Monday March 7, 2011

The just-concluded 2011 Russian Pair Go Championships featured the strongest field ever, reports Alexandr Dinerchtein 3P, who also participated. “For the first time in history Svetlana Shikshina 3P (front left), took part, paired with her brother Ilya Shikshin 7D (back left) and it was quite obvious from the start that it would be too hard for other pairs to fight with the Shikshins team” and the siblings indeed swept the tournament 5-0. Dmitriy Surin 6d and Natalya Kovaleva 5d, the strongest Russian and European pair for many years straight, shared second place with Artem Dugin 5d and Aigul Nureeva 3d, from Kazan, both pairs scoring 4-1. “I like Pair Go very much,” Dinerchtein (back right) tells the E-Journal. He started playing at the Pair Go tournament in the European Go Congress in “1999 or 2000. At that time my partner was Julia Solomatina 1d from Moscow. We did quite well and even beat Saijo Masataka sensei and his 1k partner in even game.” He and Elvina Kalsberg 4d took second place in last year’s European Pair Go Championship and in this year’s Russian Pair Go Championships he partnered with Daria Koshkina (front right), a 3k from Yaroslavl who’s one of his students in Korean style Insei League on

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KGS. “In the third round we played against the Shikshin-Shikshina team (see game record). To everyone’s surprise we were leading at some point in the middlegame, proving that Pair Go is enormously different from the normal game. I noticed that even the two siblings had very different plans and it was quite hard for them to understand and follow each other. Check Black moves 51-53, for example when Ilya invaded and Svetlana played on the other side of the board.” Dinerchtein says playing in the Pair Go tournament “was very exciting and I will surely take part in Pair Go tournaments again. Try it too, if you haven’t played Pair Go before. It’s fun!”

Categories: Europe

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