OXFORD TOURNAMENT: On February 12, after a two year gap, the Oxford Tournament returned, on the same day as the Cheshire, and attracted 51 players. Andrew Simons beat three London players to win the event. Others winning three games were Sue Paterson 4k, Brook Roberts 6k, Peter Harold-Barry 6k, Richard Wheeldon 9k, Julia Woewodskaya 9k, and Kieran Smith 24k.
CHESHIRE TOURNAMENT: Also on February 12, the Cheshire tournament was rather small this year, thanks to a clash with the Manchester football derby and other factors, but much enjoyed by those who attended. In the top group Alex Rix (3D London) was the winner, beating Tony Atkins (2D Reading) in the final. In the Handicap Section, the winner, with a 4-1 record, was Matt Marsh (7k Sheffield). Going 3-2 were Brian and Kathleen Timmins (9k/14k Shrewsbury) and Reg Sayer (13k Stafford). 14 players took part.
EDINBURGH CHRISTMAS TOURNAMENT: The postponed Edinburgh Christmas Open, which was held February 5, saw a slightly reduced turnout at 33 players. Having earlier been presented with the 2010 Scottish Championship trophy, David Lee (2D Dundee) also triumphed on the day. Runners up with 3-1 records were Andrew Kay (4D Durham) and Matthew Scott (2D Newcastle). Also receiving prizes for 3 wins were Jenny Radcliffe (4k Durham), Eevi Korhonen (7k Tampere), Rob Payne (9k Edinburgh), Andrew Bate (10k Durham), and William Grayson (12k Edinburgh), who was 3/3 as a ghost. The Scottish championship 2011 semi-finals were decided to be David Lee v Martha McGill and Piotr Wisthal v Glynn Forsythe.
MAIDENHEAD: On January 22, Andrew Simons 3D from Cambridge won the tie-break that separated the top players at the 56-player Maidenhead-Hitachi Tournament. Second was Tom Brand 3D from Reading and third was Nick Krempel 3D from London. Winning all three games were David Ward 2D, Baron Allday 1k, David Hall 8k, Pat Ridley 11k, and Jan Poslusny 9k from Prague. The DAGG team from Cambridge won the team prize, but nobody won the 13×13 prize.
BRITISH CHAMPIONSHIP: On Sunday January 16, Matthew Macfadyen beat Vanessa Wong in the fourth game of the 2010 British Championship match. This put Matthew 3-1 ahead in the 5-game match. Matthew is therefore the 2010 British Champion.
LONDON OPEN: The London Open was again sponsored by Pandanet and WintonCapital Management and was held at the International Student House in London December 28-31,but attendance was a little down this year, no doubt due to the extremely cold weather and snow-related travel difficulties that immediately preceded Christmas. Luckily this had disappeared by the time the London Open started and 99 players turned up to play in this, by now traditional 4 day event, finishing on New Year’s Eve. Wang Wei 6D, who had just moved from Cork to London (but is originally from China) was thought to be the favourite for the Open being the previous year’s runner up. Indeed after four rounds only Wang Wei and Antti Tormanen 6D from Oulu in Finland were unbeaten at the top – they played in round 5; Antti won after an epic battle. Annti then won his last two games to be unbeaten and take first place. Wei Wang also won the rest of his games to end with 6 wins and take second place. Guo Juan from Amsterdam was the resident professional, providing game commentaries and lectures throughout the time, but not playing in the Open. However, she played in the Pair Go Tournament and won, partnered by Ian Davis from Belfast. Guo has also kindly provided €100 sponsorship for this year’s London Open on her audio site. Certificates are given to 5 young deserving players, each worth 20 audio lectures. The Lightning was won by Jukka Jylanki (9k Finland), who beat Andrew Kay (4D UK) in the final. The prizes were presented by Emma Watkins from Winton, with thanks extended to all those involved, especially Geoff Kaniuk and Jenny Radcliffe as main organisers, ably supported by chief referee Nick Wedd, Tony Atkins and many others. In parallel with the London Open was the Man-Machine Challenge, sponsored by the British Go Association, which ended in a comprehensive 4-0 victory for the Man – John Tromp, 2D, who went away $1000 richer courtesy of Darren Cook, who was using Many Faces of Go on his laptop. John said that he wasn’t going to repeat his bet, as he expected to probably lose in a couple of years time if the computer was going to continue improving at the current rate. He felt that the result didn’t reflect the closeness of the games. The final Go event was a casual Rengo event after the tournament proper had been closed, and before the New Year party, which was won by Frenchmen Arnaud Knippel and Michael White; they attribute their success to brand new hats worn throughout! This was Geoff Kaniuk’s last year as London Open Tournament Director, after many years of extraordinarily dedicated service and hard work. Congratulations to him on his retirement.
– as reported in the February of the British Go Association newsletter; E-Journal article edited by Jake Edge
