European Go Congress

Its a bit late, but here is my European go congress report.


European Go Congress Main Tournament/and results.
A lot of people have been asking me why I went to the EGC instead of the AGC, my main reason was because I wanted to see my friends from Korea. Also I wanted an excuse to travel in europe this summer.



I got off the airplane, and got to the bus. I had somehow not counted on needing money and had nothing in my pocket. Luckily I was able to trade a 3/4 empty bottle of Grappa for a bus ticket.



I found the congress site pretty easily, it was the source of all the elderly japanese people wandering about. Actually this was quite amusing, I imagine, for the locals. Suddenly the City of Tampere had a drastic increase of Japanese. I wonder what sort of ideas they had...



The congress was held at the Aleksantari school. I arrived and registered without a problem. I could not really find what to do so I just started talking to some german people. I was lucky to find a very interesting person. He had just biked from germany through Scandinavia and then taken a ferry to finland and biked the rest of the way to congress. He was also a 2d go player, and a geo-cacher, in fact for teh past 2 years i believe he finds at least one cache a day.



I spent the day hanging out with him, I found my first cache, and went swimming in a nice big Finnish lake. Also I was very surprised to eat one of the best donuts I have ever tasted.





Here are the "results"

• I played as a 1 kyu in the tournament. I had an ok result of 5 wins 5 losses. But I was not satisfied since i won 4 games the first week and only one the second.


• In the weekend tournament I did very poorly, I only won 1 game out of 5.


• My pair go partner, Kim Chaelim, and I got to the top 8, but we lost a very close game in the quarter finals.


• The team I played on in the football tournament got 4th place.

In general I was surprised after the first week that I was able to get 4 wins. I expected to not be able to hold my 1kyu level so well. The weekend tournament dissapointed me, but i blamed that on too much partying and poor sleeping conditions. I thought that my winning streak would start again after my win on the first day of the second week, but I ended up losing the last 4 games. To be honest, I was pretty disapointed with myself in losing the last game. I had a really good opening, yet somehow in the endgame my level suddenly dropped back down to 30kyu. I played Ko's I didn't need, missed ataris and didn't defend after blocking on the first line.

Overall I am satisfied with my 5-5 result, but I think I could have done better.

(Photo by EuroGoTv)

BC Card Cup and an Annoying Problem

BC Card Cup

(Also in case you are wondering what the BC Card is, here is a commercial...)

Try to solve this problem before moving on, you are supposed to capture the marked stone (Q2).

From SGF/games

I had forgotten all about the BC cup, but when my friend jeered me about not going to baduk events, I suddenly remembered it. I checked to see when it was and woah and behold it was the next day. (This happened yesterday) After trying to solve a certian go problem for about 30 minutes I gave up and went to sleep

This morning I woke up nice and early, (9:45) and set out to the Hanguk Kiwon. On the train I continued to try and solve the problem, but was not successful. I even enlisted the help of some 2d ajishi I happened to meet on the train this morining.

After getting of the train, I was not sure where to go. A nice police man helped me out.

The Hanguk Kiwon was surprisingly empty, apperently I arrived 3 hours early. I wandered around a bit and in the end decided to give the problem another shot. Again after playing it out on the board a man came over and we started to try and solve it together. We had no luck.

I moved to a new spot, and decided to skip the problem and move on the next one. As time passed by a nice man sat down next to me and we started to talk. His name Jang Myeonghan (4p) His english was quite good so we were able to talk. He told me that he was planning on visiting New York sometime, and asked for my contact info. I was embarresed, not having a business card, so I ran to a PC Bang and made some simple paper ones. (Better than nothing I guess?)

Jang Myeonghan 4P

The tournament would be starting soon, so he had to go, but not before I showed him that pesky problem. Try as I might I could not capture that stone, he glanced at it and solved it. The solution is at the bottom.


At the actual tournament I was only allowed to spend about 10 minutes taking pictures.

It was an interesting thing that happened. Before the games started everyone was relaxing in their own ways, meditating, talking to friends, laughing. There was nothing that special going one, but once the anouncment for the games to begin was made the air became heavy. Maybe it was in my head, but I found it difficult to breathe, it felt as if I was in a steam room (not as hot or humid though)

I took as many photos as time permitted. Sorry if they arent the best quality.

from 2-22-09

From 2-22-09

From 2-22-09

From 2-22-09

From 2-22-09

From 2-22-09

Solution:
He said connecting is good enough. so here is the solution. In a game it is likely white would not play 30, and just tenuki; so for all of those who, like me, loathe that little marked stone, you can go ahead and ignore whites 30 (presumably elsewhere) and capture it.....

From SGF/games

Masters Open

The Masters Open

This past Sunday I had the pleasure of running the Masters Open. I was the Director, and Kim Dae Yol was the organizer.

From Masters Open

Me

Although only 12 people played in the tournament, it was pretty intense having so many talented players in one room. We had 4 former US Open winners! Andy Liu, Young Kwon, Dae Yol Kim, Lee Jong Moon.

From Masters Open

Young Kwon 7d

There where two things that stood out to me the most about this tournament. Although we had only 12 players we had 4 kids competing. We all know that there are these amazing kids out there that are 6d at 6 years old... well thats a bit of an exaggeration, but everytime I see these pre-teen 6 dans it always blows my mind.

From Masters Open

The 6d Children

There was a moment towards the end of the tournament that really stuck with me At one moment Mr. Tao came in the room to say hi to his old friends, and everyone was just so happy. The simple game of Go created ties between people that last your whole life. Personally, I have made friends from all over the world, from all walks of life, there is just something about the relationships forged over the wooden battlefield...

From Masters Open

Vincent Liu


My absolute favorite thing about go is that these 12 year olds could play with the 70 year olds and have the two players be equals on the board. This event had a lot of this. It was rather odd but we did not have any "young adult" aged players. Everyone was either around 13 years old, or in their 50's or 60's.

Andy Liu won the first prize of $800

From Masters Open

Andy Liu



Jie Liang, Jong Moon Lee, And Xiliang Liu where tied with 3 wins 1 loss each. Tiebreaking was used to determine the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th place.

Jie Liang took home 2nd.

Jong Moon Lee took 3rd.

Xiliang Liu took home 4th.

From Masters Open

Coffee Go

From Masters Open

Young vs. Not So Young

From Masters Open

Friends in thought

From Masters Open

Xiliang Liu Vs. Jong Moon Lee

For all photos visit

Masters Open

New York Open 2008

The New York Open is a Tournament I created.

I enlisted the help of Christopher Vu to be my Tournament Director.

While I was the tournament organizer.

The Idea of it was to have a annually or Semi-Annually occurring large tournament in NYC.

I advertised it to have a relatively large first place prize of $500.

It would take place over 2 days have 5 rounds.

All games would be even, and it would be broken up into separate divisions.

Here is the report...



October 10th-
The New York Go Open is the next day. The New York Go Center was a mess. Christopher Vu, the tournament director, and I, The organizer were at the go center until 12 am reorganizing, and decorating. Hiding holes in the wall, shooing away moths and setting up all the tables.

We finally got home and to bed around 2 am. Chris stayed on my couch so that he would not have to trek 1 hour in the middle of the night.

My main concern was that we would have enough seats to fit everyone in.

October 11th-

42 people showed up for the tournament. 48 had pre-registered, and a few people promised they would bring friends. Only 42 people actually made it. The main problem with this was providing the $500 top prize that I had promised. We made it by, if the Go Center was more strict with rent, I do not know what we would have done.

Anyway it was a lot more action the our club had seen in a long time so we were pretty happy regardless.

We set up a Go In Our Garden Review Area where many player were studying in between rounds.

A notable quote from Andy Liu "When you are 1d you should be able to remember your games. This is one of the big differences between a 1d and a 4kyu"

I did awful in my games today. Although I won the first one I played by 5.5, I lost the second two. The second game, I lost when my opponenet threatened to, either a. Cut two groups in half, or b. capture a stone. I chose the wrong one. We went back and counted what would happen if i chose b....I would have won by 12.

The third game I played I just played horrendously the whole time, I lost an even game to a supposed 13k. (I think he was sandbagging since he finished 2wins 3 losses in the 9k-1k division)
BTW he was the Tournament Organizer, and he entered this division so that we would have an even number of players.

There was one incident at the event. One of the 5d players lost on time. He made a huge fuss about it. His logic was since his clock did not warn him he was running out of time, it was somehow not fair. Keep in mind the time settings were 1h base and 5 of 30 byo-yomi.

He was yelling and making threats, so to calm him down I gave him an additional 30 sec period, that beeped every second.

He lost the game by a large margin to a 12 year old 5d, Andrew Huang.

I felt awful for the kid because his opponent was creating such a fuss. I am not sure what I would have done in the kids place.

Overall the first day was a success. One thing that I must mention is that all the food that you participants ate was donated by our Tournament Director Christopher Vu. Next time you see him make sure to thank him.

Pictures from day 1.

1. Me (blue shirt) V. Chris Vu

2.Anthony Fiengold 3k John Mangual 5k
Matthew Palumbo 2k Robin Xu 4k (back to front right to left)

3. Howard Wong 5k

4. S-division (6d+)



1. Four 6d battling.
2. John David 5d vs. Andrew Huang 5d
3. Andy Liu 9d vs Jie Liang 8d
4. Dae Yol Kim 7d, and Xiliang Liu 7d in thought
5. Hyodo Shunichi 7d (second from the front)

1. Post game review
Haskel Small, Alfred Teng Michael Fodera (all 3d)
2. Kyu section

October 12th-

Chris and I made it over to the Center at 9:15 am, the tournament would be starting at 10, and we had a little work to do.

About 15 people dropped out of the second day, and 2 more joined in. The games went smoothly and people seemed pretty happy Overall.

The prizes were as Follows:

S Division
1st Place $400.00 (Andy Liu 9d)
2nd Place $100.00 (Xiliang Liu 7d)

A Division

1st Place $100.00 (Ke Lu 5d)
2nd Place $60.00 (June Joung Kim 2d)

B Division

1st Place $90.00 (Afa Zhou 1k)
2nd Place Book or Go Equipment of choice (Robin Xu 4k)

C Division
1st Place Book or Go Equipment of choice (Jesy Felicia 14k)
2nd (tie) Book or Go Equipment of choice (Betsey small 13k, and Fredrick Smadja 12k)

Winners Pictures

1. All together
2. C Division
3. A Division
4. S division

Anyway I hope everyone had a great time.

Next year I will try my best to make the tournament bigger and better, and more organized as far as starting times go.

Final standings whole tournament

OPEN DIVISION

1. Andy Liu (9893) (5-0)
2. Xiliang Liu (14179) (4-1)
3. Young Kwon (433) (3-2)
4. Oh Tae Hwan (4350) (3-2)
5. Liang Jie (11018) (2-3)
6. Zhong, Yu (8975) (2-3)
7. Kim, Dae-Yol (3039) (2-1)
8. Zhou, Xun (7316) (2-1)
9. Hyodo, Shunichi (6157) (1-4)
10. Chen, Yong (5018) (1-3)
11. Verkhovsky, Simon (6769) (1-2)
12. Liu, Yong-xin (3700) (0-3)

A DIVISION

1. Ke Lu (11746) (5-0)

2. Kim, Joung June (99999) (4-1)

3. Teng, Yu Jen (14233) (4-1)
4. Andrew Huang (13637) (4-1)
5. Chen, Walter (11796) (3-2)
6. Paul Anderson (1448) (2-3)
7. Marc Palmer (4291) (2-3)
8. Fodera, Michael (16547) (2-3)
9. Haskell Small (1062) (2-3)
10. Saul Lapidus (10587) (2-3)
11. Matthew Bengtson (19) (2-1)
12. Yu, Stephen (4002) (0-5)
13. John David (99998) (0-3)
14. Justin Johnson (14909) (0-3)

Division B – Final Standings

1. Afa Zhou (10817) [4.5-0.5]
2. Robin Xu (16845) [4.0-1.0]
3. Howard Wong (14893) [3.0-2.0]
4. John Mangual (11454) [3.0-2.0]
5. Anthony Feingold (14448) [3.0-1.0]
6. Carrie Lapidus (10828) [2.0-3.0]
7. Christopher Vu (11614) [2.0-3.0]
8. Leonaurd Baum (9420) [1.0-4.0]
9. Boris Bernandsky (13734) [1.0-4.0]
10. Avi Mowshovitz (14885) [1.0-1.0]
11. Joshua Gang (14514) [1.0-0.0]
12. Matthew Palumbo (14643) [0.0-3.0]

Division C – Final Standings

1. Jesy Feliccia (14592) [5.0-0.0]
2. Frederic Smadja (16887) [3.0-2.0]

2. Elizabeth Small (2098) [3.0-2.0]
3. Barbara Huang (14149) [2.0-3.0]
4. Diana Huang (14150) [2.0-3.0]
5. Daren Huang (14165) [2.0-3.0]
6. Joanne Huang (14145) [1.0-4.0]
7. Janis Rancourt (16005) [0.0-3.0]

-Boris Bernadsky about 4k.