bgj132

UK News and Tournaments ~ Tony Atkins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

Go Tutor. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

Francis in the USA ~ Francis Roads . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

Council House ~ How dan certificates are awarded ~ Tim Hunt . . . . . . . . 11

Gozone ~ Tony Atkins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

Nakade & Ishi-no-Shita ~ Part Thirteen ~ Richard Hunter . . . . . . . . . . 15

Thrilling Semeai Revisited ~ Alex Selby. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

Scaling the Heights of the MSO ~ Tim Hunt . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22

Houston We Have A Problem ~ Francis Roads . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24

The Go Rating System of Igor Goliney ~ Franco Pratesi . . . . . . . . . . . 26

Unbounded Thoughts ~ Richard Court . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Fireworks ~ Simon Goss . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30

Diary of a Go Plonker ~ Ian Marsh. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

Review of Go++ ~ Nick Wedd. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35

Not Really an Ethical Problem ~ Nick Wedd . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36

The 1st Incheon World Amateur Baduk Championship ~ Simon Goss . . . 38

Thrilling Semeai Games ~ Part Two ~ Richard Hunter . . . . . . . . . . . . 43

Ten Years Ago ~ Tony Atkins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

EGC 2003 St Petersburg ~ Steve Bailey . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

Scaling the Heights of the MSO ~ Answers ~ Tim Hunt . . . . . . . . . . . 51

World Go News ~ Tony Atkins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53

BGA Officials ~ Postal, e-mail and Web Addresses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56

UK Club Lists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57

Notices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59

Glossary of Go Terms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60

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BRITISH GO JOURNAL NO 132 AUTUMN 2003 ~ CONTENTS

October 2003 Journal 11/27/03 1:34 PM Page 1

Leicester Square58 players entered the Leciester Tournamenton 14th June held in the usual church hallvenue. Additionally this year 8 schoolchildren from Aston School andLoughborough Grammar School played in a13x13 beginners’ tournament. First prize inthat went to Vishal Dhutia with 8 wins andjoint second to Ben Horsley and Simon Hiouwith 6. In the main tournament Simon Shiu(4 dan Bristol) was again the tournamentwinner. He last won in 2001, being squeezedin a tie-break in 2002. Winning prizes for3/3 were Gerry Mills (1 dan Monmouth),Clive Wright (1 dan Nottingham), MikeLynn (2 kyu Leamington), Alec Edgington(5 kyu Wanstead), Mike Pickles (6 kyuYork), Andy Price (15 kyu Leamington),Thomas Hawley (18 kyu Nottingham),Duncan Forsyth (21 kyu Unattached) andRichard Meddings (25 kyu Aston). In thecontinuous 13x13 handicap prizes went toNayan Dhutia (25 kyu Loughborough) formost wins (with 8) and Alex Beman (23 kyuLeamington) for most games (with 10).

Welsh DragonThe 11th Welsh Open at Barmouth was heldon the sunny weekend of 28th and 29th June.It was won as always by MatthewMacfadyen (6 dan Leamington) beingawarded the bottle of Glenmorangie; he nowhas 53 games unbeaten there. Second wasTatsushi Akiya (4 dan) who traveled fromTokyo for a holiday including the event andwas rewarded with a Welsh dragon. Winninga two-book prize for 5 out of 5 was AlistairBrooks (20 kyu Swindon). On 4/5 were TomWiddecombe (2 kyu Devon), Gary Beman (6 kyu Leamington) and Jonathan Englefield(12 kyu High Wycombe). Organiser PhilipWard-Ackland (6 kyu Barmouth) awardedhimself a strong drink for winning 4 out of4, able to compete thanks to the help of the

Harveys, Pitchfords and Stephen Bashforth.The Continuous 9x9 winner was ShawnHearn (6 kyu Sleaford). Wayne Walters andPhilip Ward-Ackland jointly won the firstBackgammon tournament, going on into thesmall hours of Saturday evening.

Edinburgh FestivalLast year the Scottish Open was missedbecause of hosting the British Open.However it was back on 5th and 6th of July.Again it was held in Lee House at thePollock Halls of Edinburgh University. The site also provided accommodation forthose of the 26 players who needed it.Players came from Scotland, England, Isle ofMan and Japan, and were able to explore thenearby Arthur’s Seat, city centre and localrestaurants. On the Sunday Tony Atkins andProfessor Iwashita ran a Go stand at theJapanese Festival, held at Lauriston Castle inthe Edinburgh suburbs. In the tournamentthree 4 dan players beat each other to end on5 wins at the top. Split by sos, winner for thethird time was Wanstead’s Francis Roads,second was Tokyo’s Tatsushi Akiya and thirdwas Wanstead’s Quentin Mills. Winningprizes for 4/6 were Reading’s Ron Bell (4 kyu) and local player Allan Crossman (3 kyu). Shinpei Tanaka (2 kyu Edinburgh)won 3.5.

Letchworth GardenTo celebrate its centenary, Letchworth addedGarden City to its name and renewed itscentral gardens. The second tournament washeld on 19th July and attracted 39 players tothe new venue of the 1907 Meeting House.The galleried hall held most boards, but thetop two played in the gallery itself. Therewas no need to place anyone in the hall’ssheep pen, as the weather was nice so thebabes and partners were able to stay outsidein the gardens. Tournament winner was

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UK NEWS AND TOURNAMENTS

Tony Atkins [email protected]


Alistair Wall (4 dan Wanstead), who beatKim, Selby and Shepperson to win.Organiser Simon Bexfield was again a prizewinner with 2 out of 2. The players on 3wins were Erwin Bonsma (5 kyu Ipswich)and Azan Mahwah (19 kyu LSE). TonyPitchford (7 kyu Chester) won 2.5, as didlocal Syd Noah (6 kyu). The Junior Prizewent to Jonathan Englefield (11 kyu HighWycombe) and Chris Goldsmith (7 kyuCambridge) won the Continuous 9x9. Epsom DerbyThe second Epsom Tournament on thehottest of days, 9th August, attracted 56players to the air conditioned EbbishamCentre. The top group was very strongputting the bar at 5 dan. Also the first BritishChampionship game was held in the upstairsroom. Matthew Macfadyen beat MatthewCocke, watched by game recorder NatashaRegan, the tournament players and by manyplayers on the internet thanks to a webcastby Nick Wedd (until technical problemsintervened). Epsom winner was HirsohiTakamiya (5 dan Central London). Allplayers on two and three wins got prizesthanks to sponsor Forbidden TechnologiesPlc, including large umbrellas, and everyonewent away with a Go puzzle mouse mat.Those with three were: Li Shen (4 danCentral London), Hyo Sik Cho (1 kyuLondon) and Jil Segerman (8 kyu Brighton).12-year old Li Shen beat three 5 dans,enough to earn promotion to that grade inSeptember. The best team was the Eadingteam (mostly from Reading). Jenny Radcliffe(15 kyu Durham) won the 9x9 and AndrewJones (3 dan Wanstead) the 13x13. A groupof players including the organisers andsponsor enjoyed a Chinese buffet afterwards.The following Saturday a Go match tookplace at the Korean Festival at FairfieldRecreation Ground in Kingston Upon Thames.After one round the scores were tied, butafter three the Korean team lead by Mr S.Y.Park were well ahead to take the cup, whilstEngland had to settle for the plate.

Northern SoulThe Northern this year moved back fromSeptember to the 16th and 17th August. Theusual team of John Smith and Chris Kirkhamran the event, but the event was now part ofthe Mind Sports Olympiad. This meantcompeting for medals and top place prizemoney, not the normal prizes, and a changeof venue to the Renold Building, UMIST, inManchester. 28 players took part. All themedals went to young Chinese players. Goldmedal winner with 6/6 was Li Haiou (6 dan)a former professional who has been studyingin Liverpool. Second was Chen Lei fromLondon with 5/6 and third was HanZhongwei with 4/6. Paul Taylor (1 kyuCambridge) took a creditable fourth with 4/6and fifth was Tim Hunt (3 dan Open Uni)and sixth Dan Gilder (3 dan Manchester) on3/6. On four wins were: Martin Harvey (3kyu Manchester), Bill Streeten (4 kyuWanstead) and Mihoko Isoda (15 kyuOxford). In another room MatthewMacfadyen won games two and three of theBritish Championship, beating MatthewCocke to keep the title. Again it was webcastand various strong players made commentsremotely, or on the demo board in thecorridor.

Mind GamesThe 7th Mind Sports Olympiad moved to anew five year venue of UMIST inManchester, over ten days from 16th to 25thAugust. Go events were held on bothweekends. The first had the Northern andChampionship Games and no less than fourevents took place over the holiday weekend.Go Rapidplay on Saturday 23rd was won byLi Haiou (6 dan China) with 6/6. Silver wasDan Gilder (3 dan Manchester) and Bronzewas Masashi Sugiyama (2 dan Japan).Jonathan Englefield (11 kyu) won 4/6; 15players took part. On the Sunday morningthe 7 player Lightning was won by PiersShepperson (5 dan London) with 5/6, secondwas Masashi Sugiyama with 4/6 and third

3


Natasha Regan (1 dan Epsom) with 3/6. Onholiday from Japan, Mihoko Isoda (15 kyu)also won 4/6. That afternoon the 8-player13x13 was won by Tim Hunt (3 dan OpenUniversity) with 4.5/6. Masashi Sugiyamatook another silver with 4/6 and Simon Goss(2 dan Bracknell) took the bronze. MihokoIsoda won 4.5/6 and Jonathan Englefield 4/6.On the Monday the Pair Go was won byNatasha Regan and Tim Hunt, paired for thefirst time. Second were Helen and MartinHarvey (Manchester) and third were AnnaGriffiths and Tony Atkins (Berks). Fourthwere Mihoko Isoda and Masashi Sugiyama.Medals for this were presented by memorychampion Ben Pridmore. Go players ofcourse played in some of the other 120events as well. Winning non-Go medalswere Paul Smith who took gold at Oware,Nick Wedd gold at Skat and PiersShepperson at Peurto Rico. Tim Huntattended the first meeting of the UK MindSports Council during the event, which aimsto get mind games recognised as sports.

Cornish CreamThe second Go weekend in Penzance thisyear was the regular Cornwall event on 6thand 7th September. The Go returned to theYacht Inn after the British was held at thelarger Queens Hotel. The Cornish Handicapstarts after midday on the Saturday to allowtraveling or make the most of the fineweather to visit attractions such as StMichael’s Mount or the Gweek SealSanctuary. 12 players took part. Winner ofthe Go Bowls trophy on 4.5/5 was HennieGroot Lipman (2 dan) on holiday from theNetherlands. Several players scored 3/5 to besecond, of whom the prize winner was juniorplayer Jonathan Englefield (11 kyu HighWycombe). 20 players took part in theCornwall Tournament on the somewhatshowery Sunday. Winner of the Devon GoStone for the first time was Simon Goss (2dan) who beat fellow Bracknell player IanMarsh (1 dan) in the final. Last year’s

winner was third, Alistair Wall (4 danWanstead). The player winning a woodenstone for three wins was local lad JakeFinnis (16 kyu).

Mulberry Bush67 players attended the Open University forthe 15th Milton Keynes Tournament. Theweather was fair and often players were seeninspecting the mulberries, though nobodywas caught red-handed. In the tournament,unbeaten winner was Lei Chen (5 danGLGC); he beat Young Kim (5 dan London)and then Alistair Wall (4 dan Wanstead) inthe last round. Second with 3/3 was TobyManning (3 dan Leicester), with Dave Ward(4 dan Cambridge) in third. On 3/3 in fourthwas Alison Bexfield (2 dan Letchworth).Also on 3/3 were Niall Cardin (1 danOxford), Matt Piatkus (2 kyu Oxford), CraigYoung (9 kyu North London), Paul Blockley(14 kyu Worcester) and Zachary Tsai (17kyu Warwick). The Sandbaggers wonOxford the team prize for a second yearrunning. Alex Beman (19 kyu Leamington)and Ian Davis (7 kyu Cambridge) won prizesfor 7/15 and 6.5/8 on the MK Map GoBoard, now a regular feature of this eventfor those who don’t like square grids.

4

Ing Clockswww.usgo.org/aga/clocks.aspThis page from the useful AmericanGo Association site tells you how toset up time on the Ing Clocks. Theseelectronic timers are famed for theirability to talk to the players, suppos-edly in English and Chinese, but areunobvious to set up unless you havebeen shown how.

Tony Atkins

IN THE LIGHT


This article deals with endgame counting.Together with what was said earlier aboutsente and gote relationships that covers thebasic knowledge of the endgame which doesnot come down to special tactics (endgametesujis).A point which will readily be understood bysomeone who has tried the countingtechnique of the previous article in thisseries is that you have to deal somehow withthe four types of endgame plays identifiedearlier. For example in Diagram 1 Black’sterritory is complete, except that White Awill be a sente play against it some day.

Black will have toanswer at B underalmost all circum-stances. So count thepoints there asmarked in Diagram 2.

That gives us a firstrule: count sente playsas if played out. What about doublegote plays?

The classic double gote formation ofDiagrams 3 and 4 can be counted as if the

marked stones of Diagram 5 were in place,and the respective territories were the ‘x’points. This is the average of the two results.

That can stand as a second rule: to a firstapproximation, either side has a 50% chanceof playing out a double gote area.There are no such comfortable ways to lookat double sente moves and reverse sentemoves. Both players will rush to the doublesente plays if (a) they will really beanswered as expected and (b) there are noundesirable side effects. The reverse sentemove is always a little unexpected. Why hasthe player with sente not played it long ago?Well, it might be that the endgame has juststarted. There are other reasons (retainingsome ko threats, for example – a move thatgains one point in sente by threatening togain 30 more doesn’t need playing untilquite late on).

Summary of approximate counting● Count sente moves as played out but

watch for reverse sente.● Count double gote moves as averaged to

a middle result.● Treat double sente plays as separate issues.Now onto endgame counting as a techniquein its own right. If you want to know whichendgame point to play, all you have to do islook round all the possible plays, count thegame after each of them, and pick the bestone. But life is too short for that counsel ofperfection, of course. What everyone relieson, for almost all of the time, is localassessment of gain and loss, as in thefollowing examples.

5

GO TUTOR ~ ENDGAME COUNTING

❏ 1

B A

❏ 2

xxxx

❏ 3

1 23

❏ 4

12 3

❏ 5

xxxxxxxx


6

Diagrams 6 and 7: a double gote play worth 4 points.

Diagrams 8 and 9: a double sente play worth 4 points.

Diagrams 10 and 11: a sente play worth 5 points,and the corresponding reversesente play. Note that White 2at 3 in Diagram 10 leads to adisaster when Black cuts at 2.

Diagram 12: count the values of the double gote plays at A, B, C, D.

Answers: A is worth 6 points, B 4 points, C 2 points, D 1 point.

Diagram 13: Please confirm that this is a double gotesituation worth 28 points.

❏ 6

1

❏ 81 23

4

❏ 101

234 5

6

❏ 7

1

❏ 912 3

4

❏ 111 23

❏ 12

DCB

A

❏ 13

A


7

One more topic deserves a mention.

Count one third for a koEach of a move threatening a ko, a movecapturing a ko, and a move finishing a ko,should be evaluated at one third of the totalgain from winning that ko. The logic is that three moves are required togarner the profit. Another way to look at it isthat with three such kos on the board, all ofthem with you to capture, you take one, youopponent connects another, you connect,opponent connects the last. You have takenthe profit once from three chances.This second bit of reasoning can be seenoften enough in action at the very end of thegame. The ko in Diagram 18 is typical.

Black at 1 there, rather than at 4, might gainor lose a point depending on the finaloutcome of the ko. You do frequently seethree such ‘half-point’ kos on the board atthe close of games. The result will justifythe idea that the chance of capturing in oneis, on average, worth only a slim one thirdof a point.

Diagrams 16 and 17: allowing for the follow-up. Compared withDiagrams 8 and 9 Black has more eye shape,and could resist White by not connectingwith 4 in Diagram 16. White gains 6 points

in Diagram 17, but in gote once more.Definitely 4 points for White, and half achance of 6 more, makes the White play at 1 here 7 points in reverse sente.

Diagrams 14 and 15: explanation of the value 6 points awarded tothe double sente play shown once before inthe chapter. The changeover in points isshown by the ‘x’ markings. Note that the

question of whether the answers given willactually be seen on the board is much moreimportant as a practical matter than the exactnumber: both sides definitely will want toplay here earliest.

❏ 18

12

3

4

❏ 161 23

4

❏ 171 23

56

7

❏ 14

1 23 45

6xx

x

❏ 15

1234 5

6 xxx


Here’s a conversation which took placeabout eight times, in various words, duringmy recent trip to the States for the US GoCongress (August 2nd – 10th):American Go player: “Francis! Good to seeyou! It’s been a long time!”Francis: “Since ’99 actually, when I came tothe San Francisco Congress.”AGP: “You should come more often.”F: “When did you last come to a EuropeanCongress?”AGP: “Europe? Ah, now, that’s a long way.”F: “Yes, it’s much closer in the otherdirection.”AGP “!!!” I do my best to push our tournamentswhenever I visit the States. Usually Imention the Isle of Man, the London Open,and the European Congress, in that order.There’s interest, but the poor dears take solittle vacation that my hopes are not toohigh.This year the US Congress was in Houston,Texas. I started my visit about a fortnightbeforehand with a visit to friends inManhattan. They leave me alone during thedaytime to recover from jetlag, but in theevenings there were dinner parties and a wellattended meeting of the Brooklyn Go Club.The venue for this rotates around members’homes. This one, hosted by my own hosts,Roy and Mary Laird, attracted over 20players, and lasted until 1.30 am.The weather was pleasantly mild for NewYork, so I spent most of my time outside,exploring the waterfront and nearby StatenIsland. This boasts a substantial naturereserve, with waymarked tracks. I followedone of these through the trees for an hour orso, bird and flower books in hand. No doubtan insect book would have been of interest

too, but the insects were showing too muchinterest in me, so I retreated to SnugHarbour. This is not particularly snug, norwas any harbour visible, but it does boast anattractive Chinese Garden. This was wellworth a visit, and very different in style fromJapanese.Beware of E-tickets. I presented myself atLa Guardia Airport for my flight to Boston.My travel agent had booked the flight withan e-ticket. E-tickets have no physicalexistence; they consist simply of data on acomputer. You provide evidence of identity,and they let you onto the flight. Except thesepeople didn’t. “Yes, we can see your name on the list, butyou should have a paper ticket as well.”“But my travel agent said I didn’t need onefor this flight.”“No, for flights booked from overseas youneed a paper ticket.”“But ...”I ended up paying another $120 for myflight. At the time of writing I have still toget in touch with my travel agent, to whom I intend to address an adverse comment.My hosts in Boston were Go players Marvinand Katherine Wolfthal. Marvin is a trainedclassical pianist who now works incomputing. So when we weren’t playing Gowe had a fine old time discussing the musicof Beethoven and Elliott Carter, who is stillcomposing major works at 95.In the hospitable manner of US hosts theyhad arranged a barbecue in my honour,where I met several more of the Boston Gocommunity.The Wolfthals live out in the sticks, so Imoved on to another billet with musicalfriends closer to the centre. I had severalevening musical commitments, and on two

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FRANCIS IN THE USAFrancis Roads [email protected]


other evenings I was able to visit the localGo club. This meets in the basement of aSocial Security Office (don’t ask). Theweather was still kind, so I explored the city,concentrating once again on the waterfrontand the islands in the extensive harbour.Boston is an old city of some charm. It’solder, for example, than St. Petersburg. TheBostonians are very conscious of living inthe birthplace of the Revolution. There’seven a monument to the battle of BunkerHill, which the rebels actually lost. Bostonhas managed to escape the soulless gridplan-and-concrete style of town planning whichrobs so many US cities of any character.On to George Bush airport, Houston. From adistance, the city centre is an impressivesight. The cluster of skyscrapers rises froman otherwise flat landscape, and for oncesome thought seems to have gone into theirdesign and relative position. Unfortunately Inever had the opportunity to visit thedowntown area itself.The University of Houston is some distancefrom the city. I had been warned to expecthot weather, and we did indeed have outsidetemperatures in the 100’s. As publictransport isn’t the strongest point of the stateof Texas, I found myself more or lessconfined to the air-conditioned buildings ofthe university. This was the main drawbackof an otherwise largely well-organised andenjoyable congress. The other drawback was the lack of asuitable cafe or pub-like place to sit anddrink beer and play liar dice in the evenings.The best option was the bar of the on-campus Hilton Hotel. Why did the universityhave a Hilton? Because you can do degreesin hospitality or whatever there, and thehotel provides for those students whatlaboratories do for scientists.The congress opened with the usualceremony, followed by a pianoforte perfor-mance of Bach’s Goldberg Variations by Goplayer Haskell Small. It was encouraging to

see how many players stayed on to listen toa performance of one of the greatest of allkeyboard works, which can hardly bedescribed as easy listening. For me, thismemorable performance compensated forsome of the drawbacks mentioned above.There were about 260 participants in themain tournament, plus a goodly attendanceof young players who had their own tourna-ment in a separate room. That’s one thing theAmericans are really good at, involvingyoungsters in Go. They have a head start, asso many of the young faces are oriental, andcome from backgrounds in which Go is aswell-known as chess is in Europe. Still, wemay have lessons to learn from them.There was a team of Chinese and Japaneseprofessionals in attendance, including ourfriends Guo Juan, Feng Yun, and senseisNakayama and Saijo. Amongst the amateurparticipants there was a contingent ofJapanese visitors, a Canadian or two, ahandful of Germans, and T Mark Hall andmyself from Britain. So, hardly a very inter-national event, but that has its advantages.The common language, and, perhaps moreimportantly, the common culture, leads to avery relaxed and friendly event with fewdisputes or misunderstandings. There used to be a generally held idea thatUS grades were a stone weaker thanEuropean. I think that the US grades arefirming up now, and probably the differenceis nearer half a stone. At any rate, being oneof the weaker British 4 dans, I entered at thatstrength, and ended with 4/6, which wasgood enough for third place in my section. T Mark entered at 5 dan and didn’t do sowell, though I think that not being able toleave himself time to overcome jetlag hadsomething to do with that. He did well inanother respect though; Americans werequeueing up to buy his Gogod programme.The side events included the usual self-paired handicap tournament, and for theevenings 9x9, 13x13, lightning and pair Go.

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I have my doubts about pair Go as anevening event. While I’m all in favour of pair Go as a strategy to achieve some sort ofgender balance, the fact remains that asthings are at the moment such a tournamentexcludes a large proportion of the partici-pants.As I expect you’ve guessed already, theWednesday excursion was to the JohnsonSpace Centre. When you enter the visitors’building, you are confronted by a 10 footmodel of a spider. Apparently a high schoolstudent suggested an experiment to see howa spider would construct a web in zerogravity. A suitably intelligent spider wasselected, and the experiment performed.After a period of disorientation, the spidermanaged to make her web, tensing thesupport strands appropriately for the newconditions. This experiment led to advancesin space structural engineering.Interesting, I’m sure you will agree, but apretty thin excuse for the animated model.The whole building was presented ontheme park lines, and clearly aimed at theyounger generation. Which I’m all infavour of, as there is a shortage of young-sters reading science and engineering atuniversity these days. Nonetheless, you hadto seek out the adult interest sections (nowdon’t misunderstand me). These turned out to include a display ofmoon rocks, and tram rides to the workingparts of the centre, where you could seesuch things as the astronauts’ training area,a Saturn rocket in sections on its side, andthe famed Mission Control, preserved as itwas used from 1965-96. “Any questions?”asked our guide. I asked why the rocketsare launched from the Kennedy SpaceCentre in Florida, but then controlled fromhundreds of miles away in Houston.“Because that’s what President Johnsonordered,” came the reply.

The AGA has been considering what powersits president should have of late. Somemembers felt that under their old constitutionthe president had too much power, so thenew one has policy determined by a board ofeight governors, some regionally elected,and then carried out by the president andother officers. So now while the presidentmay advise, he doesn’t actually have a say indecisions. It’s my opinion that they’ve now swung toofar in the other direction. Managing unpaidvolunteers is a very different business frommanaging paid employees. It is far easier forvolunteers to cause difficulties by resigningwith immediate effect. I think we’ve got itabout right in Britain; we likewise have acouncil of eight, but the president and othersenior officers have a vote each, when votesare needed.This wasn’t my favourite US Congress, forreasons I’ve already mentioned. But that’snot to say that I didn’t enjoy it; just that theother five that I’ve been to were even better. Now to poetry. The Bob High Memorialcompetition invites entries of Go songs andpoems. These are judged by a panel whodon’t know the names of the entrants. I wonthe song division in ’98 and ’99, so Idecided to put in a poem this year. It camesecond. I present here both first and secondplaced entries. As you will see, it is not easyto determine just what the judges werelooking for. Here is the first prize entry, frommy near namesake Kris Rhodes, a Texan Goplayer:

A final stonethe rain falling outsideand inside, the thunder.

Francis’ own entry appears on page 24.

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11

As announced at the 2003 AGM and on theBGA Policy List1, Council and the GradingCommittees have reviewed our method ofmanaging dan grades. We have reachedsome decisions already and we plan somefurther work. This article describes wherewe have got to, and what we plan to do next.We have tried to take account of the viewsof as many members as possible in thisreview. With this issue, as with everything todo with the running of the BGA, you aremost welcome to discuss your views withany member of council.

The factors we took account of1 Dan certificates are valued and respected

by BGA members as recognition ofattainments and as targets to aim at. Noone proposes we get rid of them.

2 We know, from the evidence of theratings graphs2 that some players havequite large medium-term ups and downsin their tournament performances, whileothers have a pattern of slow but steadyimprovement. On some occasionspromotion is felt to be premature, but notpromoting players who have reached thenext level in a timely manner means thatthey will not meet the most suitableopponents, which may delay theirprogress.

3 The BGA rating list, and the policy ofencouraging kyu players to enter tourna-ments at a grade derived from theirEuropean rating has been successful, inmost people’s opinion.

4 For some time one of the aims of ourgrading policy was to bring our gradesmore into line with the European average.While we understand that there are otherreasonable views as to what we shouldalign with, we believe that there is a clear

majority view in favour of EGFalignment, so this policy should continue.

5 Until now, there has been a policy thatstronger players had to play in tourna-ments involving strong players from othercountries before they could be promotedto the higher grades. The EuropeanRatings system now provides anotherway to keep British grades aligned withoverseas grades, so this requirement is nolonger necessary.

What we have decided so farWe will continue to award dan certificates toplayers who have earned them. Dan certifi-cates remain the statement of a dan player’sofficial grade. They recognise achievements,not current playing strength, and are for life.Existing dan certificates will remain valid.Because of the variability in people’s playingstrength over time, we want to take a morerelaxed approach to people’s tournamententry grades:● We will continue with the existing policy

that dan players who are playing belowtheir official grade are encouraged toenter tournaments at a suitably reducedgrade. This has worked well over the last18 months.

● We will also encourage those players whoare playing above their official grade, butwho have not yet met the criteria forofficial promotion, to enter tournamentsat a suitably enhanced grade.

That is, with immediate effect, dan playersare encouraged to enter tournaments at agrade equal to the ‘strength’ listed on thecurrent version of the BGA ratings page,rounded to the nearest whole number. Thisincludes cases where the player’s rounded‘strength’ is higher than their official grade.It is permission, not obligation. Dan players

COUNCIL HOUSE ~ HOW DAN CERTIFICATES ARE AWARDED

Tim Hunt [email protected]


are welcome to continue to enter tourna-ments at their official grade. Anyonewanting to enter tournaments outside therange from their official grade to theirrounded strength should seek approval fromthe dan grading officer before doing so. Thismay be justified, for example on the basis ofGo Server ratings.Thus the system that has been working wellfor kyu players will be extended to danplayers. This should lead to more evenlymatched games in tournaments which makesit more interesting for both players. Also, itmay help to fix one slight problem with thecurrent system. At the moment, a strong 1dan will enter a tournament as a 1 dan, andend up playing a lot of other 1 dans, and willprobably win a lot, but is that enough to besure that they have reached 2 dan yet? Ifthey try entering a few tournaments at 2 dan,then they will have to play more other 2dans, and we will rapidly see whether theycan manage at the new level, or whetherthey get beaten up.Three round McMahon tournaments worksignificantly better at the top with exactlyeight players above the McMahon bar. Theusual way to set the bar is to say that allplayers graded 4 dan (say) or stronger startabove the bar. Sometournament organisershave experimentedwith an alternativesystem where theeight players with thehighest Europeanratings start above the bar. In ouropinion, bothapproaches are good,and like all details ofBGA-supportedtournaments thechoice of whichsystem to use is up to the tournamentorganiser.

Future workWe will change the system for awardingofficial dan grades. Tournament results onthe web site and the BGA rating list meansthat there is now a lot of publicly availableinformation about how well a particularplayer is performing. By comparison, theworkings of the grading committeesometimes appear somewhat mysterious.Also, the numbers generated by theEuropean rating system are a bit morereliable than the old promotion pointssystem.So we want to define criteria that areobjective, transparent and based on thepublicly available rating data. However wehave not yet worked out the details. We hopeto have them worked out in time to use themfor the first time at the Council meeting atthe end of November.The easiest way to explain the issuesinvolved is with an example. Below is agraph of how my European rating hadchanged with time, and the thick verticallines are the dates when I got my 1 dan, 2dan and 3 dan certificates. This is anexample of the grading committee getting itright. I got promoted to 1 dan shortly aftermy rating went up over the 0.5d mark, and I

12

2240 6 3 T030816A

2230 3 1 T030614F

2243 6 3 T030405B

2263 4 2 T030322A

2245 3 2 T030302B

2225 3 2 T030215E

2213 3 2 T030208B

2216 3 1 T030118A

2235 8 3 G030101

• 2280 5 3 T021109K

2269 4 2 T021012A

2272 6 5 T020907C

2240 3 1 T020815

2249 5 3 T020629E

2226 3 2 T020615C

2205 3 2 T020601C

2189 5 2 T020506

2202 4 2 T020406C

2211 3 2 T020303

2203 3 2 T020216B

2206 3 2 T020209C

2207 3 3 T020119A

2185 8 4 G020101

2185 5 4 T011110E

2137 4 2 T011006A

2139 3 1 T010916

2150 6 2 T010818A

2197 5 1 E010730

2221 5 3 E010728

2229 5 4 E010722

2195 3 1 T010609D

0.0 d

0.5 d

1.0 d

1.5 d

2.0 d

2.5 d

3.0 d

3.5 d

Jan 1999 Jul 1999 Jan 2000 Jul 2000 Dec 2000 Jul 2001 Dec 2001 Jul 2002 Dec 2002 Jul 2003 Jan 2004

Date

Strength


13

got promoted to 2 dan shortly after my ratingwent up over the 1.5d mark. (Since promo-tions happen at Council meetings, whichhappen every two months or so, that is thesort of timescale we mean by ‘shortly after’).In July 2001 I had a short blip above the2.5d line, but I was not promoted, and thatturned out to be right, because it was only ablip, and my rating crashed back down to2.0d. It was not until the end of September2002 that I made it to 3 dan for real.In the preceding paragraph, we had thebenefit of hind-sight. When it comes todeciding whether to promote someone, thatluxury is not available. The problem is tocome up with a rule that quickly promotespeople who have reached the next level, butwhich does not promote people when theyhave a blip. I am the person responsible forcoming up with the new system, and I wouldbe delighted to hear from anyone withhelpful suggestions.One risk that might arise from a promotionsystem based on the European ratings is thatplayers who do not compete in many tourna-ments may find it unduly difficult to getpromoted (the current promotion pointsystem, which includes some humanjudgement can allow for this to a certainextent, but has not always done so success-fully). We are aware of this risk, and so anynew system will be carefully monitored.We plan to work out the correlation betweengrades derived from European ratings (the‘strength’ column on the BGA rating list)and the ranks assigned by the Go serversIGS and KGS. This will let us give betteradvice to people playing in a tournament forthe first time who do not have a reliableEuropean rating, but who have played on the Internet.Geoff Kaniuk will make it possible to set theMcMahon bar at an EGF rating level, ratherthan at a grade, in a future version ofGoDraw.

Footnotes:1 To find out more about the policy list,

go to:two.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/bga-policy.

2 You can see a graph of any player’srating by clicking on their name in theBGA rating list:www.britgo.org/rating/list.html.The BGA rating list is based on theEuropean Go Ratings:www.european-go.org/rating/gor.htmlwhich are the product of much hard workby L Dvorak and A Cieply. We would liketo take this opportunity to thank them fortheir efforts.

Tournament Resultswww.britgo.org/resultsHow well did I do at the CheshireTournament in 2002? That is thekind of question you can answerat the BGA results pages. EachBGA tournament is indexed indate order for the last 5 years orso. The final position table isshown, so you can see whatposition you actually came. Youcan look at players’ grades andwhere they were from.Sometimes they are shown asbeing from No_club orUnattached, say. This means theydid not tell the organiser wherethey were from; it is preferred torecord the nearest town when aplayer had no club.

Tony Atkins

IN THE LIGHT


The Gozone outreach programme waslaunched earlier in the year. Teachers areactive in several different parts of thecountry. For example Matthew Holton isdeveloping a programme in the North-East.The Southern programme has grown out ofthe Hampshire Go Project being run by PeterWendes. Peter is acting as a full time semi-professional Go teacher, and has beenattending a wide variety of groups andvenues, as well as schools and colleges. He is often assisted by his wife Sheila andsometimes by volunteers such as SimonGoss and Tony Atkins. Occasionally whenPeter cannot fulfill a request then the volun-teers take over, often with help from thelocal club too. Here is a review of thehighlights of the Southern Gozoneprogramme this summer.On 19th June, several Portsmouth juniorschools gathered their best pupils for anafternoon of teaching. This was filmed forPortsmouth Television, but luckily they leftbefore Peter’s Go flag escaped up the flagpole. On 28th June Go was taught tochildren at a confer-ence for parents ofable and gifted atWarwick University.At one point theparents werewheeled in to betaught by theirchildren and theroom was simply fullof folk keen to learnGo. A popular part ofthis day was theshowing of the firstpart of the Hikaru noGo animations. YukiShigeno came to staywith Peter for a week

ending 12th July, so she could swap teachingexperiences with him. They visited severalsouthern locations including Hastings,though a plan to involve the Blue Petertelevision programme failed due to it beingsummer. Also on the 12th July Simon andTony, aided by David and Elinor fromSwindon, attended the Wiltshire branchmeeting of the National Association forGifted Children, as part of a Japanesemorning in West Lavington. On 10th September Peter was invited to givetwo Go seminars at the Victoria and AlbertMuseum. Quite a large group of quite brightpeople were keen to learn about the gamethere. On 20th September, Peter and Simontaught 90 kids and a dozen adults at a dayseminar in Horsham. Peter’s most exciting future event, as well asmore sessions with gifted children, is hisfirst residential course at Wimbourne duringthe last weekend in October, and we wishhim and all those involved in Gozone manyhappy beginners!

14

GOZONE


Simon Goss teaching Wiltshire kids at a Gozone event

Photo: Tony Atkins


15

In the last part we looked atsmall-scale sacrifices. As alink to this part, considerDiagram 1, which shows astandard life and deathposition. Black to play and

kill the corner. It seemsclear that Black can’t savehis two stones, but he has aclever way to sacrifice themthat prevents White frommaking two eyes.Black must start with 1 inDiagram 1a. White blocks

at 2 because Black 2 wouldreduce his eye-space toomuch. Next, Black 3 isatari, so White captureswith 4. Black 5 is the keymove in this technique.White can’t cut this stoneoff. He plays 6. but Blackconnects out with 7. Next, ifWhite captures the two

black stones, Black retakes(right of 6) and his stones 3,5, and 7 are all connectedout, leaving White eyeless.The key to this technique isthe fact that White cannotatari from the rear (right of3), which would preventBlack from retaking. Simplyplaying 1 at 5 is no good,but please check foryourself.The same technique canwork with a three-stonesacrifice, as shown inDiagram 2 where it is Blackto play. The white stones onthe left have threeliberties while theblack ones have two,so Black is losing thecapturing race.Nevertheless, he cankill the whole whitegroup by making aclever sacrifice.Black 1 in Diagram2a is the vital pointfor this technique,but it’s too hasty.White blocks at 2 andthe result is ko.Playing 1 at 3 is evenworse. Black losesthe capturing raceand can’t produceanything clever in theway of a sacrifice.Black 1 in Diagram2b is the way to start.If White plays atari

with 2, Black sets up hissacrificial shape with 3.This is atari, so there’s notime for White to play atarifrom the right and capturethe black stones in a‘connect and die’ situation.White must capture thethree stones, but Blackretakes one white stone andthe two marked stones forman eye-stealing combination.So why doesn’t White play2 at 3, the vital point?Because the B1 – W3exchange would reduceWhite’s liberties. Black

NAKADE AND ISHI-NO-SHITAPART THIRTEEN ~ UNDER THREE STONESRichard Hunter [email protected]

❏ 1 Black to play

❏ 1a White dies

12

3

4

56

7❏ 2 Black to play

❏ 2a Hasty12

3

❏ 2b Be patient1

23


16

simply plays atari from theright (right of 3) and he stillhas two liberties himself.Black 3 certainly is a vitalpoint, but rushing to takethe vital point immediatelyis not always best. In thiscase, Black 1 makes itsuicidal for White to takethe vital point, so Black cantake it with his next move.Diagram 3. Black to play.

White seems to have lots ofeye-making potential. Hehas captured two stones, isthreatening to capture onestone on the left, and has aneye in gote on the right. IfBlack connects at the 2-2point, White makes an eyeon the right and lives. IfBlack pushes on the right tobreak this eye, Whitecaptures the stone on theleft and lives. What canBlack do?Black 1 in Diagram 3a is aclever dual-purpose move.It not only saves the singlestone on the left, it also

threatens to break White’seye here. If White makes aneye on the right with 2,Black 3 is a superb follow-up to 1. Increasing thesacrifice from two stones tothree kills White in thesame manner we saw in thelast journal. I’m sure youcan read out the continua-tion. White captures threeblack stones, but Blackretakes at 3, whichcombines with the markedstone to give White a falseeye here. Isn’t thatbeautiful?Once you’ve mastered thistechnique, you can see itcropping up even whensome stones are missing. InDiagram 4, White can makean eye in gote with A, whileBlack has a defect at B that

urgently needs defending. IfBlack plays 1 at A, White Blives easily. The obviousdefence, connecting at B,lets White play A and live;White has a second eye onthe side. Black 1 at C alsoprotects the weakness, but isno more effective at killingWhite. Black 1 at D istemporarily forcing, butBlack will still have todefend his weakness in

gote, so that doesn’t workeither. What’s the answer?Well, looking back atDiagram 3a should give youa strong clue. The key moveis Black 1 in Diagram 4a.

White can push in at the 3-3point at any time, but notplaying it can be psycholog-ically effective, becauseBlack is more likely tooverlook the diagonal moveof 1.Diagram 5: Black to playand live.

Black 1 in Diagram 5a isthe only move that lookslikely to have a chance. Awhite stone here wouldbreak Black’s only eye.Black 1 is atari, so White

❏ 3 Black to play

❏ 4 Black to play

AB

CD

❏ 4a Blindspot1

2

3

❏ 5 Black to play

❏ 5a 3 is the key move

12

3

4❏ 3a Tesuji

1 23


17

captures the three blackstones. Next, Black 3 is agood move. This forcesWhite 4, which appears tohave miai to connect eitherside, but ...when Black blocks on theright with 1 in Diagram 5b,

forcing White to connect onthe left with 2, Black 3 hitsa defect in White’s position.This cut under the capturedthree black stones may behard to see in advance. Notethat if Black plays 3 inDiagram 5a below 1, Whitecan cut at 3 in sente beforedefending at the 2-2 point,so Black dies.Here’s another example ofseeing under three stones.Diagram 6: Black to playand live. Black has threestones in atari, but if he

connects to save them,White connects solidly athis own cutting point andBlack cannot make twoeyes. Black needs a littlemore finesse. Ignoring hisstones in atari, Black shouldcut with 1 in Diagram 6aand expand his positionon the second line.

White’s placement at 1 inDiagram 6b preventsBlack from making twoeyes on the side, butWhite is overlooking hisown weakness. Black 2,played under the stones,catches White in a “connect

and die” situation. 1 and 2are miai. If White defendsat 2, Black plays 1 andlives. Beware of dangerlurking under three stones.Diagram 7: Black to playand live.

Black 1 in Diagram 7a istoo straightforward. Whitecaptures the two stones inthe corner and Black endsup with two half-eyes. (Ahalf-eye is an eye in gote).

Black can complete eitherone in gote, but Whitebreaks the other one.Instead of 1, playing ataribelow 2 is no good either;White throws in at 2 and theresult is just the same.The trick here is toconstruct an effective shapeto sacrifice. Turning at 1 inDiagram 7b gains a movefor Black. White plays 2and 4 while Black 3 and 5make half eyes. Whitecaptures the three blackstones with 6, but as you

❏ 5b Under the stones12

3

❏ 6 Black to play

❏ 7 Black to play

❏ 7a Too slow

1 23456

❏ 6b Surprise

12

❏ 6a Ignore the atari

1

2

3


18

should be able to see,there’s an ishi-no-shitacoming up.When Black plays 1 inDiagram 7c, White needs to

add a move in the corner,which leaves Black time tomake an eye with 3. Blackis now alive because he hasone full eye and two half-eyes.Diagram 8: Black to play.This position is very similarto Diagram 7, but there’s a

subtle difference that callsfor a difference approach.The throw-in and turn ofBlack 1 and 3 in Diagram8a look good. Whiteconnects with 4 at 1 and theresult is the same as inDiagrams 7b and 7c. Thetrouble with this is that it’s‘katte yomi’. You areassuming that White willcapture at 2.There’s nothing to stopWhite from descending at 2in Diagram 8b. This iseffectively the same asDiagram 7a. Black dies.What about skipping thethrow-in of 1 in Diagram 8aand playing 1 directly at 3?Doesn’t this threaten asnapback? No, White 6 isatari.Black must atari at 1 inDiagram 8c and then play 3and 5. This looks likeDiagram 7a, where Blackdies, but there’s a differ-ence. After Black 7 inDiagram 8c, ...White needs to add a movein the corner. If he breaksone of Black’s potentialeyes, Black 2 catches him ina snapback. This snapbackconfiguration may beunfamiliar to some readers,but it’s an important shapeto study. In Diagram 8d, 1and 2 are miai. If Whitedefends at 2, Black hasthree half-eyes, so he makestwo eyes even if Whitebreaks one.Diagram 9. Black to play.Black’s eye-space is rather

small. It looks like endingup as a five-point nakade, asin Diagram 9a for example.Black must maximise hiseye-space with 1 inDiagram 9b. White can cutat 2 and capture the black

❏ 7b Technique

1

2

34

56

❏ 7c Black lives

12

3

❏ 8 Black to play

❏ 8a Katte yomi4 at 1

1 2

356

7

❏ 8b Black dies

12

3 45678

❏ 8c Correct

12

3 4567

❏ 8d Snapback

12

❏ 9 Black to play

❏ 9a Nakade

12


19

stones on the left, but Black3 is the key move. Thiscreates a by-now-familiarthree-stone sacrifice shapethat gives Black enoughtime to play 5 to 9 andmake two eyes.The previous article in thisseries ended with twoproblems.

Answer to problem 1Diagram 10 shows the basicproblem facing Black. If hemakes an eye with 1, White

connects at 2. Then, ifBlack widens his eye-spacewith 3, White 4 stops himgetting an eye here. Whitecan connect out either side.

The trick here, once again,is for Black to increase hissacrifice in order to create amore effective shape. Black1 in Diagram 10a threatensto connect underneath at 4or cut at 5. The throw-in of2 gives White a nice atari at4, but instead of connectingat 2, Black cuts at 5 leavinghis three stones in atari.White captures them with 6at 2. Next, Black widens hiseye-space with 1 inDiagram 10b just as inDiagram 10. But there’s an

important difference thistime. Black 3 is sente againstthe left. It makes miai of 4and 5. If White connects outwith 4 to break the eye,Black 5 captures two whitestones in an ishi-no-shita.White can play 2 inDiagram 10c, but the resultis even easier to read out.Black 7 is a straightforwardatari.

Answer to problem 2The hane of Black 1 inDiagram 11 is the keymove. White throws in at 2,

but Black makes a doglegwith 3. Black 5 is atari, soWhite captures with 6 at 2.Next, Black 1 in Diagram11a is sente, so White mustconnect at 2. This leaves

Black enough time to makean eye on the side with 3and 5. White 8 attempts tomake the eye in the centerfalse, but there is a problem

❏ 9b Technique6 at !, 8 at

12

3 457

9

❏ 10 Too simple

12 3

4

❏ 10a 6 at 2Increase the Sacrifice

12 3 4

5

❏ 10b Black lives

123 4

5 ❏ 11 Correct 6 at 2

1

23

45

❏ 11a Black lives

1

2

34

56 7

89

❏ 10c White 2 is no good

12

3

45

67


20

in this position. Black 9 is atari. If Whitethrows in with 10 at 8, Black captures themarked stone. White cannot break the eyehere, so Black lives. Study the variations byyourself.

I leave you with two challenging problemsto study. Both are Black to play.

❏ Problem 1 Black to play❏ Problem 2 Black to play

This is a comment onRichard Hunter’s interestingarticle Thrilling SemeaiGames – Part One, whichappeared in BGJ 131.As far as I can tell, therewas a mistake in the profes-sional play and thecommentary which wentwith it, in that the playerplayed a wrong move whichwas predicted by thecommentator, and no-onenoticed this in the post-mortem. (Although Richardpoints out that the post-mortems are usually moredirected at finding improve-ments for the losing side,which was Black here.) I have discussed this withRichard, and I think heprovisionally agrees.

The wrong move is White 8in figure 3, which should beat 12 (possibly white 8 at 10works too – I haven’tlooked at this properly) andthen White has an uncondi-tional kill.If this is true then itwouldn’t affect the conclu-sion that from Figure 2Black should go for the goteseki of Diagram 8, but itwould mean that whitemade a mistake in the gamenot noticed by the commen-tator, and it would alsomean that White 4 in Figure3 is probably not a “terriblemistake” after all, as he stillcan expect an unconditionalkill just as if he haddescended on the other side.

Diagram 1 shows theposition after Black 7 inFigure 3 (which in the gamecontinued White 8 at A3, 9at A1...

THRILLING SEMEAI REVISITEDAlex Selby [email protected]

1A

B

CX

X

X

X

DD

DD

DE

E

❏ 1

❍


21

Actually the above exerpt probably doesn'tinclude enough of the surrounding positionas there are potential weaknesses in thewhite wall.The point of White 8 in the diagram is thatWhite is denying Black an eye and then willusually prefer the shape resulting from awhite stone at C rather than a point above asin the game. This sets up an eye vs no-eyesituation with Black being forced to fill A3and A5 himself, which in turn means thatWhite needn't make an approach move at A9 because he can leave Black's A7 libertyto last.There is a case when White wants to playA3, but that's only after Black commitshimself to a no-ko variation. So White A3 tobegin with (as played) seems aji-keshi.Imagine you are White and have just playedmove 8 as in the diagram. This is yourmethod of killing Black unconditionally:1) Don't let Black get an eye. So answer A

at B and vice-versa (miai).2) Play C as soon as Black plays any of the

points marked X.

3) If Black plays C when D1, D7, A1 andA5 are unoccupied then you can throw-inat A1 and if Black B1, you can go A3 andget two eyes.

4) The only time you can't get the A2 shapeis if Black plays B. Answer at A andprepare to play an ordinary no-kovariation, blocking at A3. You should beone liberty ahead.

Black can make a mini-breakout andthreaten White's centre groups, aiming atcuts/ataris at the points marked D andvarious linking threats involving the pointsmarked E. But I think this is OK (though itis not easy to be certain) because then Blackwill only have false-eye connections whichhe will have to fill himself in the attempt togain liberties from the outside. White willthen be at least two liberties ahead in therace, so can afford to spend a move makinga thick shape. For examples see Diagrams 2and 3.

12

3

456

7

❏ 2

12

3

45 67

8 910 1112 13

14 15

16

17

18 1920

21

❏ 3


22

Problem 1

This is very painful. It isfrom my game in Round6 of the Northern GoTournament against LiHaiou, the Chinese 6 danwho went on to win thegold medal. The questionis, what have I (White)overlooked in myreading up to this point?For bonus marks, whatshould White do next?

Problem 2This comes from theRapid PlayTournament on thesecond Saturday. I wasrunning the event, notplaying in it, and so Icould watch a numberof the games. Onegame reached aposition like this (itwas a rapid playevent, so I did nothave time to notedown the full boardposition). Blackplayed A. Can youfind a better move?

Problem 3This comes from the PairGo tournament. Whenwe discovered that therewere only three pairsentered so far, NatashaRegan (1 dan) and I (3dan) hastily enteredourselves as a fourthpair, partly to round outthe numbers, but mostlybecause we scented achance of victory. This isfrom our Round 2 gameagainst Mihoko Isoda (15 kyu) & MasashiSugiyama (2 dan), twoJapanese from Oxford. Ihave shown the completegame record with a fewbrief comments. If youwant to know who

SCALING THE HEIGHTS OF THE MSOTim Hunt [email protected]

1

2

3456

7 8

910

1112

❏ Problem 1

A

❏ Problem 2

Milton Keynes does not reallygo in for tall buildings, so oneof the first things I noticedabout the MSO at UMIST wasthe number of trips I was takingup and down in lifts. The Gowas on the 3rd or 4th floorabove ground level and myaccommodation was on aboutthe 6th. However, everythingwas very close together, startingwith the three minute stroll fromManchester Piccadilly station tothe main playing area, theReynolds building, which wasright next door to the accommo-dation block and the buildingcontaining the student union bar.While the heights of thebuildings were most unlikeMilton Keynes, I did not feelhomesick. Common to both MKand UMIST is the large numberof pieces of sculpture dottedabout. So, walking back fromthe restaurant (and there aremany good ones within 10minutes walk of UMIST) toyour accommodation, you getsurprised by pieces such as ‘aTribute to Vimto’.But I was talking about lifts. Ofcourse, on the Go board, thereare no lifts, there are onlyladders, and most of us knowfrom painful experience howtricky they can be. During thevarious Go events I competed inor watched I noticed threerelatively interesting ladders,and I thought they would makea nice collection of problems forthe Journal.


23

played which move, you need to know thatthe order of play in Pair Go is woman,woman, man, man and you can work it outfrom there.Mihoko and Masashi, knowing that theywere the weakest pair in the tournament,chose to play mirror Go in all their games.This is a reasonable strategy because thenthe 15 kyu player makes dan strengthopening moves. However, that let us create agame of two large moyos, so that whenwe played the tengen at move 15 itwas clearly an excellent move that putsblack a bit ahead.Both 25 and 26 should be at 27.36 is a good move, the plan is to attackthe weak black group and, as it runsaway, to break into the black moyo.This is what happens in the game.42 would be better as a bamboo jointat 54.I would play 45 as the solid connectionat 46 to keep the black moyo intact,and not worry about letting Whitecapture a few stones on the edge,however Natasha has a different styleof play. This is one of the fun thingsabout Pair Go. You get taken intopositions that you would never get intoon your own, which seems like a good

way to learn new things.Black 51 is a really bad mistake by me. If Iplay at 52 instead, the black group easilylives or connects out. When Natasha pointedthis out to me afterwards I said “Doh!”58 is the last mistake in the game, and bringsus to the problem position. Black to play andget out of trouble.The answers are discussed on page 51.

1

23

4

5

6

7

8

9

1011

12 13

14

15

16

17

18

192021

22

2324

2526 27

28

2930

31

32

33

34

35

36

373839

4041

424344

45

46

47

48

49 50

515253

54

5556

5758

❏ Problem 3

Interview with a Go Princessjin.jcic.or.jp/nipponia/nipponia14/cover.htmlYukari Umezawa is a professional player (5 dan) who some of the readers will havemet. She has two web sites in Japanese language that can only be read with a Japanese-supported browser (and knowledge of Japanese). For an interview in English visit thispage from the on-line version of Nipponia magazine. The magazine contains lots offeatures on Japanese life and culture, so the other editions might be of interest too.

Tony Atkins

IN THE LIGHT


24

HOUSTON, WE HAVE A PROBLEM.Four brave Americans blast into spaceAll risking their lives as they reach for the stars.They know that if all goes well, they’ll win the raceTo establish the first human contact with Mars.

Before they had lift-off, the orders were clear:“We’ve checked every system; on that please depend.But if you’ve a problem; when danger you fearThen this is the call for our help you must send:Mission Control! Mission Control!We have a problem here, Mission Control!”

Three months into space, and a problem arises.There’s nothing to do, and the men are quite bored.No music, no TV, no books; it surprisesThat their recreational needs were ignored.

They tried playing checkers, but that was no fun,And bridge led to nothing but partnership strife.At chess it was always the captain that won.He declared that he’d not been so bored in his life.

So:”Mission Control! Mission Control!We have a problem here, Mission Control!”

“We thought that might happen,” the answer soon came,“For the interest of games like chess soon fades away.In a secret compartment we’ve hidden a gameWhich will fascinate, however often you play.

They soon learnt to play with the stones and the ban,But the folks back at Houston forgot that in space,Where the gravity’s nil, there’s a flaw in their plan,As the stones just kept floating all over the place.

So: “Mission Control! Mission Control!We have a problem here, Mission Control!”

The answer came back on the inter-space phone:“Floating stones should not baffle the astronaut mind.Fix a small piece of chewing gum under each stone.”So at sticky Go soon they left kyu grades behind.

Came the time for Mars landing, and soon they were grounded,And for the first time our brave heroes felt scared.By green bug-eyed monsters their craft was surrounded.For this situation they’d not been prepared,


25

So: “Mission Control! Mission Control!We have a problem here, Mission Control!”

“To make friends with these Martians, please, how do we try,For we cannot speak any more Martian than Greek!”“Use American English,” soon came the reply,“That’s what extra-terrestrials usually speak.”

To an underground city our heroes were led.Were they captives? What now did these Martians intend?And the inter-space phone of the captain went deadUnderground; so this time he could no longer send:

“Mission Control! Mission Control!We have a problem here, Mission Control!”

Said the King of the Martians: “I’m longing to learnIf you Earthlings are cultured; do you all play Go?”The captain said quickly: “Please let us returnTo our craft, and our goban and stones there we’ll show.”

When the king saw the ban, he exclaimed with a sneer:“Those 19-line boards we just use for beginners.The standard is 61 lines for us here.Let us play, and see if Earth or Mars are the winners”

So:”Mission Control! Mission Control!We have a problem here, Mission Control!”

Came the answer: “You’ll lose, and they’ll think we’re inferior.Abort; or the US of A will lose face.We must keep up the image that we are superior.Shut hatches; blast off; and come straight back to base.”

To the king said the captain: “We have to leave now.We’ve remembered a dinner date back home on earth.But I’m sure that our Mission Control will allowUs to come back to Mars and show just what we’re worth.”

So:”Mission Control! Mission Control!We have no problem now, Mission Control!”

So what can we learn from this heroic story?Two precepts all astronauts now need to know.If you hope to return from your mission with glory,Speak American English, and LEARN TO PLAY GO!

Francis Roads


Usually the playing strength of a Go player isdetermined by his rank or his rating or both ofthem. Ranks correspond to rather coarsesections, whereas ratings allow for finermeasurements. If a suitable rating scale isavailable, it will then be possible to establishaccurate ranks for selected intervals of it.In principle, the best possible kind of ratinguses a ratio scale, as the Kelvin scale is fortemperature. At least two such scales havebeen suggested for Go (BGJ 124, 2001, pp.42-43), but major basic problems remain fortheir application. Before a satisfactory ratioscale is applied to Go players, it may bereasonable to search for partial solutions. The system discussed here is a recent oneand is shortly described, together with itsresults, at:

holigor.fcpages.com/baduk.htm. It does not deal with the whole range ofplaying strength; in particular, weak playersare not considered at all, even if there is notheoretical lower limit of strength to beobserved.The author of this rating system is Dr. IgorGoliney. He was born in 1960 in Ukraineand graduated there at Kiev State University;in 1989 obtaining his Ph.D. as a theoreticalphysicist. After working in the Kiev Institutefor Nuclear research, he is now active at theNational University of Singapore.Igor Goliney has been kind enough todiscuss with me several points of his systemand even to perform a few tests, inserting inhis system simulated games against playersat the theoretical limits of strengths, such asa perfect winner and a perfect loser. Amongthe following paragraphs, a few are extractedor verbatim copied from his pages, othersderive from our private correspondence,including the results of the simulationmentioned. One of the starting points for this original

rating system has been the need for a morereliable comparison of the relative strengthof Go champions. Everybody knows, forinstance, that the number of Japanese profes-sional players in the 9th rank has greatlyincreased in recent times – even if theybelong to the same and highest rank, theycertainly do not have exactly the samestrength. A connected question is how tocompare the strongest professionals ofdifferent countries, in the absence of asignificant number of international competi-tions.Another starting point has been Goliney’smathematical knowledge, indicating that theusual way for finding exploitable physicallaws consists in the minimisation of suitablefunctions or functionals.With respect to the various ranking systemsproposed, Igor Goliney approaches aconnected but different problem: how to ratethe strongest players in a completelyobjective way, simply on the basis of thegames that they are playing among eachother, without assuming for any player apreliminary value of strength, to be adjustedlater on. The rating table of this system is built by theminimization of the function,

F = " ak (xi – xj – rk)2where

xi and xj are unknown ratings of theplayers.rk is the result of the match, 1 or –1depending on the win or loss of the firstplayer.ak is a coefficient that describes theimportance of the match; for the moment,the only contribution comes from agingof the results, which consists in thedecrease of the coefficients ak in thefunction and is performed on the tourna-ment basis.

26

THE GO RATING SYSTEM OF IGOR GOLINEYFranco Pratesi [email protected]


The formula is ak = 1 – exp(–y)where y is the number of years from thetournament.

Summation is performed over all games inthe database, which includes all resultsfound at

www.kyoto.zaq.ne.jp/momoyama/news/news.html.

These are international tournaments and themajor domestic tournaments in Japan, Koreaand China. Handicap games are not present in thedatabase, and the presence of variousconventional values for komi is not takeninto account; at the moment, it is only amatter of win or loss. It is useful that thestrength of the players selected is not toodifferent – otherwise, the evaluation functionitself would be bad, punishing the strongerplayer.Moreover, for providing a ‘correct’ order forweaker players, it would be necessary tohave games among everybody, whereasweaker players seldom find an opportunityto play with the champions. The actualsituation is thus such that only the strongestplayers can be ordered in a reliable way withthis system. After minimization, the least rating is foundand the whole set is shifted to make it zero;thus all ratings are made positive, and thenare multiplied by 1000 before the finalpresentation. To avoid unreliable situations, a devaluationof the rating of players with few games isimplemented. This has a damping effect onfluctuations of their ratings up to approxi-mately 20 games. Then, in the region 20-40games, fluctuations are yet big enough, butthe damping does not work anymore. For alarger number of games the statistics takesover and the rating becomes more firmlyestablished.The situation as of beginning August 2003(when the database used as source has beeninterrupted, planning only to continue whenthe Japanese masters again achieve world

leadership) is shown in the Table (overleaf)for the first 60 entries.The order of strength established byGoliney’s system is rather different from anyordering expected for the best players.Goliney’s rating system indeed makes theemphasis on the level of player’s opponents– this factor is almost as important as theratio of wins and losses.We usually feel a notable respect for thestrongest players, who have established theirvalue in the course of years. Often, however,a player becomes universally known, and atthe same time approaches the descendingpart of his playing career. On the contrary, this system tends to overes-timate young players with few games buthigh percentage of wins. The system is thususeful to indicate future champions, youngplayers – in several cases yet unknownamong Go fans – who win a few gamesagainst the champions. It thus occurred thatthe high strength of players as Cho U, SongT’ae-kon, Yamashita Keigo, and TakaoShinji were clearly indicated by the system,before their following greatest successes.A possible use of these ratings for correctlydetermining players’ ranks is not immediate.However, if we select a kind of Elo rankswith 75% winning probability for distin-guishing rank partitions, this would corre-spond to a 721-point difference; that is,about the distance between Yi Ch’ang-hoand Rin Kaiho. There are further aspects that we would liketo have available, however, and in particularhow to rate all the players, possiblyincluding such ‘theoretical’ players as theperfect winner and loser – namely playerswho always win or lose against anybodyelse. This system was not built with thispurpose, but its response may be checkedwith input data from simulated games withsuch nominal players.After introducing both a perfect loser and aperfect winner in the existing set of players,the rating difference between perfect winner

27


and loser converges to 1000 points, if thenumber of games between them is largerthan the number of any other games in thedatabase. However, the convergence is slow,as the square root of the game number. If the number of games between the perfectplayers is not large enough, two pools areformed. With respect to the average player,the perfect loser is 1000 points below in thedatabase (because of constant losses),whereas the perfect winner is 1000 pointsabove. The difference between the perfectplayers themselves is about 2000 points.If instead we try and extend the system toinclude all existing Go players, in actualconditions, the range of all the ratings from abeginner to the strongest player can only beroughly estimated to correspond to about50,000. The reason of the increasing interval

has to be searched in the missing gamesbetween players of greatly different strength– these games are not present in the databaseused, but even in actual practice are far fromfrequent.In conclusion, Goliney’s system appears tobe a valid tool, which fulfils its proposedgoal of ordering the playing strength of thestrongest active players. Clearly, the systemis based on a mathematical treatment ofexisting data that cannot be adjusted tofavour one or another player. It thus providesa completely impartial way to order thestrongest players of the world, independentof their career, age, or country. At the same time, our search for a ratioscale, suitable for correctly representing thestrength of all Go players, down to theweakest ones, must go on.

28

No Player rating M-W:L1. Yi Ch’ang-ho 4220.01 238:177-612. Yi Se-tol 4105.46 211:144-673. Kong Jie 4076.01 113:78-354. Wang Lei 4055.25 98:66-325. Cho Hun-hyeon 4013.84 231:152-796. Gu Li 4001.18 105:73-327. Song T’ae-kon 3998.29 66:45-218. Kim Chu-ho 3992.11 33:22-119. Yamashita Keigo 3961.55 155:107-4810. Yu Ch’ang-hyeok 3957.99 206:132-7411. Cho U 3950.75 143:95-4812. Mok Chin-seok 3945.23 137:88-4913. Yu Bin 3923.51 120:72-4814. Yoda Norimoto 3923.08 128:81-4715. Liu Xing 3908.98 55:35-2016. Takao Shinji 3906.64 83:54-2917. Chang Hao 3902.97 166:98-6818. Cho Han-seung 3896.92 107:61-4619. Kobayashi Satoru 3890.07 67:41-2620. Zhou Heyang 3874.94 125:82-4321. Pak Yeong-hun 3842.8 99:60-3922. Hu Yaoyu 3836.67 89:52-3723. Xie He 3836.39 63:39-2424. An Cho-yeong 3825.23 75:38-3725. Mimura Tomoyasu 3825.2 50:31-1926. Cho Chikun 3812.56 214:130-8427. Akiyama Jiro 3810.49 53:32-2128. Hane Naoki 3795.66 162:97-6529. Yamashiro Hiroshi 3785.42 41:25-1630. Wang Xi 3780.25 45:28-17

No Player rating M-W:L31. O Meien 3741.04 172:99-7332. Ding Wei 3728.57 88:50-3833. Kobayashi Koichi 3714.1 150:80-7034. Rui Naiwei 3699.28 124:81-4335. Ch’oe Myeong-hun 3683.23 90:46-4436. O Rissei 3673.51 187:99-8837. Shao Weigang 3664.31 93:48-4538. Ma Xiaochun 3660.17 101:51-5039. Ch’oe Ch’eol-han 3650.62 63:33-3040. Kato Masao 3639.83 136:77-5941. Yun Seong-hyeon 3627.16 46:18-2842. Peng Quan 3626.83 73:41-3243. Yi Sang-hun 3606.44 44:24-2044. Kim Myeong-wan 3601.78 32:19-1345. Yuki Satoshi 3596.67 77:44-3346. Paek Tae-hyeon 3590.19 42:21-2147. An Tal-hun 3583.14 41:20-2148. Dong Yan 3583.06 69:37-3249. Liu Jing 3582.17 73:36-3750. Kiyonari Tetsuya 3581.98 25:13-1251. Rin Kaiho 3579.82 117:61-5652. Nie Weiping 3579.66 62:31-3153. Pak Pyeong-kyu 3577.39 25:13-1254. Huang Yizhong 3571.58 83:44-3955. Komatsu Hideki 3564.75 36:18-1856. Luo Xihe 3564.7 99:51-4857. Yun Hyeon-seok 3547.82 42:18-2458. Kim Shujun 3546.44 41:25-1659. Wang Yuhui 3533.28 55:24-3160. Yun Chun-sang 3521.5 21:11-10


29

Firstly, I must apologise to Matthew Jamesfor replying to his article Thoughts onReading the Spring Journal through thisJournal without contacting him first,however I am not on the net. I have talked about unbounded Go withAntonio Moreno and, perhaps separately,with Pete Langely at the Bristol club sosome of these ideas may well be theirs,though obviously, since I propound themhere, all the errors are mine. There are two concepts that I feel have beenconfused in Matthew's contribution, infinity,and lack of boundaries, the surface of asphere is finite (you can determine its area ifyou know its radius), but unbounded (there'sno edge to fall off). The two are significantlydifferent, because on an infinite board youwould never reach an edge, and would nevercome around behind stones ‘from the otherside’, while the latter condition would beusual on a useably small (eg 19x19)unbounded board.So far as I can tell, there's no need to changeany of the rules of play (rules about the sizeand shape of the board would seem to haveto change, unless they assume a rectangularshape without specifying it) to play oninfinite or unbounded areas, but the effectsof the sides and corners, which generallymake establishing a live group easier, areobviously lost.In the realm of Topology, into which wehave drifted, spheres and lenses are identical,and I'm going to assume from here on thatanything said about a sphere applies equallyto a lens.Mapping a Go board, or any rectangularmesh, onto a sphere is non-trivial, notice thatthe lines of longitude all converge at thepoles, which would make playing second onany of the intersections at or next to the

pole impossible with physical stones (thoughon empty intersections it would be a legalmove). However you may notice that thismakes a cylindrical board quite playable(supposing you can get the stones to stick).By extension, if you visualise the cylinderbending around, so that the north pole joinsup with the south pole, and the lines oflongitude join up with themselves to becomecircles, you have a fat ring (technicallycalled a torus), which has all the requiredproperties; it is finite in area, it has noboundaries, and all the intersections are nearright angles.Even better, it's relatively easy (compared tothe sphere) to make a representation of atoroidal playing surface on a computer screen,since it's the normal playing surface with theborders removed. Obviously, you need to beable to scroll the screen to see whether the thegroup at the top is attacking the group near thebottom, and equally left to right.It's also possible, though probably lessobvious and much more difficult to play on,to make a toroidal board where one line oflongitude joins up with another, making thelines one or more spirals depending uponhow many lines the lines of longitude areoffset from their own other end at the joint. I presume you can also make spirals of thelines of latitude, but I can't visualise that.If someone insists on playing on a sphere, I think the easiest way is probably to make itout of pentagons and hexagons like a soccerball, these can be sectioned into triangles,and these can be further divided into smallertriangles, except at the exact centre of thepentagon the intersections would have 6lines coming in, the centre of the pentagonwould have 5 lines. This would be equiva-lent to playing on a flat board divided intotriangles, with the added problem of it beingunbounded.

UNBOUNDED THOUGHTS

Richard Court


Some people feel that there’s littlepoint looking at professional gamesuntil you’re at least dan strength. Butsome games are worth it for everyonejust because they are fun. You don’tneed a PhD in chemistry to enjoyfireworks.Here’s a fighting game that can beenjoyed by everyone, with a littlenarrative to help kyu-level readers.It’s the first game of the 5-game finalof the 2002 LG Refined Oils Cup.Black is Lee Se-tol 3-dan, the newestteenaged Korean superstar, aged 19when the game was played on4/10/2002. Commentaries on hisgames in Go World emphasise hisenormous fighting strength. White isCh’oe Myeong-hun 8-dan. Komi is 6.5.Figure 1 (1-38): Apparently Ch’oewas in an innovative mood in thisgame. According to the GoGoDdatabase, this is the first game inwhich White 8 has been played inthis fuseki, White 14 is a new movein the joseki in the lower left, andWhite 30 is a new move in the josekiin the upper right.Figure 2 (39-64): Black attacks theweak white group in the upper right,keeping it separate from the whitestones at the top. White only defendswhen he feels he really has to, prefer-ring to take territory as often as hecan. He even takes some more with56, allowing Black to make theattack even more severe with 57.White is making a huge amount ofterritory and Black has almostnothing definitive yet. Will Black beable to get enough out of the attackon the white group?

30

FIREWORKSSimon Goss [email protected]

27 36 26 372 34 29 1

35 3132 28

22 3821

20 19 3018 17 25 3316

158

97 23 5

13 10 24 1411 4 6 312

❏ Figure 1 1 – 38

58 59 6260 56

48 42 40 6154 52 51 47 41 39 57

64 63 5350 46

55 44 4549 43

❏ Figure 2 39 – 64


31

Figure 3 (65-100): Black cross-cutsat 65 and lives in the upper right, butWhite still has around 40 points ofterritory on the upper side. An inter-esting feature of this sequence is thatanother white group has becomequite weak (what happens if Blackpeeps at A?). There’s going to beviolence soon! At the end of thefigure, White returns to looking afterhis weakest group.

Figure 4 (101-128): Notice howBlack doesn’t use cuts to pursue hisattack when he could have (Black 1and Black 15). Instead, he plays in away that makes his own groupbetween White’s two weak ones verystong. The peep at A is looking evenmore interesting now.

92 7491 84 93 94 7381 80

95 79 78 68 6687 77 75 71 67 6589 76 72 70 82

88 85 69 83 10086 90 98 97 99

96

A

❏ Figure 3 65 – 100

22 21

67

1 3 415 2 5 26 25 8 9

19 16 17 14 10 12 11A 27 18 24

13 28

❏ Figure 4 101 – 128 20 at 2; 23 at 17


Figure 5 (129-163): Black makes thepeep and gets a ko. For me, the mostinteresting thing about this game isthat Black answers White’s ko threatat 152 not by answering the threat,but by making a ko threat of his ownelsewhere!Black’s internal ko threat at 155makes the ko bigger, because ifBlack wins it now, he underminesWhite’s territory on the lower side.So now White goes ahead and winsthe ko. But, while he does, Blackgets two moves in a row attackingthe central white group (159 and161). White has about 90 points ofsecure territory and prisoners – Blackmust kill!

Figure 6 (164-207): Here’s how hedoes it. White resigns after Black207.

32

6353 58

52

42 4039 29 3038 31 6135 32 34 5941 33 3646 47 4462 3756 45 49 55

48 51 50❏ Figure 5 129 – 163

43 at 38; ko (at 51): 54, 57, 60

82 7271 83 7367 6670

6964

65 395 86 68 97 2

74 81 89 9679 76 75 80 88 90 91 98

77 78 93 87 92 99 10094 7 5 1 84 85

6 4

❏ Figure 6 164 – 207


Fruit flies like bananas...I remember the tournament when someonefirst showed me a digital Go Clock. It wasone of those clocks that had an amazingnumber of features. You know the type.Press the right button twice and then the leftbutton eight times quickly for such and sucha feature. It was such a pity that come thefirst round the owner had to rush off andfind the manual in order to set the time limit.Not that you can’t go wrong with the oldfashion mechanical clocks1. In a recenttwenty minutes time limit lightning tourna-ment both my opponent and I sat down andnoticed the previous user had kindly set theclocks at twenty past for us. We were justabout to start when we twigged somethingwasn’t quite right.Everyone gets the clock usage wrongoccasionally. In the same tournament a gamewas declared a draw as neither playerspotted whose clock’s flag had dropped first.Even professional players can lose track of agame. On one famous occasion a player wasdeep in thought about ko threats, and eventu-ally on asking the time-keeper whose play itwas got a wrong answer, so he played the koout of turn and lost. The responsibility is forthe player not the timekeeper to know whosemove it is.It is not unknown for both players to besitting there waiting for the opponent to play,because one player has missed the last movemade. Of course the opponent might bespending the time thinking. It is worthchecking whose clock is ticking in thesecircumstances.Getting to grips with clock usage can be alittle daunting to first time tournamententrants, especially if they have never playedwith a clock before. It is of course simple.Go Etiquette says White decides which side

the clock is placed, but before that be sure towind the clocks up, and set the handscorrectly2. Theoretically, the placing of thehandicap stones is the first move. Strictly itshould be White who starts the clocks whenboth players are ready, but this rule is oftenignored and who cares if Black starts theclock. It is also a good idea to check bothclocks are ticking. They say time stands stillwhen one is really concentrating hard, butnot that still.If the clock is not working then get aworking one from the tournament organiser.Do not be tempted to try and play the gameout without a clock. It only takes somethingcomplicated to happen on the board (such asa typical game of Go) and the naturaltendency is to slow down. You will not winany popularity stakes if you end up delayingthe next round3.If your opponent does not turn up soon afterthe start time for that round then inform thetournament director (in case the lack ofopponent is some oversight in the draw).The tournament director will then tell youwhen to start your opponent’s clock, or willstart the clock himself or herself.I wasn’t at the tournament where theorganizer went round starting the clocks forall those late back from lunch, only forsomeone to then point out that setting theclocks first would have been a good idea.If you turn up late for a round, do apologiseto your opponent. If you are a bit flusteredthrough hurrying, then take a few deepbreaths and calm down before starting toplay.At first it can be hard to remember to pressyour clock after each play. It is polite toremind your opponent if they play and forgetto press the clock, but it is each player whohas responsibility for pressing their own

33

DIARY OF A GO PLONKERIan Marsh [email protected]


clock. Eventually pressing the clockbecomes automatic. You will often seeplayers replaying through games seeming tohave a nervous tic as they continue pressinga clock that is no longer there.At least the dreaded curse of ‘tournamentbyoyomi’ 4 no longer affects us. This is oneof the few things known to clear a game ofkibitzers. In ‘tournament byoyomi’ a playerin overtime had to play a stone within somany seconds (typically twenty) and theorganiser needed to find volunteers to countdown the seconds for each player.Nowadays Canadian Overtime prevailswhere a player in overtime must play somany stones in so many minutes. A player inovertime counts out the required number ofstones and resets their own clock. Typicallywhen the last overtime stone is played theovertime procedure is repeated, but in sometournaments the procedure repeats when theclock runs out again.In sudden death games (normally lightningrules), and also when in Canadian Overtimewith overtime stones left to play, if the flagdrops on a player’s clock then the playerloses.

About the same time as my first encounterwith a digital Go clock our Club had enoughplayers working in the same building that Icould run a lunchtime ‘lightning games withsudden death’ league. On one occasion I wassurprised to receive a half finished game foradjudication.Both players had managed to get into timedifficulties, and fearful that their time limitwas about to expire had both passed! All Iwill say is that the adjudication wasn’tfavourable for either player.The hardest thing to do when playing againstthe clock is to use your time well. For mosthigh DFK this is usually no problem astypically games are over quite swiftly.Indeed the general advice for high DFK is toplay lots of games to get a feel for situations,not to sit there trying to read out situationsthat are beyond you. Play at your speed.There is no point sitting there twiddling yourthumbs just because there is time on theclock5. You will know when you havethought about your next move to yourcapability. Eventually a player will find that they arenaturally using up all their time allowance.Now you should be trying to use your timeproductively. Do you use your opponent’stime to think in? Even if you are waiting foryour opponents move in the local fight toread your response, there must be othersituations (or whole board strategy) toconsider. Are you playing at a rate that usesthe time well, so that you don’t get hassledat the end of the game?Everyone develops their own time usagestrategy, but most people leave a timecushion, so when that crucial point (thatseems to occur in nearly every game)happens then you have some time on hand.One lesson most people have to learn is notto speed up when your opponent is in timetrouble. You are just putting yourself in timetrouble as well. Better to think thingsthrough. Though your opponent may be

34

Go on Stampswww.goban.demon.co.uk/go/go_stamps.htmlHarry Fearnley has collected manythings on his web site including hisfamous bestiary of strange positions.This particular page features picturesof some postage stamps from Japan,China and Taiwan, collected from adefunct page, all of which feature Go.The amount of Go varies from a fulldepiction of a board to a game onlypart of a larger scene.

Tony Atkins

IN THE LIGHT


35

thinking in your time their weakness iswhether they are thinking about the sequenceyou are going to play; if not then they willhave limited time to read that linethemselves.Obviously in lightning games your use oftime is important. One thing that variesamong lightning rules is whether you canstop the clock when taking off large numbersof prisoners. During the BGA Congresslightning this is for three or more stones. Itis a good idea to establish what the rules arebefore you start playing, rather then runninginto the problem once the game has started.And Oh, In case you are wondering aboutthe title of this piece, the full quotation is‘Fruit flies like bananas, but time flies likeanything’.

(1) Go Clocks and Chess Clocks are inter-changeable terms, and consist of twoadjacent timers such that stopping one clockstarts the other, and visa versa. Typically, asthe minute hands pass twelve they raise anddrop a flag to indicate the end of the timelimit.(2) For some reason such clocks end uplosing one of their winders or adjustmenthandles, which results in having to move theremaining handles from side to side.(3) Just as likely the tournament director willcurtail your game with both players losing.(4) In professional games byoyomi isdifferent, and anyway professional gameshave an official timekeeper.(5) Most tournaments run an on-going 13x13play-if-you-want-to side-tournament, forplayers who finish early.

Previous issues of this Journal have carriedreviews of Go Professional, Go ProfessionalII, and Go Professional III. These programsused the Go-playing engine written by Dr.Michael Reiss, which competed in interna-tional Computer Go tournaments under thename Go4++. Dr. Reiss was under contractto Oxford Softworks, which later becamepart of Purple Software, and received asalary from them and small royalties foreach copy of his program that they sold.They embellished it with a decorative userinterface and marketed it as Go Professional,and in other ways.However Purple Software recently went intoliquidation and was unable to meet its debts.Dr Reiss was able to retrieve full rights tothe Go-playing engine he had written, and isnow marketing it himself as Go++.Go++ is a program for Windows. It playsGo, and plays it as well as any program;

it does not do anything else. It is notoriouslydifficult to assess the strength of Go-playingprograms, because humans soon becomeaccustomed to their weaknesses, and learnto take advantage of them. Dr. Reiss claimsthat Go++ is about 7-kyu, and supports thisclaim by giving its results against somemembers of North London Go Club. Thesewere, I assume, people who had neverplayed against it before. I tested it myself bygiving it nine handicap stones on a fullboard, with it set to its maximum playingstrength, and I beat it comfortably (I am 2kyu on the European Rating List). I hadnever played Go++ before, but I haveplayed its predecessor Go4++ in its variousincarnations, and therefore know somethingof its weaknesses. I also tested it by playingit on KGS, against a KGS 3-kyu. He gave itonly two handicap stones, and onlynarrowly beat it. It was interesting for me tosee how he treated it with respect, in

REVIEW OF GO++Nick Wedd [email protected]

❍


36

positions where I, knowing it weaknesses,would have bullied it mercilessly.I will not describe Go++’s weaknesses here,as to do so would reduce its value topurchasers who are looking for a challengingprogram to play.It has options of 19 by 19, 13 by 13, and 9 by 9 boards; You can get it to play asBlack or as White, but not as both, and youcan set the handicap and the komi. You canset it to any of five playing strengths, eachabout 1 grade apart. At its fastest setting, ittakes less than a second a move. At itsslowest setting, on my 1 GHz system, itaverages under half a minute a move.It only uses Japanese rules, with their fixedplacement of handicap stones. The userinterface is clean, simple, and easy to use. Itdoes not use a clock – its human opponentcan play as slowly as they like. It can recordpartly-played games for re-loading later, butit does so in ‘Ishi’ format, rather than themore widely used SGF format.Go++ (formerly known as Go4++) hasentered many international Computer Go

Tournaments, and in the last five years hasnever been placed below third in one. Itsmain rivals have been Many Faces of Go,and GoeMate. The latest versions of thesethree programs all have good chances ofbeating one another, but it is only Go++whose latest version is available topurchasers. The 2002 version of Many Facesof Go offers many more features than Go++,and costs US $89.95. GoeMate is notavailable to purchasers, but its ancestorprogram HandTalk is available at US $60, orUS $50 for a DOS version. So Go++ is notonly the strongest-playing program that isavailable to the public, it is the leastexpensive of the strong programs.Go++ is available from the web site

www.goplusplus.comfor US $35, which at the time of writing is£21.66. EU residents have to add VAT tothis. You can pay on-line by credit card indollars or sterling, and download it immedi-ately, or receive it on CD for an additional£4.94. It runs only on Windows.

In an article titled An Ethical Problem thatappeared in the last issue of this Journal, IanMarsh discussed this position.

The first thing he discussed was whetherBlack can kill the white group by playing atA. He concluded that he can’t, the whitestones are all alive. He then discussedwhether, knowing this, it is ethical for Blackto play at A anyway.I disagree that there is any issue of ethics, orof honesty, involved here.Let us consider the various beliefs Blackmay have about this position.1) Black is unsure whether he can kill

anything. In this case, he can’t be blamedfor having a try.

2) Black believes (falsely, as it happens) that

NOT REALLY AN ETHICAL PROBLEM

Nick Wedd [email protected]

❏ 1

AB

C

❍


37

he can kill something. In this case,he certainly ought to try to do so.

3) Black knows that he can’t killanything if White answerscorrectly, but thinks there is achance that she will make amistake. For instance, he maythink it is possible that she willanswer A at C instead of at B. Inthis case again, he ought to have atry. Some people claim that youought to play as if you believe thatyour opponent’s play will beperfect – but they don’t mean it. If theydid, they would resign at move 1whenever they were White in a handicapgame.

4.) Black knows that he can’t kill anything,because he knows that White will answerall his moves correctly. In this case, heought not to play at A. The reason hasnothing to do with ethics, only withwasted ko threats.

So, I conclude, whether Black plays at Ashould be governed by his evaluation of the

position, and by his view of White’s likelyresponses. Ethics, and honesty, do not comeinto it.Diagram 2, on the other hand, is a positionin which honesty is an issue.Black is to play. He counts (the rest of theboard is not shown), and concludes that heneeds to kill the whole White left corner towin. A looks like a promising start. Howeverafter that, W b4 B d2, W e2 threatens both toconnect out, and to help achieve life in thecorner.So Black considers starting with B. If Whiteignores this, or blocks it to the right, thenBlack A will kill the corner. But this won’twork – White will surely answer B byblocking to the left and securing her corner.A better plan is to start by peeping at C.White will of course connect. Then Blackcan play B, and there is a good chance thatWhite will assume that this threatens torescue the stone at C somehow (it doesn’t,and even if it did saving the corner would bebigger) and will block to the right. Black hasachieved his objective of drawing her eyesaway from the weak corner. Now he canplay A and set about killing the corner.Now, this is definitely dishonest. Black’sobjective in starting with C has nothing to dowith playing good moves, it is solelyconcerned with misleading his opponent.Whether it is also unethical depends on one’spersonal ethics.

AB C

❏ 2

European Go Politicswww.european-go.org/executive/news.htmWhat do they talk about for so long atthe European Go Federation AGM?Well the answer can be found byvisiting the Executive news pages onthe EGF site. Recent meeting minutesand reports can be found there, alongwith things like a list of useful ideasfor promoting Go in a country (basedon BGA practice) and a description ofthe major tournaments that a countrycan host for the EGF.

Tony Atkins

IN THE LIGHT


One of the first things you notice if you visitSeoul are various eccentricities of exteriorplumbing and wiring, and the call of thebrown-eared bulbul. At least, you do ifyou’re Matthew Macfadyen. Being one ofthose who only distinguish three kinds ofbird call – caw, tweet and quack – I wouldn’thave known that this particular tweet camefrom a brown-eared bulbul. But Matthewwas quite sure of it, and indeed the creaturewe eventually spotted in a tree in a park wasbrown, had wings and a beak, and saidtweet. I didn’t notice ears, but Matthewknows a lot about these things, and I’m surehe’s right.Early this Summer, the International GoFederation announced that this year’s WorldAmateur Go Championship, due to beplayed in Japan, was cancelled because ofthe risk of SARS, but that the Korean BadukAssociation was planning an alternativeworld championship event. The 1st IncheonWorld Amateur Baduk Championship was it.Matthew was the UK’s playing representa-tive, and I was there as a guest official.If you have heard of Incheon at all, it maybe because it’s the name of Seoul’s airport.In fact, though, Incheon is a city of 2.6million people and growing. Its mayor andcouncil intend to develop it to be an interna-tional free-trade area comparable with HongKong and Singapore, and it became clearvery quickly that one of the reasons forholding the event there was to place Incheonon people’s mental map. The Incheon CityCouncil was one of the main sponsors of theevent. Dinners were given by the mayor ofIncheon, the City Council and the IncheonChamber of Commerce.Incheon has one of the stadiums where the2002 football World Cup was played, and

the championship was played at this stadiumin reception rooms overlooking the pitch.(While we were there, we watched the firsthalf of a match between Oman and Nepal ina qualifying group for the 2003 Asian Cup.)The tournament system was different fromthat of the World Amateur Go Championship(WAGC). There was a 6 round Swiss tourna-ment for all participants, followed by a 2round knockout for those winning the topfour places in the Swiss. The first round ofthe Swiss was seeded according to theplacings of the countries in last year’s worldamateur, and the draw after the first roundwas random. As a result, the first roundconsisted largely of foregone conclusions forthe strongest players, and at the end of round6, there was one player on 6/6, and nine on5/6, so three of those nine found their wayinto the final by virtue of SOS and SOSOStiebreaks.Four players were clear favourites to reachthe final. Japan was represented by one ofthe very few amateur 8 dans. Korea wasrepresented by a very strong 20-year-oldwho had been through the professionaltraining but not quite made it. He was nowtoo old to become professional by thenormal route, but would be allowed to if hewon this championship – a final lifeline thatput him under enormous pressure. Chinasent a past WAGC winner and Taiwanfielded a 7 dan.It didn’t go quite as expected. The randomdraw matched China against Japan in round 3. Japan won and this damaged theChinese player’s SOS so badly that hecouldn’t recover, though he won all his othergames. He ended up in 5th place. In round 4,Taiwan was drawn against Korea. Itappeared that Taiwan was winning, but

38

THE 1ST INCHEON WORLD AMATEUR BADUK CHAMPIONSHIPSimon Goss [email protected]


Korean rules oblige you to fill in the damebefore passing, and while doing that, theTaiwanese put one of his own groups intoatari. Both players were greatly upset bythis, but that was how it was played, and sothe Taiwanese lost. He lost to China in round6 too, and ended up in 8th place.So the field was open for some mere 6 dansto get into the final four, and these placeswere taken by 23-year-old Emil Nijhuis fromthe Netherlands and Dmytro Bogatskyy fromthe Ukraine. Neither could beat their Asianopponents in the semi-finals, so the expectedJapan-Korea final happened. To me, itseemed a rather staid game, with nothingvery dramatic on the surface and all theissues based on the unplayed sequences thata mere 2 dan can’t see. But it was exciting,partly because of the importance of thisgame to the Korean’s future career, andpartly because, late in the game, the profes-sional giving the live commentary had acompletely different view of who was aheadfrom the one giving theInternet commentary.Their counts differed byabout 10 points.In the end, Japan wonthe game by half a point.So the Korean,Junghwan Kim, will notbecome professional.Life can be very harshfor a young Go player atsuch exalted levels.Matthew Macfadyentook 19th place with 4/6– a respectable result forthe UK, but Matthewwill be disappointed. Hedid the necessary againstweaker players, beatingUruguay (1 dan), Italy(3 dan), Serbia andMontenegro (5 dan) and

Thailand (4 dan). But something went wrongon Tuesday. Against Brazil (5 dan) Matthewhad a clearly won game but neglected tomake two eyes for a very large group. Then,in a very close, exciting game againstCzechia (Vladimir Danek, 6 dan), he rippedhimself off in the late endgame and lost.What does a guest official do at events likethis? The official invitation says that they‘act as supervisors and counsellors for theplayers’. Well, Matthew doesn’t actuallyneed any supervision or counselling, thoughan early morning alarm call seemed to us tobe a useful precaution. The best descriptionof our duty is to network. This was clearlyimportant to the organisers, who invited anunusually high number of guest officials.The UK, Germany, the Netherlands and theUSA sent their presidents, and it wasespecially valuable for me to get to knowthem and exchange ideas about wherewestern Go is going. Japan sent OkadaShinichiro, professional 7 dan. China and

39

Matthew Macfadyen playing Vldimir Danek (Czechia, 6 dan) inround 4. The game got into an early fight. Matthew hasalready lost a few stones near his left elbow, and there’s nowa ko semeai on his side. Matthew has just taken the ko.


Russia sent officials, and the tournamentbooklet also lists officials from Hong Kongand the Philippines, though I saw neither.The reason for inviting so many guestofficials, I think, is to do with the history ofthe International Go Federation, whichorganises the World Amateur GoChampionship. This has been held in Japanalmost every year, and an offer to host it inKorea one year was declined. Clearly, and inmy view justifiably, Korea wants to play apart in the organisation of international Gothat is more in proportion to its significancein the Go world. Another major sponsor ofthe event was the Hankuk Kiwon (KoreanBaduk Association), which hosted anothervery lavish dinner, gave us a guided tour onthe free day, and gave everyone copies of the2003 Baduk Yearbook and of a book calledSpeed Baduk for Beginners, about which Ishall say more in a minute.So I think the reason to invite so many guestofficials was to show us how committedKorea is to international amateur Go andwhat a grand job they can do of organisingan event like this. They certainly can. Thevenue was superb –comfortable, well-lit andhigh-status – and thehospitality generous tothe point of extrava-gance. They warned usto expect some glitchesin this first year, andthere were one or twominor ones, but nothingmajor, and they askedfor suggestions forimprovements and tookwhatever was saidseriously.You may have noticedthat this event was notcalled the 25th WorldAmateur Go

Championship, even though it could havebeen. The 25th WAGC was cancelled, andthis was the 1st Incheon World AmateurBaduk Championship. We were told thatthere will be a second one next year, eventhough the 26th WAGC is already scheduledfor Japan. Finances have already been foundfor the second Incheon WABC, and theintention is to continue in future years.What’s going on?The professional circuit already has severalevents that are called world championships,and none of these over-arches the others.What I hope is going on is that the samekind of thing is now coming to the amateurworld, and that both the World Amateur GoChampionship (usually, perhaps always, inJapan) and the World Amateur BadukChampionship (in Korea) will both runannually, with equal status, cooperationregarding dates, and IGF encouragement andpublicity for both. Whether this will happenremains to be seen, and it was too soon toask for definitive positions just yet. But suchfeelers as I could put out got rather positiveresponses and I think it’s feasible. It is

40

Simon playing a 9-year-old 1 kyu


encouraging that Japansent a top-notch playerand a professional guestofficial.There were opportunitieswhile there to see a littleof Korean youth baduk.On the first day, while theplayers were playing afriendship match I wasintroduced to three peopleto play friendly gameswith. One was a 3 dan ofabout my own age, one an11-year-old 2 dan and onea 9-year-old 1 kyu.What first struck meabout the children wastheir calm demeanour,good manners and the even pace at whichthey played. Each move took somewherearound 10-15 seconds. There was no instant,careless banging down of stones, but neitherwere there any long, strenuous efforts. Itseemed to me that in general they knewwhere they thought the game was going,knew the shapes, and weren’t trying to lookfor things that might be beyond their field ofvision or not be there at all. Two or threetimes, in each of these games, the boysstopped and took a little longer over a move,perhaps a minute or so. The times when theydid this were when a fight had been playedout and it was time for a strategy review.Someone I mentioned this to afterwardsthought they might have been counting. I don’t know whether this guess is correct,but it makes sense.Korean baduk players have a reputation for astyle that is very aggressive and violent. Ididn’t see that in these games. The 11-year-old played nothing that I could recognise asunreasonable. His play seemed to me to beas natural as breathing. I felt that he was alittle stronger than me. Just before the yose

began, I blundered, but I thought he wasgoing to win by a few points anyway. The 9-year-old was more focussed on killing thanon territory, but his attempts at killing wereperfectly realistic. What he went for, he got.If anything, I’d say he wasn’t quite aggres-sive enough; he left me too much time toturn my moyo into territory, reducing it toocautiously and never invading.One afternoon, while round 4 of the tourna-ment was being played, the guest officialswere taken to visit the largest of Korea’sbaduk schools. This one has around 300pupils from as young as six years old. Theygo to the school every weekday, starting at 3in the afternoon, after their mainstreamschool finishes, and continuing till 9 in theevening. Some pupils who are considered tohave special talent have dispensation toleave their mainstream schools at middayand go early to the baduk school. Pupils whocome from outside Incheon can attend asweekly boarders; this also starts from agesix. The school willingly enrolls beginners,and has several 25 kyus. It has alreadycreated several professionals.

41

Baduk school. The children are from 1 to 3 dan. Sitting onthe floor is Okada Shinichiro, pro 7-dan from Japan.


We were shown round the school and sawseveral activities going on. In one room, fourchildren who had already become profes-sionals (aged about 15, I guessed) werestudying together. In a second, some 13-year-olds were sitting by themselves playingthrough professional games. They wereplacing the moves about as quickly as theycould find them in the book, but wouldoccasionally put the book down and examinethe position for a while. In a third room,some children of mixed ages between about9 and 13, all of them between 1 dan and 3 dan, were playing games in their monthlyleague. In a fourth, some very youngchildren were working through a workbookfull of life-and-death problems. I sneaked alook at a copy that wasn’t being used, andthe level seemed to be about the same asGraded Go Problems for Beginners volume2 or 3 – in other words, not beginnerproblems. The children mark their answer toeach problem on the diagram, and the bookis handed in to the teacher for correction.Our old friend Seong-June Kim was one ofthe volunteers helping to run the champi-onship, and I had several opportunities tospend time with him. On the free day, heextracted me from the excursion and tookme to another baduk school, where he willalso teach English. His idea was that Iwould have a session with both childrenand parents, but it was morning and nochildren were there. However, I had asession with several mothers and theschool’s baduk teacher (amateur 5-dan),who played a game with me afterwards andcompletely thrashed me.One of the mothers asked me whether itwould be possible to arrange visits forchildren. Seong-June later explained to methat many Koreans like to send their childrenfor short visits abroad as part of theireducation, and that she was asking whetherwe could manage something like that.

It might perhaps be organised as exchangevisits, or in some other way. I promised tolook into it, and would be grateful forsuggestions about how we might go aboutarranging such a thing.The school that Seong-June took me to hasthe same series of workbooks that we saw inthe big school, and I asked Seong-June aboutthem. There are 20 or so volumes, from afirst introduction for complete beginnersupwards. Seong-June now works for thepublisher, Oro Media, and is translatingthem into English. The Speed Baduk forBeginners book that everyone received fromthe Hankuk Kiwon is the first of these trans-lations, which I understand will eventuallycover the whole series. When I asked to buythe first few volumes for evaluation, therewere no English copies available, but Seong-June very generously gave me the first fourvolumes in Korean.The books are organised into chapters, eachof which has an introductory explanation ofsome technique, typically using fourdiagrams with short explanatory text,followed by about 20 problems that illustratethat technique. The learning curve isextremely gentle; if you’ve grasped whatwas in all the previous chapters, the nextchapter will be very easy. The philosophyseems to be that, if it’s worth learningsomething, it’s worth learning it thoroughly,and there’s no need to rush things. I have thefeeling that the consistency, naturalness ofstyle and even pace of my two youngopponents may have come from this. And Ialso think it significant that the country thatis using this gently-paced, systematiclearning approach is producing teenagersthat can take on 9 dans on even terms(today’s crop of newly-qualified professionalshodans can do that, we were told). I shallbuy and read the remaining volumes withvery great interest.

42


43

There’s capturing race in the bottomright corner. White actually played A,but resigned next move after Blackreplied at B. First, what is the continu-ation after White A, Black B? Second,can you find a better move for White? The answer is discussed later in this article.Figure 1 shows the game a little earlier, at move140. It’s from the 28th Shin’ei tournament (1997)between Yamada Noriyoshi 7 dan (Black) andKenmochi Jo 5 dan (White). Broadcast on TVTokyo, the commentary was by Kiyonari Tetsuya9 dan with assistance from Okada Yumiko 4 dan.The ‘New Stars’ tournament features lesser-known, but up-and-coming players. Okada issupporting Kenmochi, who is a fellow disciple ofher father Abe Yoshiteru. Kiyonari is relativelyneutral, but he’s from Osaka like Yamada. If the bottom right all becomes black territory,White is clearly behind, so just playing simpleendgame moves is not going to be enough. Hehas to try and make complications. Whiteattaches with 1 to stir up trouble. Black resists with 2 in Figure 2. Black cannotjust defend passively and give way: the game willbecome close if he does that. With the moves upto 14, White succeeds in separating Black into

THRILLING SEMEAI GAMES ~ PART TWORichard Hunter [email protected]

1

Figure 1 Move 140 of the game

Figure 2 1 – 14 (140 – 153)

1

A

BProblem 1 White to play

several groups, but they all lookstronger than the white group. It’s difficult to see how White can maketwo eyes, so he must attack something:the corner? the right side?

12

3 45

6A

78

910 1112

13

14


44

Black 2 in Figure 3 is a good move. Playing2 at 3 would leave Black without eyes in thecorner.

With 8, Black lives safely in the corner, but8 is not the best move: it’s better to fill aliberty by playing one line above. Whitepushes through with 9 and shuts Black inwith 15. The black stones on the right do nothave two eyes, so this is now a capturingrace. What is the status?When Black plays atari with 1 in Figure 4,White cannot connect. If White 2 at 3, Whiteloses the capturing race. Please check thisfor yourself. White 2 looks like it might turninto a useful diagonal move tesuji. Whiteplays a ko threat with 4 and Black answersat 5. The bottom right corner was potentialblack territory anyway, so if White can getcompensation in the form of an unansweredko threat, he can afford to lose his stones inthe bottom right. Black 7 is another mistake.It’s better to play 7 at 14 (see Diagram 1).White gains liberties by connecting at 14.White finally connects the ko with 20 toensure that the black stones are cut off.White answers Black 25 (B1 in Problem 1)with 26, but resigns after Black 27. Actually,Black 27 is not the best move, but it’s goodenough. It’s actually better to push throughthe bamboo joint first.

Diagram 1: Instead of 7 in Figure 4, Blackshould play 1 here. White must connect at 2

1 23 45

6

7

8

910 11

121314

15

Figure 3 1 – 15 (154 – 168)

1

2

3

4 5

789

1011

13

14

1617

212223

24

25

26

27Figure 4 1 – 27 (169 to 195)

6, 15, 18: ko at 312, 19: ko right of 9

20: connects at 3

12

345

67

9

10

1213

15

17

18

19

20

2122

23

❏ 1 Black wins 8, 11 ko


or he’ll lose all his potential liberties at thebottom if Black cuts at 2. The Black 1 –White 2 exchange reduces White’s liberties.With the moves up to 23, Black wins.

Answer to Problem 1.Diagram 2 shows the moves that Kiyonarigave as the likely continuation if the gamehad not ended. White loses the race.

Instead of 7 and 9, White could fill libertiesin the center with A and B, but White cannot

play from the inside at 12 because of hisshortage of liberties. It should be clear thatWhite attacked the wrong end of the group.Instead, he should have started from theother side with 1 in Diagram 3.

White wins this according to Kiyonari. PoorKenmochi: he finally had a winning positionfor a while at the end, right up until his finalmove. Although the whole fight was unrea-sonable for White from the beginning, Blackmade several mistakes that lost liberties andthey eventually accumulated into anadvantage for White, who then made thefinal error.Well, you may know the feeling. In Go, itdoesn’t matter who makes the first mistake.What matters is who makes the lastmistake.White 3 forces Black 4. Next, White5 is good. If Black fails to capture with 6,he’ll get caught in a snapback. Next, Whiteplays 7 in the center. White must not play 7(or 5) at B. Although a string of ataris looksforcing, White is filling his own liberties.After 11, we see that the marked white stoneis indeed a classic diagonal tesuji, forcingBlack to make an approach move at 12.Next, White 13 is atari and Black is caughtin a ‘connect and die’ situation. The bestBlack can do is play A. This saves some

45

1

2

34

5

67

8

9

10

11

12

13A

B

❏ 3 White wins

1

2

3

45

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

A

B

❏ 2 White loses

My Italian Diarywww.nihonkiin.or.jp/kishihp/shigeno/index-e.htmYuki Shigeno will be a familiarprofessional to many, as she lives inItaly and has visited the UK severaltimes. This site contains 30 or sotranslations of reports she wrote for aJapanese Go magazine. They tell ofmany aspects of her life as a Goprofessional living in the west, andhow she has coped with Western Goplayers and Western life.

Tony Atkins

IN THE LIGHT


46

black stones on the side because Whitecannot connect at B. But Whitecaptures the six black cutting stones inthe middle, so he gets his own stonesout of trouble. This would put Whiteahead.After White 1 in Diagram 2, White canswitch to 3 in Diagram 4 and savesome stones, but it’s too late to helpWhite win the game. Black sacrificestwo stones on the side to avoid losingliberties by connecting. Instead hepushes through the bamboo joint with6. White cannot connect at 8 becauseof this shortage of liberties, so Blackconnects out with 8, capturing thestones on the left. After 9 we can seethat both White 1 and Black 2 havebeen played on pretty unimportantpoints.This was an exciting game to watch.Play out the moves and study the variousoptions during the capturing race. You will

find a wealth of interesting examples in thisgame. An sgf file can be downloaded fromthe BGA web site.

1

2

3

45

6

7

8

9

10

❏ 4 Black wins the game

The Northern was the British tournament inthe Fujitsu European Grand Prix. Attendancewas up at 68, but there were few fromoverseas due to a clash with the ObayashiCup in Amsterdam. Surprise winner was aKorean student called Ju, who beat MatthewMacfadyen before leaving early to catch aflight. Macfadyen and Cocke were the nextbest placed, but Macfadyen did win theimpromptu lightning tournament on theSaturday. Andrew and Alison Jones won thePair Go qualifier beating MatthewMacfadyen and Kirsty Healey, to earn a tripto Japan.Milton Keynes was a four-way tie betweenYoung Kim, Des Cann, Harold Lee andFrancis Roads. Matthew Macfadyen won theGo ban trophy at Shrewsbury and also the110 player Wessex. On 29th October Harold

Lee was interviewed on BBC’s Tomorrow’sWorld, whilst playing a Go program. Mrs. Suguyami and Miss Inoue, two profes-sionals from Japan, visited London andcommented on a Zhang-Macfadyen titlegame, played simultaneous and were inter-viewed for the BGJ. The ladies were on theirway to D¸sseldorf, where during a Japaneseweek the final of the Women’s Kakusei titlewas played; Kobayashi Chizu beat YoshidaMika. In the associated tournament ShutaiZhang was second behind Park Sang-Nam.In Japan Kobayashi Koichi won the Meijinfor the sixth time, beating Otake, and Katotook the Oza title from Fujisawa Shuko.Yoda Norimoto won the TV Asia Cupbeating Lee Chang-Ho of Korea, Nie Wei-Ping of China and Seo Bong-Soo of Koreain the final.

TEN YEARS AGO



Having decided that my mother, Pauline, andI would go to the EGC this year, St.Petersburg’s 300th anniversary, the first taskwas to work out how to get there. One of thecheapest routes appeared to be to fly toFinland and get the train from Helsinki. Thismeant we could fit in an extra couple of daysseeing something of Finland. To make thingsbetter, the Finns organised a mass trainbooking which we were able to join.When we discussed our plans with friendsMatti and Sinikka Siivola (5d & 8k) theyoffered us not only accomodation but also aguided tour so all was looking good.Getting the visas was tedious but straight-forward. We had to register with theCongress, pay the deposit and then emailtravel agency Monomax in St. Petersburgdetails for them to fax me a “visa invita-tion”. Unfortunately the visa invitation is inRussian (Cyrillic letters) and when theyarrived on my work fax they were thrownaway as junk faxes! On the third attempt, acover sheet with “FOR STEVE BAILEY” intwo inch high letters did the trick and theinvites were received. Now the visa regula-tions for Russia specify one photo, yourpassport, lots of travel details, the invitationsand £30 but not as a cheque. In the end Isent real £10 notes and wrote the serialnumbers on the application forms. Theyturned up a week later, in time for me to goto Glastonbury, where I saw a stall sellingwooden games including Go sets, withoutany worries.The flight to Helsinki was more interestingthan usual as they had a camera in the noseand underbelly of the plane so you couldwatch the runway as you took off and landedand look straight down as you flew – a niceidea. Matti and Sinikka met us at the airportand on the first day showed us the Sibeliusmonument; all the official buildings in

Helsinki (city population 500,000); thebeautiful underground church made as agranite and copper structure; St Mark’sCathedral and the church where they weremarried, St. Laurence. On the second day wetook a boat trip from the harbour (andmarket) to an large island fort where we sawthe sights and swam in the sea.The train trip to St Petersburg (StP in future)lasted 5 hours, 1 hour being stationary at theborder. For most of the journey the view wasof fir trees and yet more fir trees. The firstgame of pits of the congress was played inthe restaurant car to get us in the right moodfor the fortnight. At the border the Go partymanaged to pick up two more Go players,Frank and Marilyn from the US who had gotthe date on their visas wrong and beendenied entry to Russia on the previous day.At midday we arrived at StP, the mostnortherly city with a population over1,000,000 (I believe it to be about5,000,000), where we were met by theuniversity mini bus. Whilst they worked outthat there were too many of us to fit, andprocured a taxi for the excess playersPauline got tired of standing in the heat andgot into the mini bus to sit down. Suddenlythere is a shout of “Should that old lady begetting into the bus?”, but yes, she plays Go.A hot journey through StP gave us a brieftaste for the wonders of the city centre andthe drabness of the southern suburbs. Thenwe were on the main coastal highwayheading to Peterhof, 25 km to the west ofStP, looking at pleasant buildings and prettyparks with multitudes sun bathing andswimming in lakes. After 90 minutes wereach the Congress site.Some EGC’s have registration marvellouslyorganised, some do not and unfortunatelythis was a ‘do not’. But after 4 hours we hadregistered our passports, paid the fees and

47

EGC 2003, ST PETERSBURGSteve Bailey [email protected]


obtained our room key. We were too fatiguedto get our photos taken for the congressname badges and in the end we neverbothered to get them at all.Now the standard answer to the classicquestion “How was your holiday?” has nowbeen determined as “Outstanding!”. Some ofit, the palaces, tourism, public transport andfood were outstandingly good. Some of it,telephones, buying postcards and stamps,English language newspapers and in particu-lar the accomodation were outstandingly bad– “Dire” is a polite way of describing it. Wewere housed in a high rise block of flats withpot holes in the corridors inside. Fortunatelythe kitchen light bulb was broken so wedidn’t have to use the room. The bathroomwas “interesting” but that at least made thebedroom with its small beds with horsehairmattresses and sheets that were too smallseem OK. The water from the taps ranbrown with rust for the first five minutesevery morning and we might well have triedto change to better accomodation if there hadbeen any and if we weren’t “saved” by theflat being a very rare one with a fridge and awashing machine. We survived it.That first hot evening we managed to missthe opening ceremony due to the time it hadtaken to register but werein time for the buffet.There was a limitedsupply of ‘normalbeverages’ yet an almostlimitless supply of vodka– reputed to act as a goodmosquito repellent. Latermany congregated at anoutdoor cafe (a marqueein a car park on theoutskirts of the site with aBBQ doing ‘meat’) fordrinks and pits andcongenial conversation.The accomodation wasB&B, so the Sunday

morning introduced us to the delights of aRussion breakfast in the university canteen.A typical breakfast was a plate of coleslawwith sugar on, a cup of tepid water with atea bag, a lady shouting “Ticket”, a slice ofbrown bread laced with vinegar and a plateof cold rice with a schnitzel. It seemed morelike lunch. In the adjacent building was the‘Bankomat’ – a nice name – which gaveRoubles using a British bank card from 8 til7 with no difficulty at all.The Russians planned that the first roundwould start two hours later than all the otherrounds at 12:00. Unfortunately even thatwasn’t enough and we started playing at13:00 only to be told to stop at move 15 at13:10. The super group was wrong so theentire draw was being redone and a newdraw appeared for 15:00. That secondevening six of us (2 Swedes, 2 Brits, aNorwegian and a German) braved the publictransport to go into Peterhof town to aproper restaurant with nice decor and silverservice. A delicious meal including wine foronly £10 a head. Public transport is good,even if occasionally frightening. At a busstop you rarely have to wait longer than 5minutes for a bus or mini-bus to come along.All appear to be owner-operated vehicles

48

Samson Fountain at the Summer Palace in Peterhof

Photo: Steve Bailey


(some used to be Austrian Post-buses)presumably doing the route with a licencefrom the council. The fares are fixed and inthe minibus you get on, sit down and as itspeeds along people pass money forward tothe driver who sorts the change out andpasses it back whilst driving. Some passen-gers gather the money as it passes by andtake the opportunity to split a large noteinto many small ones and it seems chaotic– yet it works well. After our meal westrolled round the lake and viewed thelocal cathedral (later nicknamed the ginger-bread church due to its style). When wereturned to site it was late (23:30) but weflagged a passing bus down as it was goinghome and asked if he went to the univer-sity. He said no but then said “How many”.We said “Six” and he said “Yes” and wehad our own hijacked bus all the way backto the Congress.This review is mostly about the people andthe tourism. From my point of view the Gowas a minor part of the holiday. In the end Imanaged 4 out of 10 as did Pauline. Beingthe 300th anniversary of the founding of StPthey have done up many of the palaces(though there are many more left torenovate). During the fortnight we wereimpressed by the magnificence of Peterhof:the formal gardens and fountains; theinformal wooded parks, the Grand palace;the Cottage palace; the small ‘palaces’ suchas Marly and the Peterhof Hermitage. In StPwe were impressed by the many palaceexteriors; the incredible magnificence of theWinter palaces including Catherine theGreat’s Hermitage with its vast art collec-tions and so over the top gilt rooms; thechurches and cathedrals – amazing outsideand doubly so inside. Generally the localshad worked out most ways of persuadingyou to part with your cash including horserides along Nevsky Prospekt (Oxford Street).But for some reason they hadn’t got to gripswith postcards. Only very rarely could youbuy one card, mostly you had to buy a pack

of 16 and nowhere sold stamps. In the endwe gave our postcards to Wayne Walterswho only came for the first week and askedhim to post them from the UK!Being good tourists we dutifully found andadopted a nice jazz cafe in StP which didgood food and had shaded tables on thepavement. We tried the hydrofoil boat fromPeterhof to StP – smooth and comfortableonce we had coped with the bureaucracy ofgetting a ticket and finding a boat thatwasn’t reserved for a tour group. Weindulged in the StP Metro – very cheap, 15pper ride – just buy a token and the trainscome every two or three minutes. Thestations are deep and airy with magnificentdecor including granite pillars. It turns out that Russian isn’t that differentfrom other European languages, it is justwritten using Cyrillic. A fine hobby wasconverting letters to their phonetic form andthen often the word made sense (“pyb”sound like “roob”, short for Roubles). Wedid have problems with lunches in the cafein building 16 at the campus. Initially allwas fine as the food was displayed in chillercabinets and you could point to what youwanted cooked. Eventually we got a littlemore adventurous and tried to order thingswe had seen other Russians eat. We thoughtwe had asked for pasta and meat stew, wegot macaroni cheese. Then next day webrought our pocket Russian phrase book inand showed the staff the chapter on “food”.As we pointed to an item they would shaketheir heads and say “Nyet”. Then theystarted flicking through the chapter andstarted smiling before they burst into fits oflaughter. I’ve no idea what the phrase booksaid but I wonder if it could have been “Myhovercraft is full of eels”?There were very few Brits at the congress.We were disappointed when Wayne Waltersfailed to arrive at the start of the first week.But he did arrive on the Monday havingsuffered a cancellation due to the Heathrow

49


baggage handlers strike on the Saturday. Hehad booked a single room but was forced toshare with a strong Asian player. Towardsthe end of Wayne’s week, he lost his glassesand amazingly he found his co-habiter hadbeen wearing them for two days! The European Go federation AGM is held atthe end of the first week of the congress andI was the British representative. This yearwas much better organised than in someprevious years and the meeting only lastedsix hours, finishing at 24:15 on Friday night.The most interesting vote was for thelocation of the 2007 congress which went tothe town of Villach in Austria. One pointraised during the meeting was that folk wereunsure what the professionals were doing atthe congress – apparently there were simul-taneous games on offer along with a gamecommentary service – but from my kyuperspective I sadly didn’t even know theywere there.We had already determined not to enter theevening side events to aid our touristic plans.We decided to drop out of the weekendtournament as well for the same reasons. As a result we happened to be passing theMariensky Theatre at 19:00 on the Staurdayevening when a performance of Swan lake(by the Covent Garden ballet company!) wasabout to start. The Kirov company were inLondon at the time. As we queued to see ifwe could get cheap tickets in the gods, aDane living in StP approached us with twotickets for sale in the front row of the centreof the Dress circle. A bargain, great seats, awonderful ballet and pleasant company fromthe Danish couple.The third organised excursion we went onwas to Tsarskoe Selo. More palaces about25km south of StP. After a four hour queuewe were again presented with magnificentand ostentatious decor – it doesn’t surpriseme that they had a revolution in the light ofthis opulence. We arranged to get off the busat the palace and do the palace grounds and

local town in more detail. We returned to StPby train – wooden seats but only 25p for a25km journey. The station after Tsarkoe Selohad a novel name it was called “21km” fromStP.Towards the end of the last week wemanaged to prise our passports and exit visasback out of the system. Unsurprisingly therewas far too much bureauracy: we even filledin forms that nobody even looked at; andwhilst tearing an entrance ticket to show ithas been used makes sense, I never under-stood why shops tore till receipts when youbought something to show that they had alsobeen used. At the end we arranged a farewell meal atRestaurant Alexander in Peterhof after theclosing ceremony. Unfortunately the time inthe programme, 17:00 – 19:00 actuallymeant 7pm to 9pm and we felt obliged tomeet at the restaurant at 7:30pm as arranged.Thus we missed the closing ceremony wherea prize was awarded to a 72 year oldGerman gentleman for being the eldestplayer in the Congress. Thank you to theFinns who spoke up to say that this wasincorrect and Pauline Bailey was older by afew years! The organisers resolved this byawarding both players a Congress watch andT-shirt, a worthy contrast to the transportmanager’s first day mini-bus comments :-)On the last morning an early start and amini bus got us to the train station for the07:50 train to Helsinki. Even though I hadonly spent two days in Finland, a real senseof being home flooded thorugh me as wecrossed the border out of Russia. We spenttwo hours strolling around Helsinki harbourbefore dashing to the airport and a real BAplane back to Heathrow. The pleasure ofthis fascinating holiday thus came to acrescendo when we reached home and thedelights of a decent shower and a real bed.Overall the fortnight was hard work ratherthan relaxing but well worthwhile anddefinitely outstanding.

50


51

Problem 1I wanted to capture the twoblack stones on the edge byplaying 1. What I hadoverlooked was that theladder at 2 works. How onearth can the marked whitestone not break this ladder?This is so unfair!

For reference, the correctjoseki following black’shead-butting move is shownin Diagram 1b. Of course, Icould still have got almostthis result in the game, but I

didn’t. I panicked and madeanother mistake straightaway.

Problem 2Neither of the straightladders (7 at 8, or 9 at 10)work, but going round thebend does. Never assumethat the ladder is broken,just because one of theladdering stones gets put inatari.

Problem 3Black can capture thecutting stones in a ladder.Mihoko and Masashiresigned after seeing 63 inDiagram 3 overleaf. Therest of the ladder is shownin Diagram 3b.

If White had played 58 at61 it would have been verydifficult for us to find asecond eye for a group. Wewere lucky.Overall, I had a great timeduring the 6 days I was atthe MSO. As well asplaying, organising andwatching a lot of Go, andwinning two gold medals, Ilearned to play Snatch andBoku, which are fun, andPacru, which was not to mytaste. It is quite a pretty andoriginal game (the first everPacru tournament was partof the MSO) it just did notsuit me. However, bothSimon Goss and JonathanEnglefield were hooked.

SCALING THE HEIGHTS OF THE MSO ~ ANSWERSTim Hunt [email protected]

12

3 456

7 89 10

❏ 1a

123 45

678

9 1011

12

1314

15

16

17

❏ 1b

12 345

67

89

1011

12 1314 15

❏ 2


52

There were a few problems. Themain one being that the roomused for the NorthernTournament on the first weekendwas too small because theBritish Championship title matchwas being broadcast over theInternet, and only the larger ofthe two rooms allocated to Gothat weekend had a networksocket. There were not prizes foreveryone who won 4/6 in theNorthern, but only the peoplewho came in the top few places.That was probably my fault. Andwe had cleverly scheduled anearly finish for Round 6 of theNorthern, so that people couldtravel home more easily, butthen we had to wait until 6:30pmanyway for the big prize-givingceremony. We will, of course, dobetter next year. If you have anycomments about how the Goevents were run at the MSO,please talk to a member ofCouncil.As I was leaving, Tony Corfe(who, with David Levy, is thedriving force behind the MSO)told me that the combined entryfor the Go events had been 66.His challenge to the BGA was todouble that in 2004. I willcertainly be back. In fact, mysummer holiday for next year isalready planned. A week on theIsle of Man, playing Go in theIoM Go Congress, back-to-backwith a week in Manchesterplaying Go in the MSO.

58

5960

61 6263

❏ 3a

1 23

567

8 91011

12 131415

❏ 3b


53

Budapest Tournament62 players attended the first tournament ofthe new Toyota-PandaNet European Go Tourin Budapest in early May. As well of lots oflocal Hungarians, a group of Croatians andYugoslavs attended. Winner, unbeaten, waslocal student Diana Koszegi (5 dan). Secondon four wins was Radek Nechanicky (6 dan)from Czechia and third was the best of thethree-win players, Tibor Pocsai (6 dan) fromHungary.

Amsterdam TournamentThe 32nd Amsterdam attracted 128 playersto the European Go Centre over theAscension holiday and it was a Toyota-PandaNet Tour event. Winner on 6/6 was DuJingyu (7 dan) from Germany. Emil Nijhuis(6 dan) from the Netherlands only lost toDu; fellow Dutchman Geert Groenen (6 dan)only lost to Emil. Pie Zhao (6 dan), FrankJanssen (6 dan), Robert Rehm (5 dan), GuoJuan (7 dan), David Wu (5 dan) and CarstenLiebold (5 dan) ended on 4/6. There werealso children’s and pair’s events, a lightningand a one day rapid play for those notplaying in the main event.

Hamburg TournamentThe German Toyota-PandaNet Tour eventstarting on 7th June was won by a Japaneseresident, Asai Hideki (6 dan). Second on 5/6was Chinese resident Du Jingyu (7 dan).Czech player Radek Nechanicky (6 dan) wastop of the group on 4/6, followed by fellowCzech Vladimir Danek (6 dan) andGermany’s Bernd Schuetze (4 dan). 136 took part.

LG CupTwo westerners won in the first round of thisprofessional world event held in Korea.Strangely both beat Taiwanese players calledO. American Michael Redmond (9 danJapan) beat O Meien (9 dan Japan) andRussian Alexandr Dinerchtein (1 dan Korea)beat O Rissei (9 dan Japan). Both then lostto Korean 5 dans in round 2; Michael toWon Seongjin and Alex to Cho Hanseung.Six Koreans and two Chinese playerssurvived to the quarter-finals.

Warsaw Tournament63 players, mostly local, took part in thePolish Toyota-PandaNet Tour event starting21st June. The top three beat each other towin 4/5: Mykhailo Galchenko (5 dan) fromthe Ukraine, Tibor Pocsai (6 dan) fromHungary and Ion Florescu (6 dan) fromRomania. On 3/5 was top local LeszekSoldan (6 dan) and Czechia’s RadekNechanicky and Vladimir Danek.

European Go Congress St PetersburgThis has held at the university campus atPeterhof, just out of St Petersburg from 18thJuly to 2nd August. The Congress seems tohave been well run, the food was cheap andthe great Russian city was only a short rideaway. However some aspects of Russian lifewere a bit primitive. A group of strongvisiting Koreans dominated and of courseRussian players also featured among thewinners. In the European Championship theOpen Champion with 9/10 was Hong SeulKi (7 dan Korea) who only lost to another

WORLD GO NEWS



54

Korean. Second equal were Jang Bi and ParkSung Kyun and 4th was Li Ki Bong, allfrom Korea and on 8/10. Fifth and EuropeanChampion was Russian professionalAlexandr Dinerchtein. Just behind by 1 SOSpoint was Russian Alexei Lazarev (6 dan).Placed 9th and 10th were two 5 dans,Romania’s Colnel Burzo and Russia’sMikhail Galchenko. From the UK, WenboMao scored 3/5, Steve Bailey 4/10 andPauline Bailey 4/10 having finished the firstweek on 4/5 before meeting a lot of under-

graded Belo-Russians. 310 took part. The161 player Weekend Tournament was wonby Alexandr Dinerchtein with 5/5. The topgroup on 4/5 were Frank Janssen (6 danNetherlands), Ohmori Hirobumi (5 danJapan), Lee Hyuk (7 dan Korea), AndreiKulkov (6 dan Russia) and Dina Burdakova(4 dan Russia). The usual selection of othercompetitions were held such as 9x9, 13x13,Lightning, Ladies, Under-18, Pairs, Rengoand Team, but no UK players were prizewinners.

Players at the 2003 EGC in St Petersburg

Photo: Steve Bailey


US Go CongressThe 19th US Go Congress was held atUniversity of Houston, Texas, from 2nd to8th August. Some 300 Go fans attendedincluding Francis Roads and T.Mark Hall.Jie Li, the 22-year old politics student inCalifornia, won the US Open with 6 straightwins. He lost the Amateur Ing to his Gostudent Joey Hung. In the Professional Ingthe winner was Feng Yun (9 dan). She beatMingjiu Jiang (7 dan) in the final. Third was

Huiren Yang (1 dan) who beat Yilun Yang (7 dan) by 1 point. Best at Pair Go wereyoung Gina Shi (4 dan) and Mozheng Guan(7 dan). The Die Hard’s winner was BillHewett (3 dan). The self-paired wasdominated by Martin Lebl (1 kyu), HorstSudhoff from Germany and former UKresident Dan Micsa (3 dan) who won KyuKiller and Hurricane awards; Champion wasChristopher Vu. Dan also came third in the3-dan section of the Open. Best of theBritish Team was Wanstead’s Francis Roadstaking third in the 4-dan section of the Open.Day-off trips were to the Houston SpaceCenter, Museums and Galveston’s MoodyGardens.

Leksand OpenA new summer event held between 6th and10th August by Leksand Lake in Swedenwas attended by 106 players, including manyGermans and Dutch. Winner wasWillemkoen Pomstra (5 dan NL) with 5/5.Second were German 4 dans Stefan Budigand Thomas Jipp.

Brno TournamentFor the second year running the Toyota-PandaNet Tour major Czech event was heldin Brno not Praha. 159 players attended thetournament which started on 6th September.Winner was Romania’s Dragos Bajenaru (6dan). Second was Ukraine’s DmitrijBogackij and third was local VladimirDanek, both on 5/6. The top ten places wereall strong players, yet it was a surprise to seeGuo Juan at 8th, having lost to a lucky 3 dan(Ivan Kostka from Czechia).

55


56

☛ PRESIDENT:Simon Goss 4 Butler Rd, Crowthorne, BerksRG45 6QY 01344 [email protected]

☛ TREASURER: T. Mark Hall47 Cedars Rd, Clapham, London SW4 0PN020 7627 0856 [email protected]

☛ SECRETARY: Tim Hunt208f North Row, Central Milton Keynes MK9 3LQ 01908 695 [email protected]

MEMBERSHIP SECRETARY: Kathleen TimminsThe Hollies, Wollerton, Market Drayton,Shropshire TF9 3LY 01630 [email protected]

JOURNAL EDITOR: David WoodnuttHergest Mill, Kington, Herefordshire HR5 3EL01544 231 887 [email protected]

WEBMASTER: Allan Crossman53 North Gyle Terrace, Edinburgh EH12 8JY0131 539 0668 [email protected]

PUBLICITY OFFICER: Nick Wedd37 North Hinksey Village, Oxford OX2 0NA01865 247 403 [email protected]

NEWSLETTER EDITOR: Jil Segermanc/o Nuclear Medicine Department, RoyalSussex County Hospital, East Road, Brighton,BN2 5BE 01273 664 [email protected]

BOOK DISTRIBUTOR: Gerry Mills10 Vine Acre, Monmouth, Gwent NP25 3HW01600 712 934 [email protected]

CHAMPIONSHIPS ORGANISER & TOURNAMENTS:Tim Hunt See Secretary above

ANALYSIS SERVICE: David Ward17 Moore Close, Cambridge CB4 1ZP01223 523 683 [email protected]

ARCHIVIST: Harry Fearnley38 Henley Street, Oxford OX4 1ES01865 248 775 [email protected]

YOUTH NEWS: Alison Bexfield112 Westview, Letchworth Herts SG6 3QJ01462 684 648 [email protected]

SCHOOLS LIAISON OFFICER Peter Wendes 13 Stakes Road, Purbrook, Hants, PO7 5LU

02392 267 648 [email protected] PROTECTION ADVISOR: Sue Paterson

1 Town Quay, River Road, Arundel BN189DF 01903 889 825 [email protected]

GRADING COMMITTEE CHAIRMAN: Jim Clare32–28 Granville Rd, Reading RG30 3QE [email protected]

☛ JOURNAL BACK NUMBERS: Steve Bailey49 Stocton Road, Guildford, Surrey GU1 1HD01483 533 748 [email protected]

☛ Bill Streeten 3 Wellington Court, WellingtonRoad, London E11 2AT 020 8926 [email protected]

☛ Anna [email protected]

☛ Natasha Regan 81 Plough Way, LondonSE16 7AE 020 7231 2333 [email protected]

☛ Les Bock 36 Grove Park, London E11 2DL020 8530 5006 [email protected]

KYU GRADING/GODRAW PROGRAM: GeoffKaniuk 35 Clonmore St, London SW18 5EU020 8874 7362 [email protected]

NATIONAL TRAINER: Matthew Macfadyen22 Keytes Lane, Barford, Warks. CV35 8EP01926 624 445 [email protected]

EXHIBITIONS: Adam Atkinson 1 Kelsey Court,Burgess Hill, West Sussex RH15 0TU01444 248 011 [email protected]

AUDITOR: Toby Manning7 Oak Tree Close, Leamington Spa CV32 5YT01926 888 739 [email protected]

Useful e-mail and web addressese-mail for general BGA enquiries

[email protected] Web site

www.britgo.orgBGA e-mail listssee web site for details of how to enlist

for general and discussion broadcast:[email protected]

for policy discussion broadcast:[email protected]

BGA OFFICIALS ☛ indicates member of BGA Council


BATH: Paul Christie 01225 428 [email protected] Meets at The White Hart,Widcombe, Bath, Tues 7.30pm.

BILLERICAY: Guy Footring 01277 623 [email protected] Meets Mon eves.

BIRMINGHAM: Michael Vidler 0121 246 [email protected] Meets at theBrook pub, Selly Oak., Mon 7.30pm.

BOURNEMOUTH: Marcus Bennett 01202 512 655Meets at 24 Cowper Rd, Moordown BH9 2UJ,Tues 8pm.

BRACKNELL: Clive Hendrie 01344 422 [email protected] Meets at Duke’sHead, Wokingham, Tues 8.30pm.

BRADFORD: David Keeble 01274 581 [email protected] Meets at TheVictoria, Saltaire Rd, Shipley Weds 7.30pm.

BRIGHTON: Granville Wright01444 410 229 (h), 01273 898 319 (w)[email protected] Meetsat Grand Central pub, Surrey St, oppositeBrighton Station, Tues 8pm.

BRISTOL: Paul Atwell 0117 949 [email protected] at Polish Ex-servicemen’s Club, 50 StPaul’s Road, Clifton, Bristol, Tues 7.30pm.

CAMBRIDGE CHESS & GO CLUB: Paul [email protected] 01223 563 932Meets Victoria Road Community Centre,Victoria Road, Fri 7.30pm (term). Caters forbeginners and children.

CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY & CITY:Charles Matthews 01223 350 [email protected] Meets atCastle Inn, Castle St Mon 7.30pm; TheLatimer Room, Old Court Clare College Tues7.30pm (term); Coffee Lounge, 3rd floor, TheUniversity Centre, Mill Lane Thurs 7.00pm;CB1 (café), 32 Mill Road Fri 7.00 to 9pm;CB1 informal Sun 4pm.

CARDIFF Neil Moffatt 0292 041 [email protected] Meets ChapterArts Centre, Market Street, Canton, CardiffTues 7:30pm.

CHELTENHAM: David Killen 01242 576 524 (h)Meets various places, Tues 7.30pm.

CHESTER: Dave Kelly 01244 544 [email protected] Meets at OldeCustom House, Watergate St, Weds 8.00pm.

DEVON: Tom Widdecombe 01364 661 [email protected] Meets Tues at 7.45pmExeter Community Centre, St. David’s Hill.

DUBLIN COLLEGIANS: Noel [email protected] Mons and Weds 9:00pmPembroke Pub, 31 Lower Pembroke Street(off Baggot Street), Dublin 2.

DURHAM UNIVERSITY: Jenny [email protected] Meets Mons 8.00pm TheVictoria Hotel, Hallgarth St, Thurs PFH bar.

EDINBURGH: Phil Blamire 0131 663 [email protected] Meets at UCWClub, 15 Brunswick St, Thurs 7.30pm.

EPSOM DOWNS: Paul Margetts 01372 723 [email protected] Meets at 7 RipleyWay, Epsom, Surrey KT19 7DB but checkwith Paul first. Tues 7.30pm.

GLASGOW: John O’Donnell 0141 330 [email protected] Meets term time atResearch Club, Hetherington House, 13 University Gardens, Weds 8pm.

HASTINGS/EASTBOURNE: Patrick Donovan 01323 640 552 Meets by arrangement.

HIGH WYCOMBE: Paul Clarke 01494 438 [email protected] Meets Tues 8.00pm.

HP (BRISTOL): Andy Seaborne 0117 950 [email protected] Meets Wed & Frinoon. Please ring in advance to ensure thatplayers are available.

HUDDERSFIELD: Alan Starkey 01484 852 420Meets Huddersfield Sports Centre, Tues 7pm.

HULL: Mark Collinson 01482 341 [email protected] irregular Weds 7.30pm.

ISLE OF MAN: David Phillips 01624 612 [email protected] Suns & Weds 7.30pm.

UK CLUB LIST


LANCASTER: Adrian Abrahams 01524 [email protected] Meets GregsonCommunity Centre, 33 Moorgate Weds7.30pm.

LEAMINGTON: Matthew [email protected] 624 445 Meets 22 Keytes Lane,Barford, Warks. CV35 8EP Thurs 7.30pm.

LEICESTER: Richard Thompson 0116 276 [email protected] Meets at 5 Barbara Avenue,LE5 2AD Thurs 7:45pm.

LETCHWORTH: Simon Bexfield 01462 684 [email protected] Meets Caffeine CoffeBar, off Station Rd 1st Sun 2.00pm pleasephone to check.

LINCOLN: Dr Tristan Jones 07752 681 [email protected] Thurs 7.30pm.

LIVERPOOL: Roger Morris 0151 734 [email protected] Meets Maranto’s WineBar, Lark Lane Weds 8pm.

MAIDENHEAD: Iain Attwell 01628 676 792Meets various places Fri 8pm.

MANCHESTER: Chris Kirkham 0161 903 [email protected] Meets at the SquareAlbert in Albert Square Thurs 7.30pm.

MID CORNWALL: Iyan Harris 01872 540 529Meets Miners & Mechanics Social Club, St.Agnes Thurs 6:00pm.

MIDDLESBOROUGH: Gary Quinn 01642 [email protected] Meets at the Universityof Teesside Weds 4:00pm.

MONMOUTH: Gerry Mills 01600 712 [email protected] by arrangement.

NEWCASTLE: John Hall 0191 285 [email protected] various places, Weds.

NORWICH: Tony Lyall 01603 613 698 Meetsat The Louis Marchesi, Tombland,Thurs7.30pm.

NOTTINGHAM: Clive [email protected] Meets Weds7.00pm at The Crown Inn, Church St,Beeston.

Open University & Milton Keynes:Tim Hunt [email protected] 01908695 778 Meets 1st Mon of month at O.U.Cellar Bar other Mons at Secklow 100,Midsummer Boulevard Central MK, 7.30pm.

OXFORD CITY: Richard Helyer01608 737 594 Meets at Freud’s Café,Walton Street, Tues & Thurs 6pm. Check with Richard that Freud’s is available.

OXFORD UNIVERSITY: Niall [email protected] Meets at theSeminar Room, Corpus Christi Coll Weds 7.30pm (term).

PENZANCE: John Culmer 01326 573 [email protected] Meets UpstairsFlat, 39 Morrab Road, Penzance Thurs8.00pm.

PURBROOK: Peter Wendes 02392 [email protected] Meets most Thursevenings at Peter’s house, ring and check.

READING: Jim Clare 0118 377 5219 (w)[email protected] Meets at theBrewery Tap, Castle St, Mon 6.30pm.

SHEFFIELD: Will Segerman 0777 370 [email protected] Meets Red Lion, CharlesSt, Suns 7pm.

ST ALBANS: Alan Thornton 01442 261 945 or Richard Mullens 01707 323 629 Meets atThe White Lion, 91 Sopwell Lane, St. Albans.Non-regular visitors ring to confirm.

SWANSEA: Meets at JC’s, a pub on the univer-sity campus Suns 3.30.

SHERBOURNE & YEOVIL Julian Davies 01935423 046 [email protected] MeetsBrewers Arms, St James St, South PethertonWeds 7.30pm.

SWINDON: David King 01793 521 [email protected] Meets at Princeof Wales, Coped Hall Roundabout, WoottonBassett, Weds 7.30pm.

TAUNTON: David Wickham 01984 623 519Meets Tues various places.

WEST WALES: Jo Hampton 01341 281 [email protected] Allday 01341 280 365 Llys Mynach,Llanaber Rd, Barmouth LL42 1RN.

58


WEST SURREY: Pauline Bailey 01483 561 [email protected]. Meets inGuildford Mons 7:30 except bank holidays.

WINCHESTER: Alan Cameron 07768 422 [email protected] Meets at TheBlack Boy Pub, 1 Wharf Hill, Bar End,Winchester Weds 7pm.

WORCESTER & MALVERN: Edward Blockley01905 420 908 Meets Weds 7.30pm.

LONDON CLUBSCENTRAL LONDON: Keith Rapley 01494 675

066 [email protected] Saturday12:00 to 19:00 sharp (except when the Fridayor Monday is a bank holiday) at the CrosseKeys pub, 9 Gracechurch Street, LondonEC3, Board fee £2.00

NORTH LONDON: Martin Smith020 8991 5039 [email protected] in the Gregory Room, Parish Church,Church Row, Hampstead Tues 7.30pm.

NORTH WEST LONDON: David Artus 020 8841 4595 [email protected] at Greenford Community Centre,Oldfield Lane (south of A40) Thurs 7pm.

SOUTH WOODFORD: Francis Roads020 8505 4381 [email protected] Meetsat Waitrose Coffee Bar Tues 10.30am

TWICKENHAM: Roland Halliwell020 8977 5750 (h) Meets irregularly at Popes Grotto Hotel Sun eves. Always ring to confirm.

WANSTEAD & EAST LONDON: Alistiar Wall 0208556 4232 [email protected] at Wanstead House, 21 The Green,Wanstead E11, Thurs 7.15pm.

59

Up to date information on UK Go clubsis maintained on the BGA Web Site at:www.britgo.org/clublist/clubsmap.html

Please send corrections and all new oramended information to Allan Crossman,the BGA Webmaster.See page 56 for all BGA contact details.

NOTICESJournal ContributionsPlease send contributions for the SpringJournal as soon as possible and in any caseby 31st January.Copy sent via e-mail is especially welcome.Please supply plain text as all formattinginformation will be discarded.Diagrams can be supplied as mgt or sgf filesfrom any reliable Go editing program.Please e-mail your contribution to:

[email protected] post to:

Andy Brixey91 Kiln House LaneSt Annes on SeaLytham St AnnesFY8 3AB

Advertisements£100 per page and pro rata (b/w). Contactthe Editor for colour cover rate. Privatelyplaced small ads, not for profit, are free.Discounts available for a series.

BGA Tournament Phone 07951 140433The BGA has a mobile phone so that peoplecan contact tournament organisers on the dayof the event (for example, in case of breakdown or other problems). Please note thatnot all tournaments make use of this phone.

Web addressesWhen quoted in the Journal, these aregenerally given without the leading http://,which can be assumed.

© 2003 BGA. Items may be reproducedfor the purpose of promoting Go and not forprofit provided that all such copies areattributed to the British Go Journal and theconsent of the author has been sought andobtained. All other rights reserved.Views expressed are not necessarily thoseof the BGA or of the Editor.


AJI: latent possibilities left in a positionAJI KESHI: a move which destroys one’s own

aji (and is therefore bad)ATARI: having only one liberty left; stones

are said to be ‘in atari’ when liable tocapture on the next move

BYO YOMI: shortage of time; having to make a move in a given time. Overtime is nowmore widely used in tournament play

DAME: a neutral point; a point of no value to either player

DAME ZUMARI: shortage of libertiesDANGO: a solid, inefficient mass of stonesFURIKAWARI: a trade of territory or groupsFUSEKI: the opening phase of the gameGETA: a technique that captures one or more

stones in a ‘net’, leaving them with two ormore liberties but unable to escape

GOTE: losing the initiativeHANE: a move that ‘bends round’ an enemy

stone, leaving a cutting point behindHamete: a move that complicates the

situation but is basically unsoundHASAMI: pincer attackHOSHI: one of the nine marked points on

the Go boardIKKEN TOBI: a one-space jumpISHI NO SHITA: playing in the space left

after some stones have been capturedJIGO: a drawn gameJOSEKI: a standardised sequence of moves,

usually in a cornerKAKARI: a move made against a single

enemy stone in a cornerKATTE YOMI: self-centred play; expecting

uninspired answers to ‘good’ movesKEIMA: a knight’s move jumpKIKASHI: a move which creates aji

while forcing a submissive replyKOMI: a points allowance given to

compensate White for playing second

KOSUMI: a diagonal playMIAI: two points related such that if one

player takes one of them, the opponent willtake the other one

MOYO: a potential territory, a frameworkNAKADE: a move played inside an enemy

group at the vital point of the principal eye-space to prevent it from making two eyes

OVERTIME: in tournament play, having toplay a number of stones in a certain timee.g. 20 stones in five minutes

OIOTOSHI: ‘connect and die’, capturing by acascade of ataris, often involving throw-ins. If the stones connect up to escape,they all get caught.

PONNUKI: the diamond shape left behind aftera single stone has been captured

SABAKI: a sequence that produces a light,resilient shape

SAGARI: a descent – extending towards theedge of the board

SAN REN SEI: an opening which consists ofplaying on the three hoshi points along oneside of the board

SEKI: a local stalemate between two or moregroups dependent on the same liberties forsurvival

SEMEAI: a race to capture between twoadjacent groups that cannot both live

SENTE: gaining the initiative; a move thatrequires a reply

SHICHO: a capturing sequence shaped like a ladder

SHIMARI: a corner enclosure of two stonesSHODAN: one dan levelTENGEN: centre point of the boardTENUKI: to abandon the local position and

play elsewhereTESUJI: a skillful and efficient move in a

local fightTSUKE: a contact playYOSE: the endgame

GLOSSARY OF GO TERMS


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