2001 European Go Congress Individual Lightning Handicap Tournament

Time limits were 10 minutes each, sudden death. Komi was 6½. Normal handicaps, corresponding to grade difference were used (not the "Irish handicaps", one stone more than grade difference, as used in some other events).

The event was structured as a knock-out. However players who lost games were given the option of entering the draw for a side-tournament, not for prizes.

There were 84 entrants. The first round reduced them to 42. The second round reduced them to 21.

For the third round, a player was borrowed from the side tournament, to make the number even. After this round, ten players remained. These are listed in the table below.

The fourth round reduced these ten players to five. So, for the fifth round, a player was borrowed from the side tournament, to make the number even. This was Mykola Gluschenko. He won his game, so the fifth round reduced the five contenders to two.

Thus, two players entered the sixth and final round, to play each other for the first prize. They were Andrei Tchebourakhov and Torben Pedersen.

While Andrei Tchebourakhov and Torben Pedersen were playing the final, the two players whom they had defeated in the "semi-final", Geert Groenen and Krzystof Podbiol, had a play-off for third place. However, Ivo Svec pointed out that he has as good a claim as them to the third prize, as he had been undefeated until the fifth round. He was therefore assigned a "bye" into a second round of the play-off for third place; in this he defeated Krzystof Podbiol, and won the third prize. Geert Groenen might have argued that he deserved a chance to play Ivo Svec in a further play-off, in the hope of bringing about a three-way tie for third place and a further round of play-offs; but it was getting late, and he generously agreed to waive this.