53rd Wessex
— Tony AtkinsThe event took place as usual at St Marks Community Centre in Bath. Turnout was good, after a few late withdrawals and some on the day entrants they had 36 players and one unnecessary ‘ghost’. It was especially pleasing to see a number of new faces. Possibly the main downside of the day was the parking; Bath Council seems to be making a good job of deterring all traffic from the city centre. The organisers will look into what can be done for next year.
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UK Beat Norway
— Tony AtkinsThe first match in the new season of the C-League was against Norway. Bruno, Scott and Tim all won, but Jon Diamond was a no-show meaning the team won 3-1. Slovakia beat Slovenia and South Africa beat Spain, both 3-1, but our penalty point for the no-show pushed us down to third. Kyrgyzstan and Denmark drew their match.
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Robot Introduced at Sheffield Tournament
— Tony Atkins
The Sheffield Tournament had 38 entrants, reports organiser David Wildgoose. The bar was set at 1k providing six players above the bar and was eventually won by Peikai Xue (4d UCL). Five players gained prizes for winning all three of their games. Other than Peikai they were all from Cheadle Hulme: Megan Upton (14k), James Zhao (16k), Claude Robinson (27k) and Pip Hawkes (34k). Results
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BGA Public Liability Insurance - Possible Issue
— Colin WilliamsMembers should be aware that a question has arisen as to whether the BGA’s Public Liability Insurance does in fact cover them. We are working as a matter of urgency to clarify the situation, but until we have a definite solution members should act on the side of safety and consider that they do not have Public Liability Insurance for themselves or their events from the BGA.
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"Knives Out" at Edinburgh Open Tournament
— Tony AtkinsThe Edinburgh Open was again held at the "St Columba's by the Castle" Episcopal Church Hall. This year, nice weather meant they could use the garden of the church hall as a review space. Overall turnout was up on last year with 29 players and pleasingly included three first-time tournament players.
The bar was set at 2k, which made for a very competitive field of seven players who could win the competition. Local player Grzegorz Kudla (2k) won the tournament with three wins from three games, following a tense final game with Ai Guan (Birmingham 1k).
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Go at 27th Mind Sports Olympiad
— Tony AtkinsThe 27th Mind Sports Olympiad (MSO) took place in its regular venue of the JW3 centre in London. As usual a large number of games fans from around the world, including this time a large team of Koreans, assembled to play a long and varied list of games. Some Go players competed in several games: Ai Guan, Paul Smith and Caleb Monk; Natasha Regan was the Women's Pentamind champion. Details of all MSO results are on the MSO Database.
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If you have any comments, please email the webmaster on web-master AT britgo DOT org.
British Championship on KGS this Weekend
— Colin WilliamsThis weekend on 26th / 27th and if needed 28th at the London Go Centre Bruno Poltronieri and Ho Yeung Woo will play the best of three 2023 British Championship title match.
Play will start at 12:00 each day and go through until the end of the game. The London Go Centre will be doing a live stream on their YouTube channel. Commentary will be provided on KGS (probably the English Room) by Matthew Macfadyen. Please take the time to drop in online and have a look at how it is going.
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BGJ 204 Now Available in Members' Area
— Tony AtkinsThe Summer 2023 edition of the BGJ is now available for members to read in the Members' Area, with printed copies being sent out to those that receive them.
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"New" Venue Popular for Welsh Open
— Martin HarveyOn 24-25 June, the switch back to Barmouth's Dragon Theatre proved popular with the 30 attendees, who took advantage of a rare whole-weekend tournament on the BGA calendar. The theatre was the tournament's very first venue in the seaside town, back in 1993. It felt good for the event to be supporting a fine, renovated community amenity, for this 29th edition.
The weather was mixed, but there were chances to climb the cliffs for views of the town, its wide bay and the start of Snowdonia national park's scenic mountainous region.
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