In the 6th round of the online teams league, the British team lost to Spain, but two games only by a very small amount. All the games went into overtime. First to finish was Martha McGill's game against Rogelio Gomes. Unfortunately some edge stones got captured and Martha had to resign. On board one Andrew Simons claimed our only win against Paco Garcia de la Banda. When Andrew killed one of Paco's large groups late on, Paco was unable to kill Andrew's back and had to resign. The other two games were very tight finishes and both ended at almost exactly the same time. Unfortunately we lost both: Des Cann lost to Jesus Roldan by 1.5 points and Sandy Taylor to José-Manuel Vega by 3.5 points. This left UK very mid-table with three wins, two losses and a draw. Spain's win put them up to third behind Bulgaria and C League leaders Turkey.

Full results for the season and game records can be seen here

The dates and locations for both the Candidates (Warwick University) and the Challengers Leagues (International Students House) this year are now confirmed. Details are available on our Calendar page.

Please note that only limited (and not cheap) on-site accommodation is available for the Candidates, so if you want this please book as soon as possible.

As part of the effort related to the European Youth Go Championship in Bognor Regis we've organised a Learn to Play Go day at the Fishbourne Centre in West Sussex on 8th March.

Please feel free to invite anyone to drop in between 10am and 3pm (experienced players also welcome).

We're please to be able to report that GoGoD is now back online, after a period of down-time, but at a different location:

After spending so many years on the GoGoD database, T Mark Hall was naturally keen that his legacy should endure. He therefore asked John Fairbairn (in photo right) to try to keep the project going, at least until the original target of 100,000 games was reached (it currently has 79,000 games).

To match even a fraction of the work Mark did is a daunting task, but he did leave a large reserve of games for processing, and so John has decided to re-light the flame, but with considerable changes to ease the workload.

The most important are:

• GoGoD moves from standing for Games of Go on Disc to Games of Go on Download.

Toby Manning (2d Leicester) won the Maidenhead Tournament with a surprise win over Andrew Simons (4d Cambridge) in the last round. Also winning all three games to claim two prizes were: Francis Roads (1d Wanstead), Paul Barnard (1k Swindon), Adam Heslop (4k Edinburgh), Malcolm Walker (7k No Club), Daniel Peace (9k Oxford), Colin Lee (11k North London) and Charlotte Bexfield (16k Letchworth). All those on two wins were rewarded with one prize.

Results

Also winning prizes were Charlotte Bexfield and Johannes Siven for 4/6 in the 13x13 side event. The box of chocolates for the best team was shared by members of three teams: Paratus, Arundel and Maidenhead, each with 6 out of 12.

It has been confirmed that two Japanese Professionals, Chizu Kobayashi 5p and Masaki Minematsu 6p are to visit the European Youth and British Go Congress over the weekend of Feb 28/March 3.

During the preceding week they will visit Oxford Go Club, and during the following week Chizu Kobayashi will visit Edinburgh Go Club.

This will be the first visit of a professional go player to Scotland for 15 years.

Some of you will have been aware that T Mark Hall, who died in December, left a bequest to British Go in his will. This was in two parts:

• his Go books, pictures and other ephemera were left to the British Go Association (BGA)
• a substantial sum was left to the Go community via a Trust, with the Trustees being John Fairbairn and the Officers of the BGA (President, Secretary and Treasurer).

We have arranged for the books etc. to be stored with the BGA Archive until a more suitable location can be found. Suggestions for this location are welcome. [We're mindful that the best locations might wish to be paid for housing it.]

Probate will probably not be for several months and the precise amounts involved won’t be known until then. Details about the setting up of the Trust also need to be worked out.

We will let you know when further details are settled.

The British Go Association will again be demonstrating Go at the London Anime and Gaming Con on Sunday 9th February. If you like anime, manga, cosplaying or video games you’ll enjoy London Anime and Gaming Con. The venue address is: The Rocket Complex, London Metropolitan University, 166-220 Holloway Road, London N7 8DB, and the convention is on both Saturday 8th and Sunday 9th February from 11 am.

Playing Go in a sumo ring

Since I have moved to England in Autumn 2012, I have played more Go tournaments than I would have ever thought of. One day in Spring 2013 I logged on to an online Go platform and read about the Osaka Go camp August 2013 in Japan. It sounded like the right combination of joy and learning, and it didn’t take me long to sign up.

That was certainly one of my best decisions that year, so in this story I’d like to write you a bit about my experience in Japan.

The Go camp was held at a Sumo training center, so some of the tables were in a Sumo ring that you would now and then stumble over. Casual playing and invidual learning usually last till late in the night.

We had professional Go training and a camp league where we would play with each other.

Congratulations to Oscar Selby, 7 kyu from Epsom, for winning the 2013 Youth Grand Prix with an outstanding 1411 points - more than twice the number of his next challenger!

Second came Edmund Smith, 15 kyu from Milton (Cambridge), with 702 points and third was Melchior Chui, 12 kyu from Cambridge, with 499 points.

Full details for 2013 are here

Cash prizes to the top three players are provided from a fund set up in memory of John Rickard, 4 dan, and will be presented at the British Youth Go Championship.