The South London teaching day and tournament went ahead today with 24 students and 3 teachers - Andrew Kay, Tim Hunt, and Francis Roads, to whom we are very grateful that they gave up their time for us. Students were split into groups of similar strength and spent some time with each of the teachers in the morning.

In the afternoon was a three round tournament. Students were again split into groups, each of which played a Swiss-style tournament with handicap equal to grade difference.

I plan to close the current league season on 21st December at noon, leaving people free to enjoy the Winter Solstice at 17:11.

We've had a good few games in Divisons 2 and 3 although Divison 1 has been a bit thin on the ground.

Unless anyone objects beforehand I shall declare drawn unplayed games in matches which have started. However I would prefer to see them played out so if that means you please can you finish them as soon as possible.

Please can all teams confirm as soon as possible that they will be playing next year. I hope to get the next season under way in March, so everyone please check that they can play. We would be pleased to welcome any new teams that want to join the league, so don't be shy!

I hope everyone has enjoyed the league this year and I look forward to some interesting games in the coming year.

John Collins

We are pleased to announce that the online Korean Go Server, is sponsoring an Oxford vs Cambridge Match at the London Open.

The match, which will be shown online on the WBaduk server, will be on the evening of December 30.

Each team will have 4 members: two current students, and 2 alumni.

More information is available at the LOGC page

We are very grateful to WBaduk for their financial support making this match possible.

We started out tied with Turkey at the top of Division C, but they are nominally the strongest of the other teams in the Division and quite close to us in overall strength. Nevertheless we had high hopes as we put out our strongest team.

Sadly, this was not to be to be the case as we lost all three completed games...

On top board Andrew Simons had a good opening with one cutting group between two weak groups. He didn't play that severely and his opponent managed to settle both groups, but he got some decent profit in exchange, though Andrew did make an annoying timing mistake which meant his opponent could get a big tenuki during the fighting.

Bruno Poltronieri, 3d, organised a successful Coventry Tournament again, a very successful one for him in that he was the winner. Second was Andrew Kay, 4d, and third Yuanbo Zhang, 3d. Winning all three games were Manchester's Chris Kirkham, 4k, and local student Joseph Ireland, 8k. 37 players took part.

Results

Andrew Kay won the first game by resignation and the second game on time to retain the British Championship, winning 2-0 verses Andrew Simons.

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The Online Study Group (formerly Shodan Challenge) will be starting on 29th November and running for six weeks. Players of any strength who wish to improve their go-playing abilities are very welcome!

You are encouraged to choose a goal to work towards for six weeks, and a study plan to follow during that time. Using the group, you can arrange matches with players of similar strengths, request / offer teaching games, or discuss variations of a game you have played or watched. There will be a league system in place to help you find opponents of around your strength.

(Stronger players are also encouraged to join to help review games and offer advice. Please note that you are only committing to six weeks at a time, and you are not assigned individual students to mentor, so the level of commitment required is low!)

To sign up, please send an email to me with your name and approximate rank (if applicable).

Just to remind you that the second game of the BGA title match takes place on Saturday at about 10:00am. Once again the moves will be relayed live on KGS.

The four qualifiers from the various events played the semi-finals of the Scottish Championship. David Lee (Dundee) beat Piotr Wisthal (Aberdeen) in the first and Matt Crosby beat Martha McGill (both Edinburgh) in the second. In the best of three final, played on KGS, David beat Matt by two games to one to hold on to the title for a fourth year running.

A Go hothouse sprang up in Letchworth Garden City, over the weekend of 8th - 10th November, when 14 of the our strongest and most promising players congregated at the home of Letchworth Go Club organizers Simon and Alison Bexfield for an intensive weekend honing their Go skills under the guidance of Guo Juan 5 dan professional.