UK Tournament Report

The 51st British Go Congress was held in Bristol and the very modern Future Inns Hotel, just across from the Cabot Circus shopping centre in the middle of the city.

It started on the Friday with a teaching session and then the British Open Lightning. This was won by Alex Kent (3d); he beat the previous winner, Xunrui Zhao (3d) from London, into second place.

However in the British Open, played as usual on the Saturday and Sunday, it was Xunrui Zhao who was the winner, scoring victories in all six games. In second place was Jon Diamond (3d) and third was Sandy Taylor (2d) from the local club.

The 42nd Trigantius took place in a spring-like Cambridge, again held at the University Social Club in Mill Lane. A recent record of 56 players (including two ghosts) meant the event got off to a late start. In addition in the afternoon there were 28 players in Paul Smith's Novices Tournament making it even more popular (though more crowded). This number included four adults and a large group of pupils from Harpenden Academy.

The main tournament saw the return of Sam Aitken (3d) who won all three, including a win secured against Andrew Simons (4d Cambridge), to become this year's holder of the Trigantius Trophy.
Other players on three wins were Alison Bexfield (1k Letchworth), Matthew Reid (1k Cambridge) and Sebastian Pountney (8k).

Skye had beautiful weather while the rest of the northern Europe got snowed under. As a result just 19 of the 33 who'd registered for the fifth Isle of Skye Go Tournament got through. Juliusz "Julko" Pruszynski tried to travel from Lodz to Skye by bus but only got as far as London; he was sorely missed.

Either Edwin Brady or Donald MacLeod were to have done the draw but both were snowed in. Nick Wedd started writing names and drawing lines on index cards but John Collins turned out to have the program on his laptop and did sterling service in spite of computer crashes forcing him to type it all out again on the Sunday morning. He got a prize and a cheer for his efforts.

John Collins and Carel Goodheir won leagues C and B of the Friday evening 9X9 contests with 5 and 4 out of 6 games respectively.

Freezing national temperatures nonetheless, this year saw the South Manchester day retain its attendance from last year's inaugural day. Cheadle Hulme School (CHS) again kindly allowed use of their fine premises and, as in 2017, two events (Main and Fast) were held at the same time. The Main event, run by Chris Kirkham, attracted 20 players, while the Fast (run by Helen Harvey) featured 13 players. CHS was represented by 13 of its students (better than last year), while the Head of Physics, Mike Winslow, had given up his day to be on hand in case any issues arose.

29 players enjoyed teaching and a rapid tournament at the Dice Cup board game cafe in the centre of Nottingham for the first Kyu Player Teaching and mini-tournament. Teaching in the morning was given in three ability groups, by Chris Bryant (Sheffield), Toby Manning (Leicester) and Alison Bexfield (Letchworth); it was very much appreciated.

A 3 round McMahon tournament was held in the afternoon, with only 30 minutes per player and no overtime, which caught out a few (including one of the organisers!). Winning the tournament was Jonathan Green (4k Leamington) who is shown receiving his prize from Toby Manning.

The new London Go Centre was launched on the weekend of 17th and 18th February with an event that featured teaching, a tournament and more.

The previous London Go Centre was in Lambolle Place in London's NW3 between 1975 and 1978, when it closed as it was not financially viable. It had long been a dream of several London players to have a centre again, and when T Mark Hall left his estate to fulfill this aim a rebirth seemed a possibility. Various options were investigated by the trust set up in his name. These included acquiring a building for use as a Mind Sports Centre in conjunction with others such as Chess.

Yangran Zhang (3d Manchester), seen seated on the left, won the 20th Cheshire Tournament. A record 46 players took part, thanks to a large group from Cheadle Hulme School, as well as players from Liverpool, Manchester and other local clubs.

Yangran beat Gong Cheng, Mark Zhang and Alistair Wall to take the title.

Also winning three games were Ai Guan (7k Lancaster), Chun Yin Wong (11k Lancaster), Andrew Boyd (13k Liverpool), Gordon Hall (20k Whaley Bridge) and Elliott Barlow (30k CHS).

Hugo Ryan (35k CHS) won the Fighting Spirit prize, Ben Howe (27k CHS) won 6/10 in the 13x13 and Elliott also won a prize for 9/9 in the 13x13.

Results

Tim Hunt, 2d Milton Keynes, led his team to victory in the 27th Maidenhead-Hitachi Tournament. He beat Jim Clare in the final to win the tournament and he led the winning Milton Keynes team in the team competition. All players on three wins got an envelope and the choice of a game or a bottle, and those on two wins got a choice of one out of the three. The prizes, the great location and the free buffet lunch are all thanks to long term event sponsor Hitachi Europe. However rumours that Brexit is making the company consider moving to Europe proper mean this might be the last such event.

Those on three wins were Geoff Kaniuk (5k Cambridge), Joel Barrett (6k Manchester) and Robert Scantlebury (8k Sheffield). The 13x13 side event prize was not awarded.

Results Press Photos

Of the 94 players from the UK and abroad that played in the 2017 London Open it was the large group of Chinese players currently living in the UK that dominated the event, but also there were two Belgian players in the top 5, Lucas Neirynck in third with 5 wins and Thomas Connor in fifth with 4 wins. The UK's top player, hence winning the David Ward Trophy, was Daniel Hu in fourth place with 4 wins also. In the end it was Weijin Chen who ended unbeaten with seven wins who took the trophy and top cash prize. Second place went to Ho Yeung Woo who only lost in round four to Chen. Chen is shown here in his last round game against Yousun Yang who took sixth.

Alistair Wall (1d) from Wanstead Club in London travelled up to Edinburgh for their annual Christmas Tournament. He topped the list of 19 players at the Skyscanner offices by winning three games out of four. He beat local player Boris Mitrovic (2d), but lost to another local Liu Yen-Ting (1d) who won two out of two.

Others winning three games were Roger Daniel (6k Wanstead), Serhii Gavrylov (7k) and Edinburgh players Robin McLean (10k) and Neil Sandford (15k).

Results