UK Tournament Report

Charles Hibbert from London entered Maidenhead-Hitachi Tournament as his first ever tournament. Having achieved 3d on both KGS and IGS, he entered at 2 dan and went on to win all three games to claim the Maidenhead title.

Also winning three games, and in second and third place, were Alistair Wall (1d Wanstead) and Jitka Bartova (1d Praha). As usual all players winning three or two games got a prize from the eclectic selection on the prize table or, this year, a mystery envelope. Those on three were: France Ellul (6k Maidenhead) and Fred Holroyd (8k Milton Keynes). 55 players took part.

Both Wanstead and Leamington teams won 9 games out of 16 to get the team prizes of sweets and chocolate. Charlotte Bexfield and Edmund Smith both won 4 games in the 13x13 side event.

Congratulations to Centrol London Go Club A team, Franciso Divers, Michael Webster and Chuck Fisher, for winning the 2014 season of the online league ahead of Belfast and claiming back the GoGoD shield, which they last held in 2011, from Edinburgh.

The second division was won by Cornish Rogues (Paul Massey, John Culmer and Rob White), who will be moving up to the first division next year, narrowly beating the Three Counties team.

We are starting to take bookings for the next season of the online league, which we hope to start promptly in April, so please could everyone who wants to take part get in touch with me at jmc AT toad.me.uk to confirm that they want to play.

Whilst we like to have teams associated with clubs, people on their own are very welcome to join up with an existing team which is low on members, so please don't hold back.

The 41st London Open Go Congress took place at International Students House at the end of December 2014. As well as the main seven-round tournament, there were Pair Go, Doubles, Lightning and Rengo side events, and the tournament culminated in 40 participants attending a New Year's Eve Dinner.

Day two of the London Open, Monday 29th December, saw rounds three and four of the Open. At the top in round three Benjamin Teuber lost to Mateusz Surma and Young-Sam Kim lost to Chi-Min Oh. So the two on four wins faced off in round four; Oh beat Surma to take a clear lead. At the end of the day the other players on four wins were: Kalle Timperi 1k, Lova Wåhlin 2k, Johannes Siven 3k, Alberto Adriasola 4k and Jannik Gram 5k.

Results

The three pros present were busily anaylsing games at the end of each round and in the early evening Miss Choi gave a lecture for kyu players and Fan Hui reviewed a game with the stronger players.

The 2014 London Open got under way 15 minutes late on Sunday 28th December after a repairing. 108 players in all are expected, with 101 already playing. As usual a large number of players are from outside the UK, with many strong Chinese players as well as players from several European countries.

Also present are three professionals: Fan Hui from France, Dongeun Choi from Korea and Hajin Lee, the IGF Secretary.

Again the venue is ISH at the top of Great Portland Street convenient for seeing London and providing accommodation for those staying over.

Results

The Edinburgh Christmas tournament saw a total of 25 players.

Tongzhou (Joe) Cai (3d Glasgow) sparkled the most and took the bottle of champagne with 4 wins from 4. Prizes for 3 wins went to co-organiser Boris Mitrovic (3d Edinburgh), Alistair Wall (2d Wanstead), Niall Paterson (5k Glasgow), Baron Hasslinger (5k Edinburgh) and Greg Cox (10k Dundee). The remaining two prizes went to Quintin Connell (9k Glasgow) for 2 wins from 3, and Magdalena Mladenova (1d Sofia) as the furthest-travelled on 2 wins.

Results

The second South London kyu players' teaching day and tournament was again at the Croydon Quaker Meeting House. Nineteen students were taught in the morning by four teachers - Andrew Kay, Alex Rix, Tim Hunt and Alison Bexfield. In the afternoon there was a three round tournament.

In the teachers' section the teachers all played each other, in a round-robin tournament, with all games even. In the students' tournament all games were played with handicaps equal to grade difference where appropriate.

Andrew Kay won the teachers' tournament with three wins; he received a prize of a bag of delicious gingerbread men from the organiser's excellent local cake shop.

For a second year running the Coventry Tournament had a local winner. As the previous winner, Bruno Poltronieri, concentrated on organising, it was his University of Warwick club mate Philip Leung (5d) who won this time. He was rewarded with a bottle of port and a box of Maltesers. Second was Wu Ruizhu (5d) also from Warwick and third was Alison Bexfield from Letchworth. Those on 3/3 also got prizes: Ben Riddell (2k Cheltenham), Andre Cockburn (7k Nottingham), John Capper (12k Nottingham) and Christopher Manser (17k Warwick). 32 players took part.

Results

Congratulations to Andrew Kay who defeated Alex Kent today to retain the British Championship by three games to nil.

A copy of the game is available, with comments from Matthew Macfadyen 6d.

Thanks to Nick Wedd for hosting, and to all others involved.

Toby Manning

Game Three Relay raw record including unmoderated comments.
Game Three Review with comments by Matthew Macfadyen 6d.

After a year gap Matthew Cocke regained the Three Peaks title. He won all five games, at the event at the Commodore Inn in Grange-over-Sands, to take the title for the fifth time. Winning four games were Roger Huyshe (4k Shropshire) and David Cantrell (6k South London). 31 players, including organiser Bob Bagot, took part.

A new venture this year was a team event with a small engraved toast rack as the prize. This was kindly donated by Graham Blackmore (one of the regulars). The first winners were a team from Shropshire -The Wollerton Wanderers - Brian Timmins, Kath Timmins and Roger Huyshe.

Results