UK Tournament Report

Thirty-six players turned out for the Welsh Open, held at Barmouth for the 20th year. Richard Hunter (3d Bristol) won with 5 out of 5. Other prizewinners with 4 out 5 were Toby Manning (tournament runner-up), Edward Blockley (5k Worcester), Huw Mort (10k York) and Colin Maclennan (10k Twickenham).

The tournament was fortunate to be visited by two Korean lady professionals; Juyeon Ko (8p) and Sohyun Park (3p). Ms. Ko gave a lecture before the start of the tournament on dealing with non-joseki moves, and the two gave a simultaneous display against 17 players on Saturday evening, winning all their games and spending time afterwards with each player to discuss critical moments.

Results

Andrew Kay (5d South London) retained his title by winning this year's Durham Tournament. Reduced to one day, because of hosting the British earlier in the year, the event attracted 19 players from as far away as Edinburgh and southern England. Second on tie-break from Matthew Crosby (3d Edinburgh) was Boris Mitrovic (1k Edinburgh) who went away with the prize of a month's subscription to Dinerchtein's Insei League. Unattached player John Green (4k) won all three games and Martha McGill (1k Edinburgh) was rewarded for not losing any games (she had one win and two jigos). The event finished an hour early and gave plenty of time to allow players to stand in the rain and watch the Olympic torch arrive in the city, before going on to an Italian restaurant. The weekend was completed by a barbecue on the Sunday.

Results

Natasha Regan and Matthew Cocke retained the British Pair Go Champions title for a third year. They won the top group of the 22nd Pair Go Championships beating Jenny Radcliffe and Francis Roads, the organiser, in the final. Winning the fighting spirit prize were Jackie Chai and John Johnstone.

In the handicap group there were 6 pairs including several children and a 5d Korean lady. Winners were Helen and Martin Harvey, playing in the handicap section as Helen was still recovering from injury. They beat the youngsters Rebecca Margetts and Oscar Selby in the final, proving that 26 stone handicaps can be overcome. The handicap fighting spirit prize was won by Yvonne and Paul Margetts.

Sam McCarthy and John Collins won both the best dressed couple prize and the chemistry quiz.

Results

The Challengers' League is the penultimate event in the Championship cycle. With Matthew Macfadyen in retirement, there is a new sense of interest in who will win take the title this year - it will definitely be a new name on the trophy.

Eight of the UK's finest players descended on the Nippon Club, London from June 1st to 4th, for the all play all event. In first place, with 6 wins from 7, was Andrew 'the Great Destroyer' Kay. There was nearly a 4 way tie-break for second place, but cream rises to the top, and Nick 'Slowhand' Krempel, played his way to a 5th win, taking outright second.

These two will now meet in the best-of-three Title Match, which will be relayed via KGS. Watch out for more detailed announcements when plans have been finalised.

Andrew Kay, 4d South London, added a ninth title to his current collection by winning the Bracknell Tournament. Only one other player won all three games and that was Daniel Peace, 12k Oxford. Jil Segerman won the 13x13 with 2/2 and Jim Clare won the problem competition as the only entry. The Black Rabbits won the team prize and Paul Barnard won the caption competition. 26 players took part.

Results

Central London's Florian Borchers (3k) won the Cambridge Bar-Low on tie-break from Roger Daniel (5k Central London) and Juan Leonardo Martinez-Hurtado (5k Cambridge), all on 3 out of 4. The Junior prize went to Melchior Chui (12k) from Cambridge. 11 players took part.

Results

The Candidates' was held over the May Bank Holiday weekend at ISH in London. 22 players took part. The best players were Andrew Kay (6 wins), Felix Wang (5 wins), Desmond Cann, Andrew Simons, David Ward, Alex Selby, Nick Krempel, Chong Han and Francis Roads (4 wins). Most of these will hopefully be playing the Challengers' League on the bank holiday weekend in June since there are eight places available as Matthew Macfadyen is not defending his title.

Results

There was a pleasingly high turnout for the 2012 British Go Congress, held again in Durham for the first time since 1996.

On the Friday evening, 30 players gathered in the magnificence of Durham School's dining hall, for the British Lightning. This year held as a five-round handicap Swiss tournament, the last round saw two former Durham players battling it out to win: Andrew Kay (4d, now of South London) was ultimately victorious over Alex Kent (2d, now in Bristol). Results

On Saturday morning 63 players congregated in the more prosaic concrete environment of the Students' Union for the British Open itself. After three rounds of Go, the BGA held its AGM; no doubt reports will be provided by officials, so the important thing to note from the tournament perspective are that the meeting was so unexpectedly short that San Marco's restaurant, booked for a meal for 30 players to follow the AGM, wasn't yet ready when we arrived!

The spring London International Team Tournament was very closely contested this year with Nippon (3 team wins and 8 individual wins) pipping Cambridge (3 team wins and 7 individual wins) in second and China (2 team wins but 8 individual wins) in third. This was a particularly surprising result as China won their first six games whilst Cambridge only managed 2!

In the handicap division South London Go Club won with 4 team wins and 10 individual wins, beating Twickenham with 4 team wins and 9 individual wins into second.

In the Open division only Felix Wang managed to win all 4 games, whilst in the Handicap division Rippei Hayashi, Gerry Gavigan, Colin Maclennan, Dan Peace and Paul Langley all won 4 games and extra prizes.

Overall 36 players in 12 teams took part and two divisions took part.

Results

The Wanstead team of Francis Roads, Adan Mordcovich, Richard Leedham-Green and Roger Daniel only lost one game to win the Thames Valley Team Tournament. Second was the home team, West Surrey, with Bracknell third and Lottie's Lovers from Swindon fourth.

Results