16-Dec: London MindSports Centre moves a step forwardYesterday, 15th December, we purchased the ex-Salvation Army citadel in Ravenscourt Park, to turn it into the London MindSports Centre, for £1.7M. The purchase was made by a company set up for the specific purpose of
purchasing and owning the building, MindSports Property Limited (MPL).
I, Toby Manning, am a Director of this company. The T Mark Hall Foundation YCBC's premises in Goldhawk Road (the location of the last two London Open Go... |
09-Dec: UK Beat Switzerland to Claim Third WinIn the third round of the B-League for 2020-2021 the UK played and beat Switzerland. There was a big gap in time between Jon Diamond's win and that of Daniel Hu, with that last game lasting not much short of three hours when the opponent's cuckoo clock reminded him it was bed time and he resigned. This kept the UK team in top position, with Italy beating Finland to move up to second place, a point behind UK. Daniel Hu wrote: I won by resignation against John Walch. This was the last game to finish, with plenty of tiring calculations. My opponent made a mistake in the upper left 3-3 invasion fight, losing 2 cutting stones early on after... |
07-Dec: British Youth, Held Online, Won by Sam BarnettThe 2020 British Youth Go Championship (BYGC) featured 36 competitors, aged from 7 to 17. It was held over six rounds in the BGA Youth Group on OGS. The youth champions title stayed at Cheadle Hulme School, as did the Castledine Trophy for the best team, when Sam Barnett won all six games to take the title. Edinburgh's James Gillespie's Primary School was the top junior school. Section winners (runners-up) and other notable results are shown below. Results
U18: Jayden Ng (Yuji Chen) Youth... |
29-Nov: Alison Bexfield Playing in World Women'sAlison writes: I am playing in the World Amateur Women's Go Championship. There are 33 players from 33 countries taking part. The top seeds from China, Japan, Korea and Chinese Taipei (Taiwan) do not need to play preliminary rounds. All other countries have been put in four geographical groups to play knock out preliminary rounds. I am in the European group and there are four places available in the preliminary rounds from 15 countries. The tournament is played with fast time limits (even for me). It comprise no basic time but byoyomi of ten lots of 30 seconds. So not much scope for lengthy thinking on any single move. It is also being played on the wbaduk server. It was a good thing I did some practice on this in... |
18-Nov: UK Go Top of League Beating SwedenIn the second match of the new season in the B-League, the UK played and beat Sweden by three games to one. It was a long evening for the spectators as the top board was scheduled one hour after the others and that game lasted three hours. Previous league leaders Germany lost four-nil to Italy (including two no-shows) and so the UK moved up to first place, the only team to win both matches so far. Daniel Hu wrote: I had a toughish game against Charlie Åkerblom, spending too much time thinking in the opening and not with a great result. I tried playing a bit more solidly with my shape. My opponent made a largish moyo but I got out with weak... |
15-Nov: BGJ 193 Now Available in Members' AreaThe Autumn 2020 edition of the BGJ is now available for members to read. |
14-Nov: UK Youth Team Win Against France 3-2The UK youth team has played its first match in the European Youth Go Team Championship. We were drawn against the relatively strong French team so we knew we needed to field our strongest team. Unfortunately Ryan was not able to play in the U12 section, but Lea Wong stepped up making her debut appearance for the team. On paper we were in with a chance although it looked likely to depend on some very even games, but with grades potentially being out of date due to lockdown it was going to be tough. Lea played first on board 5 and did well to secure a win by 2.5 points. Jacob stepped up next on board 1 playing a French 3 dan. I watched his game and it was a masterclass... |
12-Nov: New Videos from London Go CentreThe London Go Centre continues to add teaching videos to its extensive collection on their YouTube channel. Latest uploads include reviews by Daniel Hu of the games in the Adult-Youth match and the first of a series by professional Mateusz Surma: Fuseki Insights. |
08-Nov: Announcing This Year's UK Youth Go TeamI am pleased to announce our UK Youth Go Team for this year's European Youth Go Team Championship is as follows: U20 players U16 players U12 players This youth team tournament is played over four rounds with five boards in each match of which one must be U20, two U16 and two U12. Despite losing two of our strongest players from last year (Yueran Wang and Bill Shen) to the pressures of sixth form exams... |
01-Nov: UK Youth Beat ColumbiaThe UK youth team celebrated Halloween by playing their first round match in the CCTV World Youth Amateur On-line Weiqi Tournament. Held on the Chinese server called Yike and sponsored by Chinese TV, this new event has 22 teams from around the world taking part on weekends between now and the end of the year. Our first match was against Colombia and was won two games to one. Jayden Ng lost a close game to Juan David Ramirez Jimenez, Scott Cobbold beat Alan Yeray Cortes Sarmiento by resignation and Caleb Monk beat Alen Vasquez Quiroga by 64.5. In the individual junior section, Ryan Zhang did well, narrowly beating Yuki Kouchi of Japan. |
22-Oct: UK Start New Season with a WinIn the first match of the new season of the Pandanet Go European Team Championship B-League the UK beat Belgium three games to one. There were wins for Daniel Hu, Alex Kent and Jamie Taylor, their game reports are below. This placed UK second behind Germany who beat Croatia four-nil and just ahead of Finland who beat Netherlands. Jamie wrote: Against Gabriel Mercier I managed to isolate a nice chunk of stones fairly early on, but then messed up the capture a bit, giving away some nice influence in exchange unnecessarily. I thought I was only a bit ahead after that, but my opponent played some slow moves and let me neutralize the influence to get... |
06-Oct: Ryan Wins UK Go Challenge FinalsThe online youth event for October, held on the afternoon of Sunday 4th, was the delayed finals of the 2019-2020 UK Go Challenge. 33 young players battled over six rounds on 13x13 boards. This time the winner was Ryan Zhang from London. Second was Cyrus Hi Him Shek from Ayrshire and third was Gene Wong from Fern Hill Primary School, on tie-break from Scott Cobbold and Lea Wong (Top Girl). David Baldwin and Caleb Monk, both 11k, notably won five games. Age group winners: Girls U08 Liann Wong |