British Congress returns to Scotland

The British Congress returned to Edinburgh after 15 years, this time hosted by the New Melville Bridge Club. With leafy Corstorphine and Edinburgh Zoo as a backdrop, the venue offered a quiet and spacious setting for a long weekend of Go. Fifty-seven players, matching last year’s turnout, gathered to make up one of the strongest player fields in recent memory.

The Congress kicked off on Friday night with the traditional British Lightning Championship. Twenty-six players were split into six round-robin groups, battling fiercely for a place in the top 12 knockout bracket. Congratulations to Dohyup Kim (8d Seoul), who emerged as champion after a close final, edging out runner-up Yaoling Yang (7d Bristol) and third-place Haoran Peng (1d Lancaster). Details of all match-ups are available online.

The tough competition continued through the weekend, with the bar for the British Open set at 5d. Ultimately, Quan Wan (7d, Manchester) claimed the title of British Open Champion, finishing with 5 wins and narrowly beating Yaoling Yang, also with 5 wins, on SOS tiebreak. A special mention goes to Chenhe Yuan (5d), the reigning British Youth Open Champion, for his impressive victory over Dohyup Kim in the final round, thus settling the rankings with Dohyup in third place and securing fourth for Chenhe. The top seven players split a cash prize pool of around £500. Link to full results and photo gallery.

Also finishing with five wins were Daniele Gentili (5k), John Armitage (9k Lancaster), and William Lindved (11k Edinburgh), each of whom bagged a giant Easter egg for their efforts. Every player had a shot at a prize, with each win earning a raffle ticket for a surprise draw. Six remaining Easter eggs were raffled off to enthusiastic applause.

Finally, for the third time running, Peikai Xue was awarded the Terry Stacey Trophy for achieving the most above-bar wins across the past year.