Rodney(grauniad): also:

Matthew(matjetius):

John(jackoheart1):

After the original journal report, i posted a request for photos on the ausgo mailing list which included the two known photo collections at that time (Rodney and Matthew).

Competition will take place on the 3rd and 4th of March. Needless to say, its going to be some very tough matches, the Argentina rep, for example, is the well known Danigabi 6d on KGS. I’ll try to do some live blogging while I’m there, so stay tuned!

Here are the albums that i have found so far.
John Hardy
Matthew Crossman
Shamim Khan general
Shamim Khan – prize winners
Shamim Khan – general – players
spgo on facebook

If you have photos from the Nationals, please upload them and tell us about it!

Neville Smythe has posted some photos from the 2009 ACT Championships on Picasa. If you have any photos around from an Australian or New Zealand tournament, please upload them to Picasa or Flickr and share with the community, or mail them to us, who will do it for you. :)

Two of the strongest players at the 2009 Korean Ambassador's Cup in Sydney

Organised by the Sydney Korean Baduk Association, the venue was as usual the Shilla Restaurant in Campsie and included a delicious Korean lunch. Our “pro-in-residence”, Younggil An 6p, was in attendance and provided commentaries for the players as well as helping with the organisation. Younggil has been living in Sydney for the last year, and is hugely popular with everyone who has benefitted from his generous and lucid commentaries and teaching games — I am comforted by his style of commenting along the lines of “Yes, that’s a way to play; another way might be …” instead of the put-down “What! You can’t play that ridiculous move!. You should play…” (Younggil will be coming to the Nationals in Melbourne, October 3-4, so come along and meet him.)

Play at the Korean Ambassador's Cup, 2009

Section A had a major upset in round 1, with 5 dan Joseph Choi defeating Yiming Guo 7d by 1.5 points. By the end if round 4, it was looking good for Miao Zhao (2008 AGA Champion) on 4 wins; the other strong contenders Guyu Liu (winner of both the the Sydney and ACT 2009 Championships) and David He (2009 Australian WAGC representative) were on 3 wins. But the final round produced two very exciting games, with Guyu Liu defeating Miao Zhao, and Yiming defeating David He in an upset. In the end Yiming, Guyu and Miao each had 4 wins, the same SoS, and only 1 point of difference in SoDoS in each case to determine the top 3 places. Yiming becomes our representative for the KPMC.

The winners at the 2009 Korean Ambassador's Cup in Sydney - and friends

At the end of the thirtieth World Amateur Go Championships on Saturday, the Australian representative David He 7d of New South Wales placed thirteenth with five wins and three losses (sum of opponents scores 39), and the New Zealand representative Longyang Li 4d placed twenty-first with the same record (but an SOS of 33). David lost his fifth round game against Juyong Koh 7d of Canada, won the sixth against Dimas Cabre Chacon 4d from Spain, won the seventh against Paisal Thunthaduluk 4d from Thailand, and lost the last against Korea’s Shin-wan Yoo 6d. Longyang in his last four rounds won against against Israel and Hungary, and lost one of the remaining rounds.

IGF Oceania director Neville Smythe was on the spot, and has posted some pictures (above). He wrote at the time:

David was disappointed to lose by 0.5 to Singapore, he was 10 points ahead for until near the end when Tan pulled off something desperate. He also lost to Canada after a good game; the Canadians always seem to be our nemesis (and I’m afraid he may also be losing at the moment to Thailand, and I think he must be feeling discouraged). LongYang Li from NZ had a very good win against Hungary, who had beaten USA.

Shortly after this, David He did indeed pull off a win against his Thai opponent, leaving him to face the second-placing player in the tournament. China took first place, and Hong Kong third, with Finland’s Antti Tormanen taking the Shizuo Asada Fighting Spirit Prize. Full results are posted by the Nihon Ki-in here, kifu of selected interesting games here.

This correspondent has somehow forgotten which day she attended at the NEC Go Tournament (blame it on assignments clogging up the brain space). She has also missed the start of the day of attendance by rolling back into sleep (again, blame it on assignments). Nevertheless when she did finally arrive, it was a cold slightly grey afternoon and just at the end of second games. This year the NEC Cup was conveniently held in the city of Melbourne itself at the gorgeous Vibe Savoy Hotel on Collins. Many players (the room was packed!) from around Australia convened in the grand hall with its gold and mirrored walls and dangling chandeliers and there were trophies, shiny and new, awaiting the winners just off to the side. I’m 98.899% sure all had a resoundingly good time as I made my way among the bowed heads and the sounds of clicking stones and the occasional laughter and winces.
As with every go tournament and go meeting, it’s obvious that this game is enjoyed by all ages and both genders, from different walks of life, and always somehow ending with a smile and a clap to the back. As games ended and points tallied up, many would group around to discuss strategies or alternate plays, going over difficulties and good decisions. Mr Kawamura, a visiting go professional from the Nihon Ki-in, with his gracious and mild mannered smile, also often made the rounds to interact with everyone as well as offering an interesting simul play with 6 young players of various ranks.
Certainly it was a successful and exciting NEC Cup in its 13th year, there was even a 50 point seki (mutual life) which I missed seeing! Well, there’s always next time ;)

Congratulations to NEC Cup top 5 placements:

Division 1 (3 dan +)
Daniel Shen 5d
Yoon Kee Jeong
Wei Xu
Kazuya Miki
Shen Feng Zhou

Division 2 (4 kyu-2 dan)
Tai Sheng Wang
Long Pan
Trithang Tran
Adam Harley
Kin Lung Mak

Division 3 (15kyu-5 kyu)
Greg Wallace
Bryce Steward
Alan Ho
Wai Chon Ho
Evan Wallace

And to all current and prospective players, see you all at next year’s Cup =)
Also look forward to the upcoming Australian Go Nationals to be held in Melbourne this year!

More photos can be found at SPGO on Facebook.

On 18 – 19 April 2009, Brisbane Go Club met with members of the Keio Old Boys group for friendly go and social activities. The venue, a large modified residence at Stretton in Brisbane’s southern outskirts, is known as Good Hope Residence by its owner and tour guide, Mr. Kanazawa. The group of eleven go players, led by Mr. Kiga, ranged in strength from 2 dan to 7 dan and consequently represents quite a challenge to the lower ranked BGC players.

This was the sixth annual visit by the Keio group, and it is always a popular activity for the BGC members. On Saturday, BGC President Dr. Mark Bell escorted the group to a day at the races, which has proved a popular acivity with our Japanese friends. On Saturday evening we played social go and enjoyed a delicious seafood dinner hosted by the Keio group. After dinner, Mr. Nomura 7 dan kindly acted as sensei, and showed us an interesting game played by him no less than 57 years ago! It is amazing that the game record still exists after such a long time, and shows clearly how much go players revere the game.

On Sunday, we were treated to a delicious lunch of Japanese soba noodles. This was followed by the now traditional team match between Keio and BGC. We matched their eleven players in two rounds of play (handicap) , and after the smoke had cleared, Keio had won by 12 – 10. The exciting final game between Matthew Crossman and Mr. Kamota was watched by many, as the result would decide whether BGC could draw the match. It was not to be – a slip in the endgame saw Mr. Kamota win by resignation. After that, we all enjoyed dinner of fresh prawns and salad hosted by BGC.

On the BGC team, the 2009 Queensland Go Champion, Kevin Jiang 6D, matched well with the Keio top players for a 1 – 1 record. Dr. Mark Bell also scored 1 – 1 .  Matthew Crossman is a recent addition to the BGC, and has achieved his current rank of 1D after just 15 months of playing go.  Jeremy Wen 1D aged 15 also scored a win in his game. Jeremy has rocketed up the ranks in the last two years, and he also is a star of the future. The Keio boys had better look out for Matthew and Jeremy next year!

The BGC looks forward to next year’s visit for more go fun with our Keio friends.

An Young Gil was also kind enough to provide us with two reviews of games from the event, which will be appearing in the printable version of the Journal. Stay tuned.

A more comprehensive report on the Nationals (and more pretty photos!) will be in the coming issue of the Journal proper, so stay tuned!

Reflections of Go