Amateur vs Pro : How stronger are they ?

Hi !

I'm glad to publish THIS post today. I had the chance, last night, to witness one of the best games I've ever watched. Amazing, thrilling...It shook me, really.

Black player is a professionnal ( yuiko(P) on tygem) and white is probably a strong amateur (gogogo6).
The game is a tesuji festival. By both. But yukio's moves are extremely sharp and so was her reading.

Yes, her reading, it's a she. I've heard a lot that "women can't match men" and "that's why they have a specific Meijin" and all. Maybe. But I don't share this opinion.

I made a little of research, in fact, quite exhaustively - I checked every pro pictures from the Kansai Ki In and Nihon Ki In websites, to find out who she is - but I didn't find her. There is no "Yuki" or "Yukio" on either of those websites, and the picture she uses on tygem doesn't match any of those that I could see on the websites either.

What amazed me in this game, is not exactly the sharpness of the moves played, rather than the time used to spot them. All of those sharp and severe moves were played in less than 2 seconds. The second half of the game is played during byoyomi, 30s/move, but yukio never used more than a few seconds to play her brilliant tesujis. As a result, despite great fights, the amateur player is completely outmatched.

I tried to made a fully detailled review, so you will see - there are more variations than I would usually share.

Enjoy the game !

Pericles

ASR Series Game 4.

Hello !

Yesterday, I made a quick presentation of "Tenchi Meisatsu", and Ben Zen (your latest post on your trip to Hong Kong is just fantastic !)  mentionned another Go-related movie in the comments. The movie is called "Tokyo Newcomer",  seems to be about a foreign Go player going to Japan but, as he doesn't speak the language, it makes it very difficult for him to communicate, until he meets an old woman (Go player as well ?)... I managed to retrieve this movie, and will watch it today (and maybe  make a review here tomorrow, if you liked the latest ?)

Another interesting collectable I found yesterday is this song "The game of Go", by Chris Linn, I'm sure you'll love it...

Also, today is the day for the ASR commented game. I picked one at random, as neither I or Climu received any games. Don't be shy ! I had already commented on alpha, beta, gamma games, I believe, so I chose one from Delta class this time. It's played by hvk, #1 and zoup #2 who respectively have scored 40,25 and 22 points as of now (quite a lot, considering it's only April 16th today)
Hvk is about 1d, and zoup is 5k.

Hope you'll enjoy the review, like always !

Pericles

Tenchi Meisatsu

Hi !

Litteraly "Insight into the universe", the title for this movie is a pretty well-chosen one. And why am I talking about a movie ? How is that related to Go, you're asking ?

Well, easy. Listen.

The english title for this movie is "Tenchi, the samurai astronomer". And this astronomer was in fact, no less than Shibukawa Shunkai (1639 - 1715).  You probably never heard that name, did you ? Well, in fact, Shibukawa Shunkai renamed himself  "Yasui Santestu II", after his father. Now it probably starts making sense, doesn't it ?

His father, Yasui Santetsu, founder and head of the Yasui House, which was one of the top 4 major Houses of Go in Japan, along with the Honinbo, Inoue, and Hayashi Houses.

Tenchi Meisatsu, is about the life of his son,who was an excellent Go player himself, just like his father, and a great astronomist, "the japanese Galileo".

Shibukawa Shunkai used many names during his life and was, among others, known as Shibukawa Harumi. For a fully detailled biography, I invite you to read this page

Regarding astronomy, Shibukawai has been the discoverer of many things, and a few of his works still remain until today. For instance, he developped a new calendrical system, the Jokyo Calendars , which is now conserved at the National Museum of Nature and Science, in Japan.

He was also the creator of the following papier-maché globe, in 1695 (also conserved in the same Museum)

The movie itself is just great ! I won't spoil any of it by telling you the story yet, but surely, you'll love it. The background music was composed by Joe Hisaishi (one of the top composers from Japan - a world-wide known composer)

You can already watch trailers, and read more about the casting here 

The movie is watchable online (streaming) on DramaCool website  (I can't guarantee the quality of their subtitles though as this is not the version I watched - If you like their work, drop them a word, they deserve to be encouraged)

The movie lasts 2h21, have your popcorn ready for the show and  dive into historical Japan !

Here are also a few screenshots :

As a bonus, I tried to find the game where the two protagonists start on Tengen, so that I could review it for the blog, but I couldn't find it. If you have it, please share it with me :) And I will review it ^^

To keep you waiting and so that you can be "inspired" by those masters' plays, here is the album of the movie. Listen to it online, on Deezer . I cannot share the archive here, for copyrights matter ..... 

Also, another game by Yasui Santetsu where he starts with Tengen against Honinbo Dosaku.

Pericles

Breaking news

Hi !

I've been a bit lazy these days.
But not completely. I have some good news.

From the statistics I get for this blog, I am apparently read and followed by a majority of french players. This is really good to see that my english reviews are appreciated, even by french players.

So here are the "breaking news". Since yesterday, I was granted a "Teacher" account on KGS, so I am likely to use audio more from now on, online for a start. And maybe later, when I get used to it, I'll start recording my teaching games in audio/video too. I certainly need to get used to it - avoid switching from a window to another when recording... I did a test yesterday, and it was harder than expected.

I played a game against a 5k, recording my comments in audio and video. But it is REALLY tough to explain things without showing any variations. You have to be crystal clear, or the listener might not fully understand what important point you are trying to explain. It's a good exercise.

I used to listen to dsaun a lot when he was still stronger than me. And it was awesome, but I never thought how difficult it was to use "voice" during reviews. That's a high 5 for dsaun (and all teachers who are used to teaching with audio)
Expect to see some videos soon :)

Another good news. I started teaching for the "Go On" community (Rooms > Social > Forum Go On). The community here is mostly french, but their forum is GREAT, really. It's full of lectures, resources, tips for kyu players, and I can only welcome the english speakers to join . Their forum also has an english-speaking subforum already- a bit empty at the moment, and that's a pity.

If they created this english section, I assume they are willing to expand and share their knowledge with a world-wide community. Not so many of the french players can speak english fluently, unfortunately. But a few certainly can. I am one of them (and feel more comfortable in english than french, to be honest). For now, they have gathered no less than hundreds of lectures (in video, sgf, topics and so on) and they are only in french. On the long run, I intend to translate them all and share them in the english-subforum.

As far as I know, there are plenty of small social french rooms on KGS. This one is basically the only one where I'm staying. If I had to make a comparison, it would be that they are as influent as the english "ASR" room. They don't run a ladder (maybe one day ?), but their system is help and lectures-oriented and I strongly recommend you to join if you are willing to learn. The more demand there will be for english lectures, the faster they will come, that's for sure.

So, hurry and join, introduce yourself, and ask for more in the forum :)
Even for english players, whereas Lifein19x19 is full of "blabla", the "Go On" has the sole purpose of teaching, sharing knowledge, helping others. That's another good reason to join.

Pericles

ASR Series Game 2 and 3

Hi !

I received 2 games from the ASR this week. So I reviewed them both (instead of the previously announced 1 game per week)

First game below is between klaas 6k and GreyGhost, about 4k (Gamma class)

The second one is between Greenbean 1k vs Compgo74 1k (Alpha class)

Greenbean and Compgo74 played the micro chinese fuseki, which I commented upon here . Feel free to take a look for more variations and details.

Also, another good website for that fuseki (and others) is Cho Hye Yeon's blog.

I strongly recommend reading her website. Cho Hye Yeon is a female 9dan professionnal. Her reviews and explanations are always insightful. She is one of the very few pros dedicated to teaching amateurs via a blog, sharing new trends, new variations. If you haven't done so yet, her site is certainly worth bookmarking.

Klaas and greyhost went through the game for review already. And I' m glad I was sent the SGF that contains their questions and variations. That helped me a lot to know what questions SDK are asking or what they are unsure of.

For the next times, it would be wonderful if you could do the same. If there is a particular pattern you are uncertain about, if there is anything that you want me to focus upon, when reviewing, just write it on the SGF.

Hope you'll enjoy the reviews !

Pericles

Xia Chenkun to rule the Chinese Mingren !

Hi !

It's been a few days since I last published a game, I've been quite busy with the week-end.

So now, there are plenty of outstanding games to watch, and some "new" pros to discover.
The game I'm showing you today is a game played by Xia Chenkun (aka Xia Jiankun). He is not so famous yet, I must say - he is not even listed on the official list of chinese professionnal players, though he has been a pro for a couple of years.
There is not much of an history about him yet as he didn't play so many tournaments or didn't win any major titles YET.
You will see, however, that he certainly has the ability to win them.

Xia Chenkun (left) / Kong Jie (right)


Last year, he was eliminated as early as the first prelim round. But he is back this year, and faced Chang Hao 9p, for the first prelim round, whom he eliminated ! Unfortunately, I couldn't find the game yet. (I certainly will, though)
For the second round of the Mingren, he was paired with Yu Bin (another top 9p), and he won that game as well ! You can see the game here

So, he qualified for the main tournament. And until now, he defeated Dang Yifei, 4p,  Shi Yue, 9p, and Kong Jie 9p.

He won them all. And he qualified for the semifinals in which he will be playing Zhou Ruiyang, 9p (the other semifinals game will be between Jiang Weije 9p and Lian Xiao 7p)

His records in this tournament is really impressive, as he defeated four experienced 9p straight. The game I'm showing here is his game versus Kong Jie, which gave him access to the semifinals. Enjoy the show !

Self atari in the Finals of the Female Kuksu - Game 3 of 3 !

Hey,

 I created this blog a bit less than two weeks ago, and it will be reaching 1000 hits by the end of the day already. It's really a pleasure to see that you all enjoy the reviews and the Go News (thank you all for your feedback !)

 A strange thing happened yesterday, in a pro game, I'm not even sure I should review it here : A self atari. Again ? yes. This time it was in a Title game tough. The game was between Kim Jaeyoung 1p and Park Jieun 9p, it was the last in the best-of-3 Finals of the Female Kuksu, in Korea. The record was 1-1 before that...

 The game was really beautiful (you can find the Final series below, uncommented)The flow of the game was very natural, since the early fuseki, and in the end, Park Jieun would win by 2,5 points, achieveing the Kuksu with a score of 2-1. If only she hadn't self-atari'ed. After 6 hours of play, she was probably losing focus, having counted multiple times that there was nothing left for her opponent to catch up, and she finalled filled a ko, which happened to put herself in a capturable position.

Park Jieun 9p (left)
Kim Youngjae 1p (right)











This is definitely not the first time we've seen such a sad ending, in a pro game. But as far as I recall, this is the first it happened in a Title Game, more especially, in a "last of the last" Finals game. A pity, really.

 Another interesting news. Gu Li was defeated at Round 1, in the 27th Mingren (chinese Meijin), by Jiang Weije, completely outread from the early beginning, thanks to a brilliant play by Jiang that Gu Li had probably overlooked (the descent on first line, on the right side - see the game below too). 

 Also, I'm preparing a lecture, which will be an interactive one, hopefully. For that purpose I prepared you a sample of "Irisxww" 's games, a strong 9d on tygem who always plays unusual moves (and surely unexpected). This will be the topic of the lecture. "How to react against an unseen-before move?". 

What would be great is that : 

1/ you take a look at the sgf (you can even download it) 

2/ Use your own records in which you had to face really strange, unexpected moves or variations, to add some more samples to the sgf (or create anther sgf) 

3/ Write down your thoughts about those moves, yes, all your thoughts. From the "omfg what the hell is that?" and the next thoughts. This will help me see if your "thinking process" is correct, and will make it easier for me to help you correct it. 

 This is sort of a homework, yes. Play the game, take 30 minutes to remember unexpected joseki variations, seemingly bad-moves, anything odd. And take 5 minutes for each to explain how you'd react, why / why not, how and so on. And if you don't remember seeing those kind of moves in your on games, use the sample materials in the sgf below. This way, when we'll be organizing the live lectures, it will be easier for all of us, to be prepared efficiently. Hope you'll do it :)

Send me your "homeworks" by email : Periclesbaduk[at]gmail.com or load them on KGS so I can save them :)

 Here is the small archive containing Gu Li's game, and the 3 games of the Female Kuksu Finals 

And click here to download the sgf about "unexpected moves"

Pericles