Former world champion, Seo Bongsu 9 dan, declares the 19th LG Cup officially open.

The main draw of the 19th LG Cup kicked off on June 9, 2014 at the Lakai Sandpine Resort in Korea.

A new wave?

A few years ago, we wrote about China’s ‘Tiger Cub’ generation, who were born in the 90s and, by now, have well and truly made their mark on the Go scene.

If anything, the remarkable results of 2013 could be summarized as ‘the year of the Chinese Tiger Cubs’.

This year, Li Weiqing 1p broke through to the preliminaries, to rub shoulders with the big guns in the main draw.

Like us, this next fact will probably make most readers feel their age; Li was born in the year 2000 and only turned pro last year!

14 year old Li Weixing 1 dan fought his way through to the round of 32. He was born in the year 2000.

Note that this isn’t even the first appearance of a pro born after 2000 at an international tournament. That honor went to Korea’s Shin Jinseo 2p and China’s Li Ke 1p, also both born in 2000, at the 2nd Bailing Cup earlier this year.

During his pre-match interview, Li, who had been paired against former wunderkind, Park Junghwan 9p, didn’t think his chances were particularly good, but looked forward to learning from the stronger Park.

Park certainly wasted no time securing himself a spot in the next round, in 146 moves.

Li Weiqing (right) had a good run. Unfortunately for him, Park Junghwan 9 dan put a stop to it in the round of 32, as Seo Bongsu watched on.

Where’s Gu Li?

Gu Li 9p was a notable absence in this year’s main draw. Unfortunately for Gu’s fans, he was defeated by An Kukhyun 4p in the final round of this year’s preliminary tournament.

Gu has played in 10 consecutive LG Cups since 2004, a record only surpassed by Lee Sedol 9p (15 consecutive appearances with 17 appearances in total), Lee Changho 9p (13 consecutive appearances) and Choi Cheolhan 9p (11 consecutive appearances).

Full results

• Xie Erhao 2p (China) defeated An Kukhyun 4p (Korea)
• Tang Weixing 9p (China) defeated Yuki Satoshi 9p (Japan)
• Byun Sangil 3p (Korea) defeated Liao Xingwen 5p (China)
• An Dongxu 5p (China) defeated Yamashita Keigo 9p (Japan)
• Li Zhe 6p (China) defeated Sun Li 5p (China)
• Ding Shixiong 1p (China) defeated Lin Zhihan 9p (Taiwan)
• Tuo Jiaxi 9p (China) defeated Ida Atsushi 8p (Japan)
• Xie He 9p (China) defeated Cho U 9p (Japan)
• Park Younghun 9p (Korea) defeated Piao Wenyao 9p (China)
• Kang Dongyun 9p (Korea) defeated Li Xuanhao 5p (China)
• Chen Yaoye 9p (China) defeated An Hyoungjun 4p (Korea)
• Kim Jiseok 9p (Korea) defeated Zhou Ruiyang 9p (China
• Fan Tingyu 9p (China) defeated Lee Sedol 9p (Korea)
• Park Junghwan 9p (Korea) defeated Li Weiqing 1p (China)
• Shi Yue 9p (China) defeated Kim Dongho 4p (Korea)
• Choi Cheolhan (Korea) defeated Mi Yuting 9p (China)

Competitors at the 19th LG Cup.

Coming up: The round of 16

The players will have one day to enjoy the facilities Lakai Sandpine Resort, before play resumes on June 11. Stay tuned for updates on the results. The pairings for the next round are:

• Fan Tingyu vs Kang Dongyun
• Tang Weixing vs Park Junghwan
• Xie Erhao vs Ding Shixiong
• An Dongxu vs Park Younghun
• Tuo Jiaxi vs Byun Sangil
• Shi Yue vs Chen Yaoye
• Li Zhe vs Kim Jiseok

The LG Cup

The LG Cup is a major international Go tournament. It started in 1996 and the prize money is currently 300 million Won. The runner up receives 100 million Won.

The main draw of 32 players is part invitational, comprising of 5 Korean players, 5 Chinese players, 4 Japanese players, 1 Taiwanese player and including the previous year’s winner and runner up.

The rest of the main draw is determined through a preliminary tournament. The format is single knockout, with the final played as a best of 3 games.

The tournament is sponsored by LG Electronics, a multinational consumer electronics company whose headquarters are in South Korea.

The time limit is 3 hours and 5 x 40 sec byo-yomi for each player.
each player.

19th LG Cup photos

Game records

Lee Sedol vs Fan Tingyu

[Embedded SGF File]

Xie He vs Cho U

[Embedded SGF File]

Mi Yuting vs Choi Cheolhan

[Embedded SGF File]

Zhou Ruiyang vs Kim Jiseok

[Embedded SGF File]

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Lee Sedol 9p was involved in another quadruple ko on June 5, 2014. This time in a game with Jiang Weijie 9p, in the Chinese A League.

The referee declared the game a draw at move 276 and an immediate rematch took place. Jiang Weijie won the rematch by resignation.

That face: Lee Sedol (left) and Jiang Weijie’s game ended in a quadruple ko.

A different kind of quadruple ko

This quadruple ko was quite different to the one in Lee Sedol’s game with Gu Li 9p in 2012 – which occured in the group stage of the 17th Samsung Cup.

Last time, there were four separate kos between two entangled groups, and there was no way for either player to avoid the situation.

However, this time, there was a double ko on the right side as well as two half point (endgame) kos elsewhere on the board.

Why did Lee Sedol fight the ko?

Black (Lee) was winning by 1.5 points (not counting the kos).

However, if Lee wanted to avoid the ko fight, he’d have to spend another move on the right side to eliminate the ko, which would lose one point.

Furthermore, White would then be able to win both the half point kos, so Jiang would win the game by half a point.

Lee counted and realized that he couldn’t avoid the ko, without losing the game, so he played the quadruple ko and the game was ruled a draw.

If Lee had been winning the game by a margin of 2.5 points or more, he would have been able to avoid the quadruple ko and still win the game.

Lee Sedol 9 dan and Jiang Weijie 9 dan play a rematch after their quadruple ko game.

The Chinese A League

Lee Sedol is the team captain for Guangxi Province in the Chinese A League. He plays in the Chinese Weiqi League as what they call a ‘mercenary’ (what we might call an import in English). Jiang Weijie is also the captain of his team, Shandong Province.

This is the second drawn game in the history of Chinese A League. There was a triple ko between Gu Li 9p and Li Zhe 6p in 2011 and it was also declared a draw.

Lightning strikes twice

This sort of triple or quadruple ko (which voids a game under some rulesets) is extremely rare, but this is already the second such event involving Lee Sedol.

There’s a great deal of complicated, large scale fighting in Lee’s games, and that might increase the likelihood of these sorts of shapes arising.

For further reading, here’s a link to Younggil’s commentary of the last quadruple ko game, between Lee Sedol and Gu Li.

In 2013, there was also an ‘Eternal Life’ game between Ahn Seongjun 5p and Choi Cheolhan 9p, which some readers might be interested in.

Jiang Weijie: Happy to win the rematch against Lee Sedol.

Is a triple ko or quadruple ko unlucky?

Traditionally a triple ko is thought to be unlucky. This is because of a story (and it probably is just a story) involving a triple ko game between Honinbo Sansa and Kashio Rigen (also probably not a real person) in 1582.

Supposedly, a game which ended in a triple ko was played in the presence of the warlord Nobunaga. Shortly afterwards, one of Nobunaga’s allies turned against him, surrounded the monastery where he was staying and Nobunaga lost his life.

There’s historical evidence for the part about Nobunaga and his ally, but not for the story about Honinbo Sansa and the triple ko game.

According to John Fairbairn, a well known Go historian, the story was most likely a construction of later Go players. In The Go Companion he wrote:

“The famous ‘Legend of the Triple Ko at Honnoji Temple’ is almost certainly an invention of the later Go world. There is no historical evidence for it in text where it should appear, such as the Nobunaga Koki, the annals of Nobunaga’s reign. The first reference to the legend was over 100 years later…” – The Go Companion, page 195.

However, the story lives on and there’s even a supposed game record featuring a triple ko floating around on the internet.

Because of this, a triple ko is still regarded as unlucky, at least in Asia.

A quadruple ko is only slightly different, but one thing we can say for sure is that it’s unlucky for Lee Sedol. In both the games he’s played which involved a quadruple ko, the referee intervened and he lost the mandated rematch.

Game record – Quadruple ko

Lee Sedol vs Jiang Weijie

[Embedded SGF File]

Here’s the link to the rematch, which Jiang Weijie won, for anyone who’s interested.

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It’s not every day that our favorite game appears on the homepage of the world’s most popular search engine, but today is Honinbo Shusaku’s 185th birthday!

Google celebrated the occasion, in their usual style, by changing their logo to a drawing of Shusaku with Go stones spelling out the word ‘Google’. Here’s what it looked like:

A ‘Google Doodle‘ celebrating Honinbo Shusaku’s 185th Birthday.

Honinbo Shusaku

Shusaku was among the greatest Go players of the 19th century (born June 6, 1829). He’s most famous for his record of 19 consecutive wins in the annual castle games.

In a time of no komi games, Shusaku was practically invincible when playing as Black. There’s an amusing and often repeated anecdote that once, when a friend asked him about the result of a game, he simply replied, “I had Black.”

Shusaku’s Go style was relatively calm, compared to other players of the time, and he was highly skilled in knowing how much he had to do to win. If he was winning, he wrapped up the game with simple and clear moves. It’s only in games where he was behind, or where his opponent overplayed, that he suddenly revealed his power.

Unfortunately, Shusaku died of cholera at the early age of 33, so his career was cut very short. He was heir to the house of Honinbo – the strongest of the Go houses (academies) at the time – but never assumed its leadership.

Many Go players, including me, have replayed the collected games of Shusaku multiple times. More than 150 years later, there’s still a great deal for most players to learn from Shusaku’s games.

That’s one of the great things about Go – each game is a work of art, which distills the knowledge and experience of both players into something more or less permanent. Beautiful games can be passed from one generation to the next on a single piece of paper (or these days, in a file). See one example below.

Outside of Asia, commentaries of Shusaku’s games have mostly been available through John Power’s excellent compilation Invincible : The Games of Shusaku.

The ghost of Shusaku also made an appearance as the fictional charater ‘Sai’ in the popular anime and manga Hikaru no Go.

Happy birthday Shusaku!

After a write up like that, it wouldn’t do to forget to say happy birthday. So please join me in saying, happy birthday 185th Shusaku!

If you’d like to do something to celebrate, perhaps you can replay the Ear-reddening Game by yourself or with your Go playing friends. I’ve posted it below.

The Ear-reddening Game

The game below is called the Ear-reddening Game and is probably the most famous of Shusaku’s games. Shusaku played it when he was 17 years old, against (quasi-Meijin) Inoue Gennan Inseki. Shusaku was still known as Kuwahara Shusaku at the time (it was customary for Japanese people to change their names when they achieved certain titles or were recognized as masters of certain skills).

Gennan Inseki was one of the strongest players (probably one of the top two) of the previous generation and had a sharp, flexible Go style (just my opinion). I really enjoy his games and they’re a treasure trove of tesuji and subtle tactical details.

In this game, Shusaku was tricked when playing a new variation of the Taisha Joseki in the lower right corner. Black 25 should have been at Black 29 – something that’s in many books these days but wasn’t yet well known at the time. Shusaku was behind up behind up to Black 61.

Black 127 in this game is a famous move which gives the game its name. It’s said that a doctor, who was watching the game at the time, said that he thought Gennan would lose after this move was played. Asked why he thought so, he said:

“I don’t know much about Go, but when Shusaku played 127, Gennan’s ears flushed red. This is a sign that he had been upset. This move must have taken him by surprise.” – Invincible, page 106.

Black 127 occupies a key point for influence, lightly assisting Black’s four weak stones at the bottom, erasing White’s right side influence to some extent, aiming to invade on the left side and developing Black’s moyo at the top.

It’s a move which has been discussed endlessly, will probably keep being discussed for a long time, and may be discussed more in the comments below. So let’s leave it at that for now and have a look at the game:

Shusaku vs Gennan Inseki – 1846

[Embedded SGF File]

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