3rd European Go Grand Slam Tournament

Title: 3rd European Go Grand Slam Tournament
Date: 28th April  - 1st May 2017
Venue: Berlin / Germany, Chinese Culture Center ("Chinesisches Kulturzentrum"), Klingelhöferstraße 21, 10785 Berlin http://c-k-b.eu
Address: Klingelhöferstraße 21, 10785 Berlin

This is an invitation-tournament of the European Go Federation for 12 players with one preliminary round and 3 final rounds. The 4 winners of the 8 participants in the preliminary-round qualify for the three final rounds. Four Professional players, certified by the EGF are already qualified for the final rounds.

Photos by Harry van der Krogt

Pairings / Results

Sponsors:

CEGO
Global Health Care
Sinogo Education
Chinese Culture Center Berlin

Tournament details:

Ruleset: Chinese rules, 7.5 Komi
Basic time: 150 minutes
Overtime: One minute 5 times

There is live commentary on Youtube and Twitch by Yoon Young-sun. It's not from the beginning but later when the games are already more advanced.

The first 4 boards will be broadcasted on KGS
GrandSlamA, GrandSlamB, GrandSlamC, GrandSlamD

• Each player must be citizen of an EGF member-country for at least 10 years
• Each player must be "active" in the EGD between 1st April 2016 and 31st March 2017

• 5 Professionals certified by EGF (Ilya, Ali, Mateusz, Pavol, Artem) - definite
• 2 players from Bonus-Point list, yearend 2016 (Thomas, Viktor) - definite
• 2 players from EGD plus Bonus Points 2016 (Alexandre, Andrii ) - definite
• 2 players from Grand Slam Qualification Tournament 2017 (Tanguy, Nikola) - definite
• 1 player by wildcard used by CEGO (Catalin) - definitive

For deciding who of the 5 EGF-Pros will not be qualified for the 2nd round of the Grand Slam Tournament in Berlin we use of course the Bonus Point List Yearend 2016. There we see Mateusz on 5th place, so he has to play the first round (last year Artem had to play in first round).

Participating Players

Name : Ilya Shikshin Nationality : Russia EGF Rank : 1P My name is Ilya Shikshin. I was born in 1990 in Kazan city, Russia. My father Valery Shikshin works as a Go-teacher. He has many students who showed good results at Russian and European championships. My elder sister Svetlana plays Go for many years. She studied Go in Korea and she is 3-dan professional. So Go is my family game. Mostly I studied Go at home. But I also had several trips to Korea to study Go there. With help of Mr. Chun Poong Jho 9p I trained in Korea for more than 1 year in total. My most notable results: Seven times champion of Russia in 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012, 2014, 2015 Three times champion of Europe in 2007, 2010, 2011 Winner of the 1st European Go Grand Slam Tournament in 2015 Three times winner of European Team Championship in 2011, 2012, 2014 Four times winner of European PairGo Championship in 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016 1 dan professional since April 2015. Currently I live in Moscow and work as a sportsman and an executive secretary of Russian Go Federation. I’m looking forward to new achievements and great games at Go.

Name : Mateusz Surma Nationality : Poland EGF Rank : 1P My name is Mateusz Surma. I was born on 3rd September 1995 in Rydultowy in the region of Silesia in Poland. I started to play Go when I was six and half. My dad taught me. In years 2009-2013 I was training Go in South Korea at schools: King's Baduk Dojang, Yang Jae-Ho Baduk Dojang, Choong-Am Baduk Dojang. I spent there altogether 2 years and 5 months. In Poland in the middle school (Gimnazjum nr 1 w Rydultowach) and the high school (Liceum nr 1 w Rydultowach) I had an individual study path. So, I would be training in Korea for 3 months, then go back to Poland and study for school at home. In the middle and high school I had one exam per subject after every term. In 2014, after passing "matura" (an equivalent to A-level, SAT, Abitur, etc.), I managed to qualify to study at the Faculty of Aeronautics and Space Technology at Rzeszow University of Technology. I was about to go to pilotage (as the specialisation), but... Go hit me again. Sixteen people among amateurs with the highest Go rating in Europe were invited for the PRO qualification tournament to Pisa (Italy) in March 2015. I was among them, so I went there, managed to win this tournament and I've become the first Polish player with the PRO title. I've finished the first year at the university. Even though I had one of the highest average grades at the faculty and pretty high chance to get to pilotage, I took one year off, because I was invited to Beijing to study Go at Ge Yuhong Weiqi Academy. I've been training there for 3 months so far (September - December 2015). Probably I won't come back to my university studies, because I realised that Go - the oldest and most difficult board game of the world - is what I'm going to stay with. Some of my biggest achievements are: 1st place in the European Professional Qualifications and obtaining PRO title as the first Polish player in history (2015, Pisa, Italy) 2nd place in the 1st European Grand Slam (2015, Berlin, Germany) 2nd place in the 2nd Silk Road Tournament (2015, Xi'an, China) 2nd place in the 1st European Professional Championship (2016, St.-Petersburg, Russia) In 2014 and 2015 I won the Polish Championship.

 

Name : Ali Jabarin Nationality : Israel EGF Rank : 1P I'm a 20 year old engineering student from Tel-Aviv, I started playing go 8 years ago when a friend told me about the game, after playing online for a while I started going to tournaments, my most notable achievements were winning the European youth(U18) championship and placing top 10 in the EGC a couple times. Other than go my hobbies have been playing the guitar(badly), reading (i work on and off in a bookstore) and playing other games like poker. I hope that 50 years from now i will still be playing this game. .

Name : Pavol Lisy Nationality : Slovakia EGF Rank : 1P Hello, my name is Pavol Lisy. I was born in Slovakia, but my first language is Hungarian. My mother was Hungarian, my father comes from Slovakia. Right now, I speak 3 languages: Slovak, Hungarian and English. When I was 4 years old I started to collect lids from beers. When I was 5 years old, I had already thousands of them. The most were white and brown. One day I was playing with them, and my father saw me. He remembered one game, which he was taught at the University. We made a board from paper and started to put lids on it. That's how I learnt to play Go. It is already 16 years ago. I am now studying financial mathematics in Bratislava. I also teach Go, you can find all the information on http://www.go-teacher.com/. I also do sports, such as basketball or football. But the best game I have ever played is Go. Go is my life. My best achievements are: 5 times Slovak Champion (2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014) 3 times European U20 Champion (2011, 2013, 2015) Winner of 1st Qinling Mountains Cup, Xian, 2015 1st EGF Professional player - 2014

 

Name : Artem Kachanovskyi Nationality : Ukraine EGF Rank : 1P I was born in 1992 in Russia, Ufa city. I started to play Go when I was 6 or 7, I am not sure. My father taught me and my brother to play. At first I didn't want to play, but my brother was so excited about the game that soon I got involved too. We were studying Go together at first - my father, me and brother. Father helped us to understand complicated books which were mostly in russian language or sometimes just some diagrams without explanations. That period of studying Go together with my brother and father was great. Then I started to read Go books separately too, as father of course was busy with his regular job most of the time, and my interest was growing. By the way, my father is Go teacher now in School of intellectual games in a Rivne city. At that time economical situation in Ukraine was at least not easy and what most of people were doing can be called surviving. My parents managed to save some money for me and my brother, and we were able to go for tournaments abroad. My first international tournament was in 2000, if I am not wrong, in a Prague - European Youth Go Championship. I was already 6 or 7 kyu at that time and somehow managed to take a 3rd place. Then next year we had one more interesting trip to Cannes, France, again to EYGC. That time I took 2nd place and went to World Youth Go Championship to Shanghai, China, where I somehow managed to take 4th place (luckily again, I cut off and killed a big group of taiwanese 5d). There were many tournaments. Most notable success in adult category were 2nd place on European Go Congress in Finland, Tampere (2010) and 3rd place in Bordeaux, France (2011). And of course, becoming a 5th European Pro in 2016 in Baden-Baden, Germany. I work as a programmer but Go is my interest. I play on Tygem on weekends, try to study pro games and solve some problems after I come home from my job. From professional players I like Kim Jiseok and Shi Yue.

Name : Viktor Lin Nationality : Austria EGF Rank : 6D I am a 24 years old student living in Vienna. I speak Austrian German, Austrian English and Taiwanese Mandarin, and I'm currently learning French. When I was around 12 years old, I found the Manga Hikaru no Go. My father happened to know this game, so he taught me Go, with the same board we used to play Gomoku with. Today I am part of the Austrian Go Federation team as their general secretary and also a KGS junior admin. Since 2014 I'm involved in the creation and organisation of the EGF Academy Notable achievements: Austrian champion 2008, 2009, 2010 and 2013, 2014 and 2015

 

Name : Thomas Debarre Nationality : France EGF Rank : 6D Hi, I'm Thomas Debarre, I live in Paris. I started playing go when I was 7 : my father had some friends who liked to play together and since I was very found of games, they taught me how to play go. A few months later, my father discovered he had a colleague who played go, so his son and I started going to the Strasbourg go club, which was great for kids like me since it was in a school and not in a bar. After that, I have improved rather steadily up to my current level, which I have reached in 2010. Because of my studies (I'm a first year student in an engineering school), I've almost stopped playing tournaments these last two years, but I'm starting to play a little more this year. Achievements : French champion 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013 4th place at European championship 2012, 2013 4th place at WAGC 2011

Name : Alexandre Dinerchtein Nationality : Russia EGF Rank : 3P I started to play Go in 1986. I was 6 years old and my father (10 kyu) was my first teacher. For the several years I was playing both chess and go, but from the age of 10 I gave up chess and started to learn Go more actively with a new teacher Valeryi Shikshin, 4 dan and his students. I was very fortunate to be living in Kazan, because it was the capital of Russian Go. There were so many top players around me : Ivan Detkov 6d, Valeryi Solovyev 6d, Ruslan Saifullin 6d, Rustam and Nail Sahabutdinov both 5d, Alexei Vasilev 5d and Roman Gataullin 5d. They kindly gave me Go lessons and I owe them a big debt of gratitude. In 1996 (I already was a 5-dan) Cheon Pung-cho, 7-dan professional from Korean Baduk Association (KBA) invited Svetlana Shikshina (daughter of my teacher) and me to study Go in Seoul. First of all I was really surprised at the level of the Korean children. I was living in one of the largest Go Schools, and there was around 20 students who were both stronger and much younger than me.Later I changed clubs several times, but I was never the strongest player in any of them. I studied Go with Pak Yeong-hun, who was already the strongest Korean amateur (I only beat him once, in 1998), Pak Chi-eun 9p, Yi Chae-ung 6p, Yi Ta-hye 3p, Kang Don-yun 9p, Ko Kun-tae 7p and later, from 2001, with Pak Cheong-sang 9p, Chu Hyeon-wook 7p and Pak Chi-hun 3p. By the time you read this article many more of the children who were training alongside me will have become professionals. I became a professional in 2002, by the special decision of the KBA with the kind support of Cho Nam-ch'eol 9p, an honorary member of the KBA, and my teacher Cheon Pung-cho 7p. I am probably not the weakest professional here, but to be honest, I would say that there is about 1 stone difference between me and the other new professionals in Korea. Nowadays I am still studying hard to make this difference smaller.

 

Name : Andrij Kravets Nationality : Ukraine EGF Rank : 6D Hello, my name is Andrii and im 25 years old. I started to play go at the age age of 7. Since my childhood i started to spend a lot of time for studying go. From 2013 to 2015 I visited China few times to improve my level. So far I am strong 6 dan in europe and trying to become better. My best results: 2002 - 1st place, Youth Go Championship in category under 12, Prague (Czech Republic) 2008 - Represent Ukraine in 1st World Mind Sports, Beijing (China) 2010 - 2nd place in Ukrainian Championship (High League), Kyiv(Ukraine) 2011, 2012, 2013 - third place in the European Team championship 2012 - 3rd place in 5th Shusaku Cup, Targu Mures (Romania) 2012 - 3rd place in European Iwamoto Memorial, Amsterdam (Netherlands) 2012,2015 - 1st place In Ukrainian Championship (High League), Kyiv(Ukraine) 2015 - second place in the European Team championship

Name : Tanguy Le Calvé Nationality : France EGF Rank : 6D I started go at the age of 12, after reading the first tome of hikaru no go, I figured out I had a goban in my room for all that time without knowing what it was...I learnt the rules on internet and played a lot there, before going to the go club of my city, Nantes. I participated to a lot of tournament in France, and more recently in Europe. Best achivements : 2nd at french championship 2012, 1st ex aequo at Amsterdam tournament 2015, 2nd Wien 2015, 5 times youth french champion

 

Name : Nikola Mitic Nationality : Serbia EGF Rank : 6D Hello, my name Nikola Mitic and i come from Serbia. I was taught GO by father when i was a kid , and although i wasn't very serious at start about it i was enjoying it. Later i started going to tournaments and starter playing competitively. I have also studied GO in Japan for more than 2 years as an insei. Now i am in Europe again and hope to compete at the highest level here. My hobbies are video games and reading.

Name : Catalin Taranu Nationality : Romania EGF Rank : 5P Learned Go at the age of 16 in 1989 1993- Third place at the European Championship, promoted to 6dan amateur 1995- Stops University of Bucharest studies and leaves for Japan where he becomes insei( Go student) at the Nagoya branch of Nihon Kiin ( Japanese Professional Go Association) 1997- Becomes the first European that achieves pro status with Nihon Kiin 2002- Reaches 5 dan pro rank and thus enters the elite of Japanese pro system ( 1-4 Dan pro are considered low level pros, 5-9 high level and pro tournaments are organized accordingly) ). Along with American Michael Redmond 9 Dan they are currently the only 2 westerners that made it to the elite class of the pro system. 2004 – Returns to home country Romania in order to embrace a promoter and teacher career. Teaches at various events and workshops all over Europe, many schools in Romania 2008 – European Champion, multiple vice champion titles in other years Winner of European ING Cup and Fujitsu Cup multiple times, chosen to represent Europe at various International Pro Tournaments , where he played living Go legends like Lee Chang Ho, Chang Hao, Gu Li, Yoda Norimoto, Otake Hideo, Yamashita Keigo , played 4 times against Lee Sedol, one of the best players in the world. Part of the European team at the first Olympic Mind games in Beijing. 2009-2011 President of the Romanian Go Federation, gets involved in organizing a lot of large events, most notable being : European Team Championship 2009, European Youth Championship 2010, Balkan Championship 2011, World Youth Go Championship in Bucharest, 2011. Also initiated the event Japanese Ambassador’s Cup in cooperation with the Japanese Embassy from Bucharest and Nihon Kiin. The event had 5 editions, from 2007 until 2012 Currently coach of the Romanian National Team , active teacher online as well as at various workshops in Romania and abroad. Father of two boys of three and a half and respectively one and a half years old.

 

Main Referee: Benjamin Teuber, 6d