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Dmytro had a small lead in the early endgame, but he made a mistake and lost the game by 1,5 points. The win would give him a clear third place. Jan won his game by half a point, taking 6th place and the title of the best European player. Dmytro took second place among Europeans and Ulas Oren, 5d, took the third continental prize. Surprisingly, Roko Crvelin, 3d, was the fourth European player with 5 wins.
These placements became possible partly because of pairing systems, which is sometimes called “Swiss lottery”. Namely, organizers made the pairing of the first round based on a draw, randomly assigning starting numbers to players and then pairing players having consecutive numbers: 1-2, 3-4, 5-6 etc. In later rounds, the same principle has been applied within groups having the same number of points: players were paired with their “neighbors in standings” whenever possible (avoiding pairing the same players twice). This variation of Swiss system was frequently applied before “computer times” and it even has the name – “Danish system”. In a tournament like KPMC, it frequently pairs stronger players with each other and weaker players with each other (in the same group), giving the opportunity for lower-rated players to suddenly overtake higher-rated players who meet much stronger opposition. Given that the first round had “random” players and the tournament was relatively short (7 rounds), we can say that only first two players are having “objective” placement: the winner Yu Fu, 8d, with 7 wins, and Hyun_Seok Shin, 7d, with 6 wins. Of course, Albert Yen, 7d, from U.S., deserved the third place, playing four of top 6 players. The possibility that Dmytro could have won 3rd place playing only one of top 6 players should be enough to confirm the hypothesis. On the other hand, most players had more balanced games after random pairings of round 1, which was the priority for organizers.
The Youth Division is the most important innovation of 20th KPMC. The idea of bringing young players to a prestigious global go tournament shall raise motivation for youth go in many countries. After 4 rounds, two players had the perfect score: Wai-Hin Li, 6d, from Macao and Ming-Ruel Tsai, 7d, from Chinese Taipei. Pairing the neighbors (as explained above), brought an unlucky opponent for Stjepan Medak, 5d, who lost to the Chinese representative Yicheng Xiong, 7d. On the other hand, Bende Barcza, 5d, and Larion Syrotkin, 3d, won the games against their European opponents Jan Komin, 3d, and Alexandru Nicolas Patrascu, 2d.
In the 6th round, Stjepan wins against the Korean representative, who lost first two games against 7d and 6d! One SOSOS point decided 7th place for Stjepan, followed by Bende and Larion, as three best European players. In a short tournament with random draw in the first round, it was easy to accumulate three losses: high-dan players from U.S., Canada and Korea placed 10th, 11th and 12th respectively, sharing the place with some kyu players.
Both tournaments were entered in the EGD before we left Taebaek: Main Tournament, Youth Division. The final standings showing the placements of opponents rather than their random starting numbers have been shared with the organizers. Nice final standings with flags can be downloaded as pdf files:
KPMC_2025_Main_Standings_Flags
KPMC_2025_Youth_Standings_Flags
As a conclusion, we may expect different pairing principles for future worldwide tournaments if the organizer wishes to achieve more realistic top placements. One option is to avoid random pairings in round 1 and apply seeding by rank/rating. Another option is to apply McMahon system with a relatively large “super-group”. Both options bear the risk of unrealistic ranks for players coming from some countries, although the practical examples show it does not happen that often.
During sixth round, the officials and guests had a wonderful excursion to the Taebaek Sky Observatory and the Taebaek baduk “club”. After wonderful view from the platform in the forest, we enjoyed playing some go in a nice building at the entrance of the National park . An entire wall in the building is covered with photographs of special go games played by top Korean professional players at the top of Taebaeksan mountain.
Games are played at the altitude of 1563 m, always on 3rd October, the National Foundation Day of Korea (Gaecheonjeol in Korean), celebrating the legendary formation of the first Korean state of Gojoseon by legendary king Dangun in 2333 BC. In case of severe weather conditions, games are played in the same room as your reporter played a few moves in a game with Mr. Tom Urasoe, head of the Overseas Department of Nihon ki-in. On the way back, we visited the location of a future thematic Baduk Park.
After the end of hectic seventh round of the Main tournament, players were invited to register for a Blitz tournament (10 minutes sudden death). Players were divided into 5 groups with 8 players according to strength, with 5 winners after 3 knock-out rounds. At the end, Larion Syrotkin, 3d, won the European finals in Group D.
After finishing in finals of groups B and D, two Croatian players were kindly asked to play a “super-final” PairGo game, deciding the first place in the Group A, against two top Chinese players, who won 4 games as well. The time setting was 5 minutes + 1x10 seconds byoyomi. Despite 4 stones handicap, the Chinese pair won the match.
Organizers did their best to give an appropriate prize to every achievement in all categories: main tournament, youth division, PairGo, blitz tournament. Winners of both tournaments were already mentioned, just like three best European players in each tournament.
Organizers did their best to give an appropriate prize to every achievement in all categories: main tournament, youth division, PairGo, blitz tournament. Winners of both tournaments were already mentioned, just like three best European players in each tournament.
:
In PairGo, Stjepan Medak, 5d, and Roko Crvelin, 3d, won the second prize in Group A, Jan Prokop, 6d, and Jan Komin, 3d, won the third prize in Group B. Nicolas Patrascu, 2d, and Damir Medak, 2kyu, won the prize for 3 wins in Group A. Larion Syrotkin, 3d, won the Group D in blitz tournament.
Traditional group photo was the highlight of the award ceremony – the banquet dinner followed. All games were available soon after the last round ended: https://kpmc.kbaduk.or.kr/us/gibo
During the tournament, all players and guests had access to a nice web application, working well on all mobile phones, showing all pairings and results in both tournaments. It was very convenient to see results of finished games in real-time, simplifying tasks of your reporter. Taking photos during games was a bit more complicated, because organisers allowed visitors in playing halls only during first five minutes. Stay tuned for official photographs to appear at: https://kpmc.kbaduk.or.kr/us/picture (now it is mostly 19th KPMC).
A lot of great commentary of top games by professional players is available on https://www.twitch.tv/europeangofederation (Roman and Stephen made a good job!).
Players had the opportunity to watch lectures or to play simultaneous games with professional players (Benjamin DG, 1p, made a great job here!).
Yet, it was not over: the departure on the following morning has been enriched with a tour to the Tongrin TanTan thematic park in the heart of the mountain. After lunch, four buses brought all participants to their destinations. A small Croatian team together with Jean-Yves (who had his midnight flight timely cancelled) had a privilege to visit the most probable venue of 21st Korean Prime Minister Cup – as it was said during the award ceremony – it is going to be Incheon. We are looking forward to an even more exciting KPMC!
