AMERICAN GO E-JOURNAL: News from the American Go Association April 23, 2001 In This Edition: - CALENDAR OF EVENTS: Latest listings! - SCOREBOARD: Boston, MA; Houston, TX - GO NEWS: NAMT Schedule; Danny Dowell Winner at Cybercamp; Chapter Championships On Hold; Go Camp Filling Fast; Go in the News: Go Makes The New Yorker's "Money Issue" - GO REVIEW: Get Strong at Tesuji - Online Go: Jan van der Steen's "Go, An Addictive Game" - AGA OFFICER CONTACT LIST CALENDAR OF EVENTS (U.S.) April 28: Cuyahoga Falls, OH Cuyahoga 2001 Go Tournament Joe Carl (330) 493-1663 jcarl@neo.rr.com April 28: Sandy Springs, MD Sandy Spring Scholastic K-12 Chess and Go Tournament and Pizza Bash Anand Modak (301) 869-0327 amodak@mcps.k12.md.us Apr 28/29: Brooklyn, NY Go at the Sakura Matsuri Festival in the Brooklyn Botanical Garden Marc Palmer morrsarian@juno.com May 5: Corvallis, OR Corvallis Spring Go Tournament Robert O'Malley omalley@oce.orst.edu May 5: Rocky Mountain Open Denver, CO Eric Wainwright (303) 626-0103 ewainwright@decisioneering.com May 12: Lancaster, PA Mothers Day Tournament (Women enter tournament free) Sam Zimmerman (717) 892-1249 szimmerman@wareunl.com May 19-20: New Orleans, LA First Annual New Orleans Spring Tournament David Dinhofer (504) 626-1138 ddinhofer@cs.com May 26-27: Baltimore, MD Maryland Open Keith Arnold (410) 788-3520 hlime@clark.net June 9 & 10: Denver, CO Yang Yilun Workshop Susan Howell showel3@attglobal.net July 21-29: U.S. Go Congress York College, York PA Keith Arnold, Director; (410) 788-3520 hlime@clark.net NOTE: this listing is not all-inclusive, featuring only upcoming tournaments in the next month or events which require early registration. For a complete U.S. listings, go to http://www.usgo.org/usa/tournaments.html For the European Go Calendar see http://www.win.tue.nl/cs/fm/engels/go/tourn.html SCOREBOARD: Boston, MA; Houston, TX April 22: Mass Go Assn Spring Handicap Tournament Boston, MA TD: Don Wiener; 34 players 1st: Jean-Philippe Estradier, 8k, 4-0; 2nd: Won Kim, 5d, 4-0; 3rd: Eric Nelson, 14k, 3-1; (Eric won by one SODOS point over 3 other players - all 4 had the same SOS score.) Next Tournament: July 15 (the Sunday before the Congress). April 21/22: 2001 Houston Spring Tournament Houston, TX TD: Andy Kochis; 29 players Open Section: (7 players): 1st: Vincent Wang, 6d (Houston, TX); 2nd: Kazuo Sato, 5d (New Orleans, LA); 3rd: Michael Kim, 4D(Houston, TX) Handicap Section I: (11 Players): 1st: Christ Hudnall, 3k (Austin, TX); 2nd: William Newman 2d (Dallas,TX); 3rd: Jeff Shaevel 3d (Austin, TX). Handicap Section II: (11 Players): 1st: Bill Ownes 12k(Dallas, TX); 2nd: Darron Shaffer 7k (Dallas, TX); 3rd: Jim Conyngham 7k (Austin, TX) Youngest Player: Stephen Sun 20k (age 9) (Houston, TX) Ms. Xue Fen Lin, Chinese female professional 1D pro paid a surprise visit and did a game analysis of some of the games played in the tournament. She plans to stay in Houston for 1-2 years while her husband is completing his post-doctoral work at Rice University. The Houston Go Club is considering events such as workshops, classes or tournaments to take advantage of her stay in Houston, reports Mike Peng. GO NEWS NAMT Schedule There will be two NAMT games this weekend: Huiren Yang, 1p v Hosuk Yi, Ama - Saturday, 4/28 starting 2pm EDT, 1pm CDT, 11am PTD (Sunday, 4/29 3am IGS time). Mingjiu Jiang, 7p v Jong Moon Lee, Ama - Sunday, 4/29 starting 3pm EDT, 2pm CDT, noon, PDT (Monday, 4/30 4am IGS time). Danny Dowell Winner at Cybercamp Sunday afternoon, Cybercamp (for kids) celebrated its first winner. Danny Dowell, a 16 year old from Wheaton, Illinois completed playing 10 games on Cybercamp and has won $25 to be spent at one of our friendly go vendors. Danny is also a chess player and learned to play go at his local chess club. He plays lots of go games on Kiseido.com James Chien and Jonathan Wang welcome all children who like to play go every Sunday afternoon from 3-5P Pacific time. If you are under 18 years of age and an AGA member see if you can also win a prize by playing 10 games on Cybercamp before the next Congress. - None Redmond Chapter Championships On Hold The AGA Chapter Championships have been put on hold, reports Steve Fawthrop. If those who have entered want to encourage others to participate he will revive it once ten teams have registered. Contact Steve at S.G.Fawthrop@Eklectika.net Go Camp Filling Fast The AGA 2001 Summer Go Camp is taking shape, reports organizer Peter Rzepecki. All go-playing kids are invited and encouraged to join the Camp. "We have already many junior go players registered from all over the U.S.A. and from abroad, but we still have openings. Do not miss this great opportunity!" says Rzepecki, who adds that "There is not much time left." For more information visit: http://www.usgo.org/gocamp/index.html or write to Peter Rzepecki, the camp administrator: AGAGoCamp@aol.com Financial help is also welcome, to help keep camp fees low to allow more kids to afford the Camp: tax deductible donations should go to the American Go Foundation at AGF attn Mary Laird, 211 W 106th St, 3C, NY, NY 10025 Go in the News: Go Makes The New Yorker's "Money Issue" "Arrayed on the living-room shelves are a few personal touches, including a Go board, a chess set, a menorah, a wax dolphin, and a white plastic-covered album with 'Sammy's Bar Mitzvah' inscribed in gold lettering on the spine." - "The Golden Pyramid," The New Yorker, April 23 & 30, 2001, page 172. The go board belongs to Sam Friedberg, a team coordinator for ACN, a network marketing company. No word on Friedberg's playing strength. GO REVIEW: Get Strong at Tesuji Get Strong at Tesuji Richard Bozulich, $15, Kiseido. Reviewed by David Goldberg, 7k The next best thing to having a personal teacher is a problem book. After I try a problem, I can flip to the answer and get immediate feedback. As a relative beginner there are a couple "theory" books that have helped my game (Lessons in the Fundamentals of Go, Opening Theory Made Easy), but it is mainly the drill of problem books that have raised the level of my play. "Graded Go Problems for Beginners" were my favorite problem books when I first started playing. I could find a volume that was hard enough so that I learned something, but not so hard as to be frustrating. If, like me, you found those books useful, I strongly recommend "Get Strong at Tesuji". Similar to the Graded series, it's simply a list of 534 problems and their solutions. If you are comfortable with problems at the level of Graded Volume III then you should find Get Strong at Tesuji useful, too. Unlike Graded, it has some problems that simply ask for the best move, and don't tell you what you're supposed to do (kill stones, live, connect two groups, etc). I found this to be an especially nice feature. It also rates the difficulty of each problem, although I didn't make much use of the ratings. If you like drilling yourself with problems, I highly recommend Get Strong at Tesuji. Online Go: Jan van der Steen's "Go, An Addictive Game" by Terri Schurter One of the richest sources of go information on the web is the Jan van der Steen site, which is titled "Go, An Addictive Game." You can reach this site at http://www.cwi.nl/~jansteen/go/ You will find more than enough information there to supply the needs of the hardiest go addict. The site is designed to provide information efficiently, with no background and virtually no graphics other than the icon in the upper right of the page. There are three main categories: Professional Events, News, and Index. Each of these three individual sections can be easily viewed in one screen. One of the main functions of the Jansteen page is the delivery of game records, which you can access through the Professional Events page, which is the first section on the site. Within the Professional Events category are further categories by country. They are Japanese, Chinese, Korean, International, and USA. Forty-one events are easily viewed in these four categories on a single screen. When you click on an event you can see who has played, and can download game records. In order to use this facility you must register via email and receive a password, which is free. The second area of the page "New" has sections titled "Changes" and "Notes." In the Index section links are organized into seven categories. These are General, Studying Go, Searching, Computer Software, Reading Material, Miscellaneous, and Supplies. Notable features of the site are a Joseki Dictionary, Fuseki Dictionary, and a seven Part series of articles by Pieter Mioch called "The Gentle Joseki" aimed at kyu players. Terri Schurter has been playing go online since 1995. Her club, Wings Across Calm Waters [http://www.wingsgoclub.org], is a "virtual" chapter of the AGA. Wings meets week-nights on the Zone from 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm Eastern Time, and on Wednesday nights at 8P on KGS. Terri plays under the name goddess_of_go. Past columns are archived at http://www.britgo.org/gopcres/agaart/index.html The views expressed in this column are not necessarily those of the American Go Association. GET LISTED & BOOST TURN-OUT! Got an upcoming event? Reach over 2,500 readers coast-to-coast every week! List your Go event/news In the E-Journal: email details to us at MAILTO:journal@usgo.org Ratings are on the web! Check the website (www.usgo.org) for the full list. GET YOUR TOURNAMENT RATED! Send your tournament data to MAILTO:ratings@usgo.org AGA OFFICER CONTACT LIST: President; Roy Laird: president@usgo.org Eastern VP; ChenDao Lin: vp-eastern@usgo.org Central VP; Jeff Shaevel: vp-central@usgo.org Western VP; Larry Gross: vp-western@usgo.org Treasurer; Ulo Tamm: treasurer@usgo.org Membership Secretary; John Goon: membership@usgo.org Chapters Coordinator; Bill Cobb: chapters@usgo.org Tournament Coordinator; Mike Bull: tournaments@usgo.org Education Coordinator; None Redmond: education@usgo.org Congress Liaison Officer; Chris Kirschner: cngrsliaison@usgo.org AGA website; Gordon Fraser and Chuck Robbins: webmaster@usgo.org American Go Foundation; Terry Benson: mailto: terrybenson@eudoramail.com AGA Librarian; Craig Hutchinson: archives@usgo.org Published by the American Go Association Material published in " AMERICAN GO E-JOURNAL" may be reproduced by any recipient: please credit the AGEJ as the source. To make name or address corrections - notify us at the email address below. Story suggestions, event announcements, Letters to the Editor and other material are welcome - subject to editing for clarity and space -- and should be directed to: Editor: Chris Garlock email: journal@usgo.org Voice: 202-289-7174 Fax: 202-371-0168