Dear friends,

 

here’s a set of actual news on upcoming European and International Tournaments:

 

  • World Amateur Go Championship (WAGC) 2017 . After waiting so long now we have the most important data:
    • Date: 2nd – 9th June
    • City: Guiyang, Southwest of China. It is the capital of Guizhou province

But I haven’t got a schedule and information about hotel and venue. I assume arrival on 2nd June and departure on 9th June will be fine if the players want to book flights right now.

  • European Student Championship 2017. I am very happy to announce that this event will happen in Ceske Budejovice. The date is 9/10th September 2017. I hope that we will have  a lot of players. Last year we had 10 players in Amstelveen, and 50% won seats in very attractive Go-Championships in Far East!

This tournament for students only is probably the European tournament with the highest probabilty to win a participation in a tournament in Far East. It will be organized by Czech Go Federation, in cooperation with new Chinese friends / bodies. It is a great chance for getting new contacts in Europe with Chinese organisations and possible future sponsors.

  • Grand Prix 2017. If you look on our EGF webpage you see the Grand Prix Season 2017 with much more tournamens than in the last years. We are nearly complete for 2017, maybe one or two tournaments can be added (candidates are Istanbul, EGCC anniversary). So I want to encourage you right now to think about applying for a Grand Prix Tournament 2018.

For 2017 we have Bonus Point Tournaments in at least 9 different countries (Russia, Poland, Germany, France, Netherlands, Czechia, Austria, Serbia, Ireland).

The Grand Prix 2017 ends with a new top-tournament, the

  • Grand Prix Final. This tournament is also scheduled, it will be played from 18th – 21th January 2018 in Olomouc /Czechia. This is a tournament for 16 players, where 14 players will qualify directly by their performance on different level B and C Bonus Point Tournaments, while 2 players will qualify via their accumulated Bonus Points at yearend 2017. Of course there will be nice prize-money for our „Champions of 2017“.

At the moment following 5 players are already qualified for this new event:

  • Ilya Shikshin (Russia) in St. Petersburg
  • Ali Jabarin (Israel) in St. Petersburg
  • Pavol Lisy (Slovakia) in Dublin
  • Mateusz Surma (Poland) in Dublin
  • Cristan Pop (Romania) in Nis.

Next two seats will be given in Paris in two weeks !

  • Grand Slam Berlin. This tournament will happen for the third time end of April (28th April – 1st May), with 12 players. Look at our EGF webpage where you see the modus and also the CVs of the qualified players. Seats number 10 and 11 were given last weekend in a special Grand Slam Qualification Tournament in Cluj / Romania, with a final decision in a „new“ lightning-tournament between 5 players. The two winners are Nikola Mitic (6d, Serbia) and Tanguy LeCalve (6d, France). Following 9 players are qualified as well: Ilya Shikshin (1p, Russia), Ali Jabarin (1p, Israel), Pavol Lisy (1p, Slovakia), Mateusz Surma (1p, Poland), Artem Kachanovskyi (1p, Ukraine), Thomas Debarre (6d, France), Viktor Lin (6d, Austria), Alexandre Dinerchtein (3p, Russia), Andrii Kravets (7d, Ukraine). The 12th player was decided by our sponsor CEGO, and this seat goes to Catalin Taranu (5p, Romania), rewarding his long time contributions and especially big effort in the EGF academy.

Special news: Mr. Zhang Wendong, 9p, will come to Berlin, with a delegation from Beijing !

  • Team Tournament Berlin / China Cup

This tournament will run for the second time, with a direct support of the Chinese Culture Center Berlin. The registration is open since some weeks, so please register your teams (3 players minimum, 4 possible).  This is the only international team-tournament in Europe (on real boards), besides the EGC and the Pandanet Team Championship Finals. You can nominate city- or region-teams. I expect also a team from Beijing, joining Mr. Zhang Wendong.  It is also a perfect opportunity to show the world how we integrate players from Far East in our European Go-Scene.

But this tournament is not only for top-players, everyone can participate, we play in different groups, while single-players will be integrated in teams as well. Please publish this tournament-announcement in your country-organisation. Information you find via the EGF tournament-calendar. Don’t hesitate to contact me for further information.

  • Grand Slam Tournament Warsaw. This new tournament is the sensation of the year ! Mateusz Surma succeeded in convincing a chinese sponsor/company to support a Grand Slam Tournament during a special chinese fair in Warsaw. Mateusz developed a nice system for this Grand Slam Tournament, details were sent to you some weeks ago. So we are looking forward on a really great Go-event in September (xxx – yyy) in Warsaw. Many many thanks to Mateusz !
  • Just a brief overview what we have to expect in the next months additional
  • EGF-Pro Qualification (Vienna / Pardubice)
  • Kidocup Hamburg
  • Go-Festival Magadan / Russia
  • EGC in Oberhof / Germany
  • Special event 25 years EGCC (October 2017)
  • Silk Road Tournament (plan for September) in China
  • Several international summer Go-events (Russia, Japan, France, …)
  • KPMC (end of September ?) – Korea
  • Samsung-Cup (July) – Korea
  • Pair-Go Championships (adults / students) in December 2017 – Tokyo
  • IMSA Elite Mind Games (December, China)

… and many more tournaments (also Bonus Point Tournaments) in Europe.

… and I know about more ideas regarding tournaments / leagues

 

So I hope you are happy with the Go development in Europe in 2017.

 

Kind regards

Martin

 

P.S.: This information has been sent as blind copy to most of the European top-players as well

 

 

 

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