[Newsletter] BGA Newsletter 250 January 2019

[Jil Segerman]

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   View <http://www.britgo.org/newsletter/250>
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*Contributions for the Newsletter* are always welcome, both from our
members and others. We ask that they be Go-related and “newsy". The place
for debate and general discussion is currently Gotalk
<http://www.britgo.org/gopcres/info#gotalk>; however, an introduction to a
new topic is fine in the Newsletter. *Instructions:* Please use plain text
not file-attachments. Keep it brief, and give web-links and contact
details. It's good to include pictures. If they are on the internet, send
me the URL. If not, attach the picture files to your email. Send your
contribution to newsletter at britgo.org to arrive by the first day of the
month.

Jil Segerman, Newsletter Editor
NEWS

The full set of recent news items, including further details of some of the
items shown here, are on our News Pages <http://www.britgo.org/news>, and
on News Headlines <http://www.britgo.org/views/news>.
British Youth Championship

The 2018 British Youth Go Championship featured 57 competitors, aged from 5
to 18. This is believed to be the second largest such event (the largest
was in 2005 with 74). There were two minibuses from Cheadle Hulme School
and groups from two new clubs, Rednock School (Dursley) and Sheffield
Chinese School.

Section Winners (runners-up and thirds)
Youth Champion: Tom Bradbury (Daniel Yang, Jayden Ng)
U18: Tom Bradbury
U16: Jayden Ng (Rowan Borrow)
U14: Edmund Smith (Caleb Monk)
U12: Zoe Walters (Rahul Surapaneni)
U10: Daniel Yang (Emily Oliviere)
U8: Yanyi Xiong (Ryan Zhang)

Winners of four games: Alexander Hsieh, Hilary Bexfield
Fighting Spirit: Auden Oliviere
Best School (for the Castledine Trophy): Cambridge Chess and Go, beat
Cheadle Hulme School
Best Junior School: Harpenden Academy, beat Sheffield Chinese
13x13 section: Abdul-Ghani Farooqi - 5 wins
Annie Walters, Lawrence Baker, Jacob Rubert - 4 wins
Pandanet Go European Team Championship

Our team lost three games to one against a strong team from the
Netherlands. This put our team down to bottom place in the Pandanet B
division, behind Denmark.
2018/19 European Youth Go Team Championship

In the second round, the UK Youth team played a strong German team, on
Saturday 15th December, and lost four games to one. There are two remaining
Saturday fixtures, on 12th January and 16th February, and we wish the team
luck in those games.
London Open

The BGA's flagship tournament - the [45th] London Open - ran from Friday
28th December to 31st at its new venue of the London Go Centre. The event
was limited in numbers because of it was being run at the London Go Centre
for the first time and the organisers wanted to make sure things worked
with a smaller venue, but still 89 players (including ghosts) took part.
Next year they will be able to accept more registrations.

Representing 14 countries, the players ranged from 30k to 7d, including
some strong children, and there was a large party from Germany.

The winner, for the third time, was Chi-Min Oh (7d) from France, winning
all his seven games. Two UK-based players were second and third - Zhiqing
Zhang and Guodong Cao. The top British player was Andrew Kay (4d).
BBC Radio 4 Documentary "Game Over, Humans"

Pro poker player and comedian Ken Cheng played poker online for a decade,
but after an AI defeated top human players, he asks if one day it will
really be game over, humans. BGA President Toby Manning had provided
information on Go. Available to listen or download here
<https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0001qjj>.
AI program AlphaZero

Natasha Regan writes: In 2016, the AI go program AlphaGo took on top
professional player Lee Sedol in an historic match and won. Since then UK
company DeepMind has improved and generalised the program to create
AlphaZero which last year achieved superhuman strength in each of chess, Go
and Shogi. AlphaZero's strategies are entirely self-taught, it was given
only the rules of each game and left to play against itself millions of
times, by reinforcement learning. This has proved fascinating in Go and
chess because AlphaZero has developed creative new ideas.

This video <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7L2sUGcOgh0&feature=youtu.be> tells
you more about the story of AlphaZero. You will spot many Go players in the
video. Apart from the Lee Sedol footage, AlphaZero developers Demis
Hassabis and David Silver both play Go, and Natasha Regan (1 kyu, Epsom)
gives her views on AlphaZero's chess play.

Natasha has teamed up with chess Grandmaster Matthew Sadler to write a book
about AlphaZero, its chess strategies and the promise of AI. As well as
giving AlphaZero's chess discoveries illustrated with annotated games, the
book explores how the build of AlphaZero has given it its distinctive
style. Whilst the book is mainly focused on chess, Go players will also be
interested in the interviews with the DeepMind build team, and an interview
with DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis that explains how the AlphaGo and
AlphaZero projects developed. The book is called "Game Changer" and is
published by New in Chess (expected January 2019 and available for
pre-order) from the publisher <https://www.newinchess.com/coming-soon>.
FUTURE EVENTS

Further details on http://www.britgo.org/tournaments

   - Maidenhead-Hitachi, Saturday 19th January
   - Cheshire, Saturday 2nd February, Frodsham
   - Trigantius, Saturday 9th March, Cambridge
   - Irish Go Congress, Friday 22nd - Sunday 24th March, Dublin
   - Welwyn Garden City (provisional), Saturday 23rd March
   - British Go Congress, Friday 5th - Sunday 7th April, Manchester
   - Candidates' Tournament, Saturday 4th - Monday 6th May
   - Bar-Low Tournament, Sunday 5th May, London Go Centre
   - LGC Self-Paired Tournament, Monday 6th May
   - Nottingham Kyu Day, Saturday 11th May
   - Not the London Open, Saturday 25th - Monday 27th May, London Go Centre
   - Challengers' League, Saturday 25th - Tuesday 28th May, London Go Centre
   - Not the London Open, Saturday 25th - Monday 27th May, London Go Centre
   - British Pair Go Championships, Saturday 8th June, Hatfield
   - Durham, Saturday 15th – Sunday 16th June
   - 27th Welsh Open, Saturday 22nd - Sunday 23rd June, Barmouth

Later

   - European Go Congress 2019, 20th July - 4th August, Brussels
   - Leo Phillips Isle Of Man Go Festival 2019, Sunday 11th - Friday 16th
   August
   - Mind Sports Olympiad, Sunday 18th - Monday 26th August, London
   - Youth Training Residential, Wednesday 28th - Saturday 31st August
   (provisional)
   - Three Peaks, Saturday 2nd November - Sunday 3rd November, Ingleton
   - Guy Fawkes Weekend, Saturday 2nd November - Sunday 3rd November,
   London Go Centre
   - London Open, Saturday 28th–Tuesday 31st December. London Go Centre

Overseas

The European Go Federation's Tournament Calendar
<https://www.eurogofed.org/calendar/calendar.htm> includes the Major
European Tournaments and a World Tournament Calendar.
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