Alex Weldon
Canadian 2d amateur. I live in Montreal and play at the McGill go club Tuesday nights. I also play on KGS as Xopods and Spodox, and give lots of lessons.
November 22, 2004: I haven't been playing as much lately as I'd like to. I'm very busy these days. Despite my poor performance at the Canadian Open, I think I'm getting stronger - I was just having a bad weekend then. In the last couple of months, my record against Steven Mays, a 2d at the McGill Go Club has gone from 2 wins - 7 losses to 7 wins - 7 losses. He says he's going to start asking me to take white every game, soon.
My strengths, as I see them:
- Defensive tesuji/shinogi
- Good shape, finding efficient connections
- Turning the tables, and counterattacking an opponent if he attacks too strongly
- Taking and retaining sente
- Finding tesuji to reduce loosely enclosed territories in the endgame.
My weaknesses:
- I am what my friend Mori at the Toronto Go Club refers to as a "poka meijin?". A master of careless blunders.
- Highly affected by my moods - commit many overplays if I'm upset
- Overconfident when winning
- Underestimate my opponent's influence - play too close to thickness, invade too deeply, take territory too eagerly. Not in the way a kyu player would, mind you, but in more subtle ways.
My style:
- Fleet-footed
- Gentle, aji-leaving
- I like to pincer in response to a kakari, and favour high, distant pincers over low, close ones.
- Where I'm not high and light, I'm very low and territorial - rarely in between.
- At times my style could probably be considered amashi, though obviously not pro-level amashi. I take territory in return for letting myself be attacked, then try to lure the opponent into stretching himself too thin.
- Prefer sides to corners
- Favour nirensei as White, and Kobayashi fuseki or mini-Chinese as Black.