Yoshida Mika

Yoshida Mika (吉田美香, b. 12 Feb 1971, Tennoji District, Osaka Prefecture) Japanese female professional in the Kansai Ki-in, ranked 8 dan, pupil of Mizuno Hiroshi 9 dan.

Table of contents Promotion history Career highlights Tournament victories Head-to-head scores against current female rivals Personal life Links Pictures

Promotion history

When she was 9 years old, her father asked her to learn Go with her older brother Yoshida Shoji (now also 8p). She reached amateur 4 dan in two years, and life-and-death problems were her favourite Go topic.

Yoshida studied under Hiroshi Mizuno? 9p. She became a professional in September 1986, aged 15. She was promoted to 2 dan in September 1987, 3 dan July 1988, 4 dan April 1990, 5 dan August 1991, 6 dan September 1993, 7 dan September 2000, 8 dan August 2003 when she was 32.

Career highlights

In 2003, Yoshida was promoted to 8th dan, becoming the first female 8 dan from the Kansai Ki-in, and the third female 8 dan in Japan.

Yoshida set a record of 590 career wins by a female Japanese professional on 6 December 2012.

On 10 February 2021, she became the first female Japanese professional to reach 700 career wins. She had lost 550 times, with one jigo, for a win rate of 56.0%.

Yoshida is currently the only female player with a plus score against Choi Jung. However, this is the only game they have played, back in the 2nd Huang Longshi Shuang Deng Cup (2912), when Choi was a 2-dan 15-year-old. But still it was an upset because Choi was over 300 points higher rated, and already #2 female in the world, while Yoshida was a veteran. Some claimed that Choi lost by 0.5 points because she forgot the point scoring under Chinese rules, but Choi denies it.

Yoshida hopes to be the first Japanese female Go professional to reach 9 dan. It will need 200 wins as 8 dan. In 19 March 2021, she had 67 wins to go.

Tournament victories

1993–1996: 12th–15th Female Honinbo (The first Kansai Ki-in player to win this title), her first when she was 22.

1998: 20th Women's Kakusei

2002–2006: 1st–4th Kansai Ladies' Tournament

In total, Yoshida has won 5 Japanese women’s titles, and 4 Kansai Ki’in women’s titles.

Head-to-head scores against current female rivals

(Based on Yoshida Mika, Go Ratings and game list), as of 19 Oct 2024)

• Ueno Asami, 5p, according to rating list, #5 female and #200 overall in the world, and #1 female and #27 overall in Japan: 0–1
• Fujisawa Rina, 7p, #9 female in world, #2 female in Japan: 0–1
• Xie Yimin, 7p, many years #1 female in Japan: 0–5
• Sugiuchi Kazuko, 8p, 4× All-Japan Women's Championship, 4× Women's Meijin, 2× Women's Kakusei: 3–4
• Honda Sachiko, 7p, Sugiuchi's younger sister, 2× Female Honinbo, 5× All-Japan Women's Championship: 6–2
• Kusunoki Teruko, 8p, Sugiuchi's youngest sister, 5× Female Honinbo, 3× Women's Kakusei: 2–0
• Ogawa Tomoko, 7p, once Female Honinbo, 2× All-Japan Women's Championship: 2–6
• Aoki Kikuyo, 8p, 5× Women's Meijin, 4× Women's Kakusei, once Female Kisei: 4–9
• Chinen Kaori, 6p, 5× Female Kisei, 4× Women's Honinbo: 10–5
• Kobayashi Izumi, 7p, 3× Female Honinbo], 3× Female Meijin, 2× Female Kisei, once Teikei Cup Female Legends: 3–5
• Kato Keiko, 6p, once Women's Meijin, once Female Strongest: 4–1
• Yashiro Kumiko, 6p, 2× Women's Honinbo, 1–7
• Umezawa Yukari, 6p, 3× Female Kisei: 3–6
• Nakazawa Ayako, 5p, 2× Women's Honinbo, 2× Women's Kakusei: 5–1
• Suzuki Ayumi, 7p, #7 female in Japan, #33 female in world, twice Female Strongest, once Female Kisei: 3–7
• Koyama Terumi, 6p, 4× Women's Meijin: 1–1
• Kobayashi Chizu, 6p,Women's Kakusei and All-Japan Women's Championship: 4–2
• Nyu Eiko, 4p, 2× Female Strongest: 0–2
• Konishi Kazuko, 8p, once Kansai Ladies' Tournament, once Teikei Cup Female Legends: 4–1
• Mukai Chiaki, 6p, once Women's Honinbo: 1–7
• Mannami Kana, 4p, 2× Female Kisei: 2–1
• Mannami Nao, 4p, Kana's younger sister, once Female Strongest: 2–2
• Hoshiai Shiho, 3p, once Female Honinbo challenger: 0–1
• Joanne Missingham, 7p, aka Hei Jiajia, #1 female in Taiwan, #39 female in world: 0–3
• Cho Hyeyeon, 9p, once World #1 and often World #2 behind Rui Naiwei: 0–1
• Kin En (mother of Jo Bun'En): 3–0

Personal life

Yoshida is the youngest of four children of a paint shop owner. When she was 30, she married a company employee one year younger in 2001 after a friend introduced them. They have two daughters.

When the first one was a baby, Yoshida enjoyed being a mother, but found it hard to play Go and look after her:

When I was setting up the game, the baby cried, so I went to the baby's side. I kept the situation until 50 moves, and 4 days had passed when I made the 51st move.

Her fellow Kansai Ki’in female professional Tatsumi Akane (3p), who has two sons of the same age, once told her, “Mika, it’s too difficult to have a family and be a professional go player at the same time.” Mika said:

I agree with this statement, but I feel that I am a person who has more than enough energy, and I feel that I am not satisfied with letting my children grow up healthily, although it is a struggle and hardship.

In 2021. the elder was in her first year of high school and the younger was in her first year of junior high school.

Links

• Kansai Kiin profile
• Japanese Wikipedia
• Go ratings and games
• Go4Go
• GoBase

Pictures

Yoshida Mika’s Kansai Kiin photo

Mika Yoshida at World Go Festival (June 2019)