Chris Hayashida / Go Blog

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17 June 2005

The ratings are finally in from the 2005 Cotsen Go Tournament. I helped run the tournament, but I also entered as a shodan and went 3-2. It was enough to push my rating to shodan. I think I would play better if I didn't have to worry about running the tournament.

Making shodan was one of my goals when I started, but now that I have, it doesn't feel like I'm strong. I still have problems reading, and I still am mystified by pro play. I also feel like I'm not spending enough time studying to really become strong.

Jon Boley mentioned to me that getting stronger was a matter of priorities. "Do you really want to get stronger?" he asked me. "Then you need to push yourself, and commit more time to Go." He was trying to convince me to go to the US Go Congress this year. I won't be able to make it, though, because a friend's getting married.

I'm looking for a new goal, now, to help me focus my effort. I want to play in the US Open, or at the open level of one of the tournaments. This means that I would need to reach 6 dan. There are a lot of strong players in the Los Angeles area, so even trying to be the best in my city would be really hard. It'd be easier to make it to the Open.

In the interim, I think I'm going to concentrate on consistency. I'm going to give up on blitz games, and raise my KGS (7k) and IGS (5k*) ratings to something respectable. I think I'm underrated, and I don't play online much. My last game on IGS was in November 2004.

Koreangrl8: Congratulations on making shodan.!! ^-^

Chris Hayashida: Thanks. Now I'll just have to get my other ratings up. :)


14 January 2006 - 3rd Toyota & Denso World Go Oza

This weekend, I went to Las Vegas to play in the 3rd Toyota & Denso World Go Oza. I wasn't going to go, but my friend Ryan convinced me. After I decided to go, two other people from the club needed rides, so the three of us left late Friday night for the tournament. We didn't arrive until 2 AM.

Before this weekend, I hadn't played serious games lately. I've mostly been playing teaching games on beginner's night at the club. I didn't think my Go was in top form. I entered as shodan, but I wasn't sure that I would be able to maintain my shodan rating.

Game 1 - Tom Tamura

My first game, I played against Tom Tamura from Santa Barbara. I screwed up in the first corner and my group died. I couldn't believe it. "Just great," I thought. "What a way to start out a tournament!" I fought back hard and made a huge territory which almost offset the loss of the group. Just as we were beginning the endgame, my opponent played on another key point in one of my groups. The whole time, I thought that group was safe. I sat there, shaking my head, and trying to figure out whether or not to resign. A friend happened to come by and saw the game, and realized that it died, too. He shrugged and left.

I sat there and read for five minutes. I just wasn't ready to resign. I think this was the most time I had spent reading out a position. I found a tesuji. Using the aji of the first dead group, I was able to live because of damezumari. I ended up winning the game.

Even though I won, I felt like I had "stolen" a game. Since I recorded the game on my Palm, I had a couple of stronger players look at it. I suspected that there was a better answer then the one my opponent played. They looked at the position, and confirmed that it was a good move, and that there wasn't a better answer for Black.

Update: I posted the position as Tsumego from Games 64.

Game 2 - Tom Xu

I played the next game against Tom Xu, a friend from the Chinese Go Club. He's 2-dan now, but I think he's been stronger than me since we met. There are a lot of strong players from his club, so I suspect he gets more practice than I do. One of them is an 8-year-old that is 3-dan already. So I'm only 25 years behind him if I make it to 3-dan by my birthday. :)

Anyway, the game went all right. We both ended up with huge territories, and I ended up with problems from the counting and I think I flubbed the endgame. I lost by 11.5. I made a mental note to practice counting more. I think it would make it more reliable. I probably should send this game to the Go Teaching Ladder. I think there's good study material here.

Game 3 - Eric

I played the final game of the day against Eric, another shodan. I held black, so I thought I'd have an advantage. I started with the Chinese Opening, but because of the way he played, I ended up approaching one of his komoku, and changed the dynamic of the game. He expanded quickly and starting making a huge moyo.

I played a splitting invasion. I thought it would attack the groups on both sides, but my invading group had to run for its life. I thought it was okay because I thought I could pressure one or both of the groups. I had read out the running fight to a point, but it got really complicated really quickly.

I managed to get sente to descend and threaten the two groups. My opponent responded incorrectly and his group died. There was a counterinvasion that I had to fend off, but after I managed to kill the invading stones, my opponent resigned.


15 January 2006 - 3rd Toyota & Denso World Go Oza, day 2

I ended up 2-1 after the first day of the tournament. I beat two shodan, and lost to a 2-dan. I was happy with the result. I decided that it is a lot easier to play when you don't have to organize the tournament. It was especially nice to be able to relax after finishing my game, instead of worrying about boards, clocks, disputes, or the hundreds of other things that go wrong when running a tournament.

Game 4 - Gong Fu Ming

My first game of the day was against Gong Fu Ming, whom I had played previously. I played against him in the Cotsen Go Tournament last year. I lost that time because he killed one of my groups. I expanded ferociously and caught up. I still lost, but it was close. In post-game analysis, Rui Wang looked over my game and saw that my group wasn't dead. It was ko-for-life. My tremendous effort to come back (and fall short) was wasted. It sort of took the wind out of my sails, though.

This time, game was going rather well. I was ahead on points, but the other player was pressing the attack. He seemed to like invading a lot. I was able to fend him off, but he was starting to get more and more power on the board, and the game was proving more and more difficult.

The worst part was that I somehow forgot to hit my clock, so both of us had been playing on my clock. I entered the 20-second byouyomi in the early endgame. I'm not great at the endgame, and I definitely cannot play the oyose well in 20-second byouyomi. I did count the board, though, and found that I was a little ahead. Since I started speeding up, my opponent did as well. I think he didn't want me to be able to use his time to think. He ended up making a mistake, though, and I cut off and killed one of his groups. He pressed on the attack, and I kept backpedalling. I was trying to play safe, and not lose too many points. Stones were cut off, and groups were made into seki. In the end, I had won by 4.5. I could tell that my opponent was pissed. I later found out that he was badmouthing me after the game. :(

Game 5 - Ryan Downing

I was 3-1 going into game 5. My friend Ryan Downing, who convinced me to go to the tournament, was 4-0. His AGA rating is 1 kyu, but I think it's lagging behind his strength. He usually takes white or gives me two stones when we play at the club. We were paired against each other for game 5. We played even. I held black.

I don't really know how to describe the game. Ryan invaded a lot, but he seemed to manage his groups ok and made my shape overconcentrated. I sort of felt pushed around. I managed to win, but I'm still mystified how it happened. Looking at the game record, I still can't figure out where the tide turned. I think this will be an interesting game to analyze later.

Game 6 - Chris Kirschner

After game 5, I was 4-1. Ryan was also 4-1, along with two other players in our group. For game 6, I was paired with Chris Kirschner. I held white, against a 3-dan!

Chris was the first person at the tournament I had played that stuck to joseki. No surprises, no weird moves, just standard play. I managed to answer all right, but I could feel that I was slipping further and further behind in the opening. I bet it all to attack one of his groups in exchange for letting him get a huge moyo. The attack failed, and I ended up resigning. Chris was generous enough to go over the game with me. It was interesting to see what his thought process was. It was a good experience, but I was sad to see my chances for an award slip away with this loss.

The Results

I don't quite understand how the tie-breakers work. My only losses were to a 2-dan and a 3-dan. Three other players in the division went 5-1. I think, though, since I played stronger players, the tie-breakers went in my favor. I ended up placing 1st. I won my first Go trophy. I also received credit good towards the Go Congress. Suddenly, going to the Go Congress seems like more and more of a possibility...

As one of the prizes, I also won a Go book. I chose The ABC's of Attack and Defense by Michael Redmond. I just started reading it, but I like it so far. That reminds me, I need to put up my list of book recommendations. I like [ext] David Carlton's Go Bibliography but I think I want to make a list of just the books (that I think) you need to buy, instead of trying to review every book that's out there.

I hope that this tournament will help my rating. I think it would be quite neat to be 2-dan for the next tournament.


1 February 2006

Should you play when you're tired? I went to the club tonight, and I played a few games, but with only three hours sleep over the past three nights. For work, I have been staying up late to talk with clients in Japan, and I still had to wake up early to make it to work on time the next day.

Needless to say, the games sucked. I would like to say it was errors due to lack of sleep, but it was more than that. It was just plain old laziness. I didn't bother to read to see if I could be cut, nor did I look for problems in my connection. The part that pissed me off the most is that I played two quick games against one of the players at the club and lost both, so the next game is kadoban back to even.

Sometimes I wonder if I should play at all, but it seems like a waste to go to the club only to watch. Other people don't even have a club in their area, so I should be thankful, and get as many games as I can, even if they are bad ones. It's just really annoying to play badly...


8 February 2006

The AGA ratings have finally been updated for the 3rd Toyota/Denso North American Oza Western Division. The AGA ratings were updated rather quickly with the results from tournament in New York, but the results from the Las Vegas tournament weren't submitted until this week. According to the AGA ratings system, my rating is 2.02903. I am now 2-dan. Barely.

Now I have to decide if I want to go to Santa Barbara later in the month for another tournament.


9 February 2006

I had to travel to Grand Junction, Colorado on business. It's cold there. Because I was out of town, I couldn't go to the Go club. I ended up playing one game on KGS, but didn't really have time for Go. I managed to string together four wins in a row on KGS. They've been over the past month, though.

While I was sitting around in the hotel room, I realized that on my notebook, I had the PDF for "How to Play Against Stronger Players, Volume 2." I ended up playing through the first game and recording it and the variations on my Palm. I found that the first game has a lot of mistakes! In the variations explored, there is a stone that shifts on the board. As a result, I don't know how valid the moves are. I guess pros make mistakes, too. It's just odd to see a mistake published in a "Super Book" from the Nihon Ki-in.


20 February 2006

I got home at 8:00 PM today, so there was no time to play Go. I had to pay a few bills, and try and get to bed at a decent hour. I logged on to KGS briefly, only to find that my rating has become 7k? - it's no longer a solid rating. :(

I think this means I need to play more.


23 February 2006

Got home late again. Happened to look at an archived copy of Sensei's Library on Tour and saw that in October 2003 I was 7 kyu AGA. I guess I have come further along than I thought I did, but it really doesn't seem like it.

I get whistful, though, thinking that I could have gotten even stronger if I only had more time...


2 March 2006

Last night, I played a game with a friend. It was kadoban to even. (I was white, no komi.) I kept counting the board in the endgame, and I was ahead, so I played safe and didn't play a few kos for a few extra points. We counted the game, and I ended up losing by four points. It was weird. Both of us counted as the game was winding down, and both of us thought I was ahead. I even tried to double-check the count on my Palm, but PilotGOne reported that black won by 30 points. (Stupid scoring bug!) I was pissed, more for my error in my skill in counting than for the loss itself.

After I got home, I looked at the game record. I uploaded it onto my PC. According to the game record, white wins by one point.

Something must have happened when counting on the board. I also ran out of stones during the game, so it's possible that something happened during the prisoner exchange. Anyway, it just makes me feel worse.

The final straw is that I can't actually bitch to any of my friends about it. I tried, and I ended up explaining end-of-game counting and leaving my non-Go-playing friends more confused, and me no more comforted. :(

I guess, in the grand scheme of things, this means that my board counting is better than I thought during the game. I just need to work on my counting at the end of the game. :)

Anyway, thanks for listening. Has this happened to anyone else?


13 March 2006

Well, I finally got to play on KGS this weekend. I managed to pull my rating up to 6k before torpedoing it with a handful of blitz games. I dropped down to 8k, and managed to win a number of slower games to get it back to 7k again.

I really shouldn't play blitz. I think winning often feels undeserved, and the time losses just suck. It's definitely an adrenaline rush, but I don't think it's good for my game.

I might have to swear it off again.


20 March 2006

Well, I got on to play four games while I was doing laundry. The first two games were rushed, and I spun out of control and didn't do so well. After my laundry was in the dryer, I played two more games. They were relaxed, and it felt like I was in control the entire game.

I just hope that I can start off this way, instead of having a number of bad "warmup games" every time I sit down to play.


6 September 2006

Today at the club, I played my first game with Tony. He's one of the strongest players at the club, and is hovering right around AGA 6-dan. It's strange, but it seems like he avoids playing me. I'm not sure why.

I was happy to finally get a game. We started a 3-stone game, since I am 2-dan AGA and he is currently 5-dan. I did really well, I think. I had good shape, and fought to stay in the game. I managed rather well, I thought, and even saved a group that had been cut off. I was pushing to get ahead in the endgame and win the game. I ignored a small move after he pushed forward. I read out the variations: a cut across the waist of a keima, the wedge, and a few others. I was safe. I played a monkey jump, the biggest move left on the board. Tony pushed through and cut. It was the one move (and the simplest!) that I didn't bother looking at. I flailed a bit trying to salvage something, but in the end, the mistake cost me the game. Looking at the game record afterwards, it probably would still be hard to win the game, but at least I would have made a better showing. :(


10 September 2006

Eric invites some of the members of the Go club to his beach party during the summer. This time, it happened rather late, and we ended up going in September. I brought along Yuan, Patti, and Aeris. Yuan played a bit online, but Patti and Aeris had never played before. I brought along a couple small boards, and we managed to get Aeris and Patti to play a game. They did rather well. I was impressed. I have to remember to get a board so they can play together.

Yuan had his own face-to-face game against one of the other beginning players. He had a hard fought game. He killed a large group in the center of the board, so I thought the game would be over. Later, though, he missed a threat and the group was freed and lived. However, he got to play a move to substantially reduce the other player's territory. It was a battle that went back and forth. Yuan ended up winning. I think it was his first win, and it was great to see. The game took two hours, though, and he had to leave afterwards.

I got in a game with Tom. It was good to play him again. I think we left things off where he had actually beaten me back to taking two stones. We played an even game, and I had to go back to basics. I used to play against him and invite diagonal openings, and try and work against his strengths. When I held black, I was doing really well with the Chinese Opening, so I switch and started experimenting. This time, though, was back to basics. While I didn't play the Chinese Opening, I did make an effort to play for the outside and get influence. I won handily, by over twenty points.

I missed out on the team game this year. I guess I'll play next year.


10 October 2006

I started a new KGS account, hayashida. It's actually an old one, but one that I hadn't used for a long time. The rating went ?, so I figured it would be good to use for a blitz account. I ended up taking a picture of my hanko, a Japanese stamp Mayumi gave me with my name on it. I thought the picture was pretty cool. I started a blitz game against the computer. I barely won. The funny thing, though, was that my rating jumped up to 3d?. I'm sure it'll adjust, but it's fun to have a "strong" account on KGS.


26 October 2006

While not Go-related per se, I started working on the registration for the Cotsen Go Tournament. That reminds me, I need to work on a Sensei's Library page for the tournament. I spent the past two days entering the pre-registration information into the computer. In case you happen to be reading this, please pre-register. It makes things go more smoothly at the tournament. I showed up with Ryan at the hotel downtown to set up the boards, clocks, and whatever else. When Chuck got back from dinner, we had to go over all the names I had pre-registered. Apparently there was a new tdlistn.txt file that wasn't posted on the web site. By the time we finished, it was already 2 AM.

27 October 2006 - 2006 Cotsen Go Tournament

Registration was a mess. After inputting all that data, Chuck left his computer up in his room while he went to breakfast. We were stuck waiting for him while he was still eating. Next time, we need to set up a computer specifically for registration. All in all, though, we weren't delayed too badly. There were a few mistakes in pairing, and they had to reprint a couple times, but other than that, it seemed to go okay. We were still late by an hour.

Game 1 - Joel Sanet

After the SNAFU of the registration, we started our first game. I played Joel Sanet, 2d. I held white. I don't know that I opened well, and I felt like I fell behind. My invading group lived, but I gave him an outside wall. I think my invasion skills need to be honed. I make groups that live, but it's nowhere near the beautiful sabaki that the pros make. As we were pushing in the endgame, I made a move that threatened to cut as well as push into his territory. He protected his territory, and I cut off his group. I was back in the game. In byouyomi, though, my endgame appears to be rather slack. I lost by a half point. :(

Game 2 - Scott Dossey

I played Scott Dossey, 1d, for my second game. I held black. BTW, I think this is one of the things that is interesting about the pairing system that winTD uses. It's set to pair even games against those one stone stronger or weaker. Essentially, it makes the handicap one less for games between players of different strength. It's supposed to increase the variance in the system, and it helps figure out the correct AGA rating more quickly for each player.

Anyway, I held black against Scott. I started with the Chinese Opening, and I don't think Scott ever managed a successful invasion. I managed to dumpling his group. Even though he stabilized it, I was leading on the board. He started to get power towards the center, so I played to reduce the middle. When I managed that, I started an attack against one of his weak groups, cut it off, killed it, and won by resignation.

Game 3 - Ryan Downing

For the third game, I played Ryan. I think I got too comfortable playing against him. We played without a clock. I think that was a bad idea. Usually, when I play with a clock, I tend to use all of my time. Without the clock, I think I picked up the pace of the game.

Things were going okay. I was getting a significant amount of territory at the edge of the board, but Ryan was starting to get a large middle. This seems to be the theme of our games as of late. Anyway, he pushed on one of my groups, and I responded. He pushed again, and for some reason, I tenukied. We played a few moves on the other side of the board. When he got sente and played again against my group, my position crumbled. I was pissed. I have no idea why I tenukied, or what I was thinking. ARRGH! I stumbled around a bit trying to get some foothold, but the game was over. I lost by resignation.

Some people went out for dinner afterwards. It sounded like a good idea, but I think the last thing I wanted to do was talk about Go after the games I had. The half-point loss was bad enough, but I was still pissed about the crummy game I played. (I wasn't mad at Ryan. He played really well. I was just pissed that I played so poorly.) I went to Patti's instead. We watched a couple episodes of Lost. I think it helped me decompress. It was probably was better for my morale.


28 October 2006 - 2006 Cotsen Go Tournament, day 2

Day 2 seemed to start better. We did better on the pre-registration, but we had to hold registration so that a few players could make it for the open section. This year, the pro demonstration game was held in the morning, so that players could arrive later. We need to schedule a check-in time, so that players that don't want to see the pro game will still be there an hour early so we can start setting up the games. We started a half hour late, but it wasn't too bad.

Game 4 - Wu Peng

I held black against Wu Peng, 2d. He is one of Rui's friends. I was running around helping everyone with clocks and making sure the games were set up. When I finally made it to the table for my game, my opponent immediated started the clock. I didn't think it was polite, since I was running around trying to get everything working. Cut me a little slack! It turned out that Mr. Yang told him it was okay to start the clock if his opponent didn't show, not realizing that I was his opponent. Mr. Yang apologized at dinner. It's okay, though. I think he was within his rights, but I thought I should be extended some time as courtesy.

We fought, and I played an odd variation to the faux "Magic Sword" joseki and was pushed around. I didn't know the variation where Black cuts anyway, and then White sacrifices the corner group for lots of outside influence. I'll have to remember that one for next time.

I managed okay, but it wasn't great. He started to get a huge middle, so I made a move that thrust into the center. It ended up being miai for killing his group or capturing cutting stones and breaking into the center. He played a few odd moves, but then didn't play the correct move to defend his group. I could have killed his group, but, under time pressure, I played the wrong move and forced him to live. I had to settle for breaking into his center. I lost by seven points.

Game 5 - Jonathan Brown

I knew Jon from when he played at the Santa Monica Go Club some time ago. He was taking lessons from Jeong-sensei and was a star pupil. He was getting rather strong. Then, for some reason, he stopped playing. I think we were around 5 kyu at the time. Since then, I made 2-dan. I was happy to see him at the tournament. Apparently he started taking lessons from Jeong again. He entered as shodan.

I held white. The opening seemed a little odd. I approached his corner instead of taking the last empty corner. I spent a lot more time in the opening than I do normally, since I was trying to figure out why he was playing this way. I even read out a variation that depended on a ladder, and realized that the ladder didn't work, so I changed joseki. It turned out later that I had the variation wrong, tho, and the ladder was in my favor. :(

I misplayed a situation on the side, and instead of winning a capture outright, it was ko. I played a threat against his corner, but got nothing for it. It helps when you play your ko threats correctly!

To salvage the position, I sealed off the lefthand side and went for a huge moyo. He had to invade, and I started to make his group heavy. He had to run out and connect, while also ensuring that my territory did not get too large. It was an epic battle. He thought he had an eye at the edge of the board, but I found a way to falsify it. His only hope was a counterattack against my group. I had read that out, and had a sequence that would make sure that I had life. It was probably the deepest that I read the entire tournament.

"Well, I guess that's it," he said. I thought he had resigned, so I was scribbling away the game in my Palm. It was a pretty big kill, 41 stones.

He said that he wanted to play it out, and played a move. I responded incorrectly, since I didn't see the move he had played. suddenly it was a semeai between our groups. He offered to let me take back the move. We actually played out a couple variations from there. The first variation, I ended up living anyway. By that time, the clock had already expired, and we had turned it off. With proper play, though, the center lives in seki, and I lose the game because I have no other points.

I wasn't in the money, so I told Jonathan that he could take the win. I'm kind of bitter, though, because I wanted the win to keep my rating up. Even if I went 2-3, though, I doubt I'd stay a 2-dan. My AGA rating is 2.010, so it would most likely drop, even at 2-3.

Aftermath

Well, after the game, I had to get back to running the tournament. There was a problem, though. Chuck's computer crashed and corrupted all of the game data! Crap! We had to figure out the awards by hand, and it was a mess. Reminder to self to bring a stable computer for the ratings for next time.

We managed, but it wasn't pretty. I missed the entire awards ceremony because we were frantically trying to figure out the rest of the awards.

Jeong-sensei won first place! It was a big deal when he lost to Jie Li, but it was a close game. I couldn't really tell what he was doing, but it seemed (to me) that he was reaching. He had a lot of territory, and it looked to me like it was enough, assuming that he could solidify and hold on. There was a ko to cut off one of his groups, and a ko for life on another group. He won both ko, but suffered heavy losses for them. He lost by resign. I thought that would have been it, but Jie Li lost his last game by a half point. As a result, the tiebreakers were in Jeong-sensei's favor.

A side note on tiebreakers: I think next year we are going to really limit who is allowed into the open section. There were a few players that were weak, and some of the top players "lost" because they played against them. The SOS ratings were low because of the pairings. I don't know the best way to fix this, but I suspect that we'll require a 6.0 AGA rating (or maybe, with discretion, a 5.9 or 5.8) before you are allowed to play in the open.

Ryan won second place in our division. He lost his last game to a 2-dan that went undefeated. He suspects that the 2-dan was underrated. Jon won third.

I ended up 1-4 for the weekend. With a little different turn of events, I could have been 4-1. I think the only game where I never had a chance was the game against Ryan. I need to play more carefully against him. I suspect my rating will drop to shodan. I guess that isn't a big deal, but it means that I'll need to play more cautiously in the next tournament.


8 November 2006

Hard to believe that I haven't updated this since March. I think I forgot about it. I made a slew of posts and back-dated them, just to have a record of what I've been doing in the past months.

I have been playing blitz games when I can, and after initially screwing up a bit, the account has settled at 3k. My "normal" account is at 2k, since I haven't had time to play as many "normal" games as I would like. It's sort of surprising that they are so close. I used to be really bad at blitz, and I guess I'm getting a little more stable.

I also started playing on IGS. I was sick of watching pro games and having other observers gripe about the comments of kyu players. I figure it's time to work on the account and get it up to dan-level. I spent the past few nights playing some games on there, and with the new glGo client, I am able to see my instantaneously my new rating on the new IGS system. I was less than 100 points from the promotion level, so I knew that if I won a game, it would promote me to 4k. It took me three games, one loss and two wins, but I finally did it. I am now 4k on IGS.

One thing I noticed is that I have to be careful about using the "seek" command on IGS. It's new with the new version of glGo, but some of the pairings have reverse komi. I haven't been paying attention to komi.


18 April 2007

It's been a while since my last entry. I haven't been playing Go competitively in quite a while, mostly due to the dearth of tournaments in the Los Angeles area.

Tonight, the Santa Monica Go Club had its anniversary party. We used the money we won from the Cotsen Go Tournament to throw the party. We had a large showing, and it was a lot of fun.

One of the highlights of the night was the simul games. Jong In Jeong, a strong player from the Korean club downtown, came and played a number of simul games. Jeong-sensei won the Cotsen Open last year. He is rated 8-dan. Four boards were set up, and he played four players of shodan or higher level at one time. As one player would be crushed, another would sit down and start a game with him. Most of our club members were crushed in the middle game. Several members wanted to see me play, so I finally sat down at one of the boards.

At first, I place six stones, since that was what the person next to me started with. Jeong-sensei looked at it and said it was too many. I placed five. One of the 5-dans at the club said to Jeong-sensei, "He's rather strong. He should only play with four." I was surprised. It was nice to hear that the stronger players at the club think highly of me. We ended up playing a four-stone game.

It's odd. I knew I was going to be manhandled. It was unsettling to sit down at the board and know that a huge fight would be coming. The game commenced. I opened well, and thought that my position was good. I did know that an invasion into my sanrensei was coming, but I thought I was prepared.

I attacked his stone when he approached my lone stone on the hoshi, and he dove into the corner. I got a wall on the outside in exchange for his group. As we started to push towards the center, he neglected a move on the inside. I thought it was odd. I played a couple move to ensure I was out into the center, and then I played a move towards his corner. He ignored it. I killed his corner. In exchange, he started to push on my stones. I needed more liberties, so I pushed out, made a base, and had enough liberties to survive. In exchange, though, I had thickened the stones surrounding my wall.

The invasion into my sanrensei came next. I managed my group okay, but he pushed me around with a driving tesuji after invading my side. Suddenly, he had thickness in my former moyo, and I had a running group. I was able to manage it though, and pushed into his moyo as I stabilized it. His center started to get big. I was trying to take territory on the side, reduce his moyo, and still get into the center. I counted the board, and I was still in the game. It was close, but I wasn't behind. The problem is that I know my endgame is not of the same caliber.

I made some points along the side. He threw a stone in on the third line. What gives? I read out the cut. It didn't work. I protected on the other side. He played a hane on the outside, and suddenly I had problems with liberties. I captured the hane stone, but then I had to go back and capture his stones inside my territory. I resigned. I was too far behind.

The people watching asked why I resigned. They wanted me to keep playing. They thought I was close. Play resumed, and I tried my hardest to continue to push into his territory. I was ignoring his sente moves and playing my own. It was still close.

At the end of the game, I had lost by eight points. I know that I lost in the endgame, but I was happy that I had faired so well.


This is a copy of the living page "Chris Hayashida / Go Blog" at Sensei's Library.
(OC) 2007 the Authors, published under the OpenContent License V1.0.
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