If you see a duck, you prefer Chinese rules, a rabbit, Japanese...

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Sumire is being discussed in the Amazon post and I wondered how she is doing/did in the large tournaments.

47th Kisei: Didn't win.
61st Judan: I guess she is seeded into Section A. She did well the previous tournament. Does anyone know?
77th Honinbo: Made it to Section B.
47th Gosei: Made it to Section B.
48th Meijin: Made it to Section B
70th Oza: Lost in the middle of Section B.
48th Tengen: Lost in Section C
also
29th Agon Kiriyama: Won in Section A. Next match coming.
31st Ryusei: lost in section A.

Seems like she did pretty well. Especially well all things considered -- like when she is compared with her peers. It looks like the Kiriyama Cup and next Judan will be our chance to see her in an open tournament.

Sumire is doing well in the female Meijin league, but as it is a female only tournament, I was posting there. There are more players to follow. I hope she becomes the challenger, it is getting very interesting. Fingers crossed.

That said, thanks for your summary. I was checking the same today, too. Perhaps, seeing her doing well, one wonders "hey, what about the rest of tournaments?" Your post saved me some work

About the Judan, she made it to the A prelim, and won one game. Another one would have taken her to the last prelim, but I guess that this win got her seeded. BTW, I'd like to say that, while making it to the Kisei C league was a great success, it required 4 wins; making it to the A prelim in the Judan required 5 wins (furthermore, she won one game). Yes, the Judan and the Kisei are not the same thing. One more thing about this: I am checking now, and Sumire played in the Osaka prelims. Now she is Tokyo. I don't think that it matters if she is seeded. Small fact.

To see her in an open tournament, we have to wait for the Hiroshima Cup, for example, or some other small event for young players. Too bad she is out of the Shinjin O.
What about NHK? Are there preliminaries? Is it an invitation only tournament?

She won the Section B in the 78th Honinbo, so she will be in the charts of section A.

The 48th Gosei has started, but she hasn't played yet.

Nakamura must be pretty popular to get her qualifying matches streamed.
https://youtu.be/wleHVhe9iOo

I was reading Go news on one of the Japanese newspaper websites a few weeks ago and they only covered the Kisei tournament and Nakamura Sumire. I guess that hints at how popular she is - non-players have seen her name.

Not only her, from time to time there are other prelim streamed. But it's true that it's not too often. Not only top games should have attention.
About popularity: I once asked a friend in Japan. She doesn't play go, but she knows Iyama and Sumire. No more to say

Back to Sumire: she lost in the Kiriyama Cup to Kubo Hideo 7-dan. But still a bit better than last year.

And today, I saw in WBaduk that she was playing to Jo Bunen 1-dan. It was their second game of the day. And not only them. Several young players were playing too. These games were not in Sumire's schedule. They must be for some new tournament, or some unofficial event, national team... I don't know. Would they broadcast training games?

My guess it that they are selection games for the Asian Games team. Korean players are playing selection matches at the moment, so the timing makes sense.

The women's Honinbo qualifying match does have commentary from Terayama Rei 6 dan. It's pretty minimal before lunch break but he comes back to discuss the fight on top.

They have 3 hours each so I'll catch the rest later.

By the way, Shibano and Yo, and Ichiriki and Sada are playing their 77th Honinbo league games on stream at the same time.

1,295 watching Nakamura. 632 watching the boys.

Great day for Nakamura Sumire.

Sumire won her game in the female Honinbo, and advanced to the main event. Last year she was in it too. Her opponent, Kibe Natsuki 2-dan, played well in the beginning. She had 90% chances of winning, and by the lunch break, Kibe could be satisfied. But then Sumire fought back, and there were several swings in the balance. But then, Sumire had a big center, and attacked some weak black stones. Some survived, some died. In the end, Sumire captured 2 dead stones to prevent a nasty ko. It was like saying "look, I can take time to capture this and avoid this problem". Black resigned after this.

In the female Meijin league, Xie Yimin lost to Ueno Asami. Xie's final result is 4-2 and Sumire, 5-1, becomes the challenger to the title. It will be a best-of-3 against Fujisawa Rina. I'd like to see Sumire to win at least one game. Asami is now 3-2 and will play Suzuki Ayumi (3-2) in the final game. The winner will be keep her seat, and the lost will have to play Nyu Eiko in a play-off for demotion. (I am assuming this, because if there could be a play-off for the challenge, there should be another one for the demotion).

In the open Meijin, there are no demotion playoffs. If there is a tie (other than for first place), rank determines the finishing order. That may be the case for the Women's Meijin.

I caught the end of Nakamura Sumire's match and I realized that I DID know the yugen commentor Terayama Rei after he brought out his books from 2017. These are the full board 9x9 yose books I've been eyeing. Better just order them before they are gone.

I clicked on Sumire's profile and I saw that she actually defeated Terayama Rei recently. So maybe he had the first hand knowledge to provide better commentary?

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Also, Igo Shogi TV released video interviews of Nakamura Sumire and Fujisawa Rina regarding the Meijin challenge.

The only words I recognized were "jusan sai" and the answer to every question beginning with "so desune" (uh huh). So I didn't get much from this but it's interesting to see them speak. I guess the conversation goes back to Fujisawa winning Honinbo at 16 years old. And I believe she was the youngest to challenge a [women's major?] title.

More news on this: https://www.nihonkiin.or.jp/match_news/ ... 33_27.html

"First Challenge Match" (or similar)


The match will start on April 14th at the Nihon Kiin's Tokyo HQ. But wait -- they don't get to go to a fancy hotel with tempura, soba, and fruit parfait?

It would be nice to see them play in a nice hotel, nice goban and so on.

It's the usual in the 3 big titles. In others... I think I have seen the Judan played in a hotel, and the Gosei in the Nihon Kiin.

But I have also seen female title matches played in the same room where they play other games. It's up to the sponsor to pay a fancy hotel, but it's up to the NK to give them one of the good rooms. This match is going to get a lot of coverage, so we'll see what happens.

I have often wondered what it is that makes one pro player a champion and others just a runner-up. It's obviously not a case of learning a new joseki or studying life & death books. It's all mostly in the realms of psychology, I expect. One thing I've noticed a lot when compiling the GoGoD Onomasticon is how often you come across players who are good enough to reach a title match, often even, but always end up as the bridesmaid. This famously happened to Kato Masao, you may recall, and he said he went in exasperation to his fellow Kitani School disciples, who had already notched up lots of titles, and asked them what he was doing wrong. He never revealed the answer, but he evidently got the one he wanted. In other words, an answer exists!

Now we can see the same sort of interplay with psychological factors for Rina and Sumire. First we should note that neither really has had the equivalent of successful title-holders to turn to for advice. But both had family members who were high-level pros, so I think we can assume they have thus acquired some sort of mental toughness from them (but nature or nurture?). An example of what I mean by that is that on the day Sumire's fate in the Women's Meijin challenge was to be decided (in a game between Ueno and Xie) she played a game in the Women's Honinbo which, according to AI, seems to have been PERFECT up to about move 60 and almost PERFECT from about move 80 to the end (move 174). There were just a couple of small blips in the bit in-between. None of this was routine fuseki or boundary plays. It was complex tactics, and I'd say her early bullying (ijime) episode in this game should become a classic for understanding what ijime is. But my main point is that she evidently kept her focus and concentration level at maximum, despite what was going on elsewhere.

At the same time, I was fascinated by Rina's responses to the interview when her Women's Meijin challenger was decided. My heart went out to her, because journalists always ask inane questions in these situations (how did you feel when the bullets were whizzing past you as you were stuck on the ice floe?), though it cannot be denied that being just 23 and having to play someone younger with an age difference of TEN is no ordinary experience. But some of her answers revealed, I thought, the sort of mental attributes that distinguish champions.

First off, she admitted that Sumire's title challenge has come earlier than expected, even though she has been keeping an eye on her games since Sumire was 5. She still hasn't processed her feelings about the age difference, and doesn't expect to until she's actually in the match-room. Part of the reason for that is that this a sort of new Sumire. Rina said her new rival now has a difference presence and aura compared to when she was five. That's not surprising in itself, but it fascinates me that Rina latched on to it. She was clearly also a bit apprehensive about becoming the "baddie" (the ヒール役 or stock villain, she called it) for the first time.

Another point is that, apart from Rina, other pros have been surprised at Sumire's rate of progress. So she clearly has something even they lack. What? All I can say is that she seems to be the female/teenage Sin Chin-seo as regards being able to play like AI bots. The other is that I have suddenly detected in her an ability to play very high-level miai (and is that an AI attribute?). Obviously I am saying that with the diffidence of a mere amateur, although I do tend to feel attuned to watching out for miai after producing books on the miai master, Honinbo Shuei.

The match in mid-April is naturally going to be a highlight for absolutely everybody interested in go. But there's one possible aspect, as yet unmentioned, that might add a little lustre to even such a match made in Heaven. I have been groping in my memory, and I can't yet recall any big go match between players who both come from high-level pro families (I exclude Yi Se-tol vs. Yi Sang-hun as they were from the same family). Can anyone else think of one?

This psycological thing you talk about is what makes pro go interesting for me. I have written about this before. I don't expect my posts to be remembered ( ) but when I try to forecast the result in a game, I do it thinking in the mental attitude of the players. That's where Iyama shines, in my opinion.

The raw ability of top pros is more or less the same. Or used to be. In these early times of AI, the one who manages to get more from it has an advantage. But in the end, the knowledge will be there, games can be studied by everybody, and differences will be small. It is better to be a tiny little bit stronger than your opponent, rather than weaker (is my English right here?) of course, but in the long term, results don't reflect only that. Back to Iyama, is he really so stronger to everybody else? Stronger enough to hold all 7 titles at the same time? I doubt it. He lost games too. But his mind must be strong enough to hold the pressure when he needed to, and keep focused for many hours.

Now, back to Rina and Sumire. If Rina has been following Sumire since Sumire was 5, it means since Rina became a pro, or was about to it. Although Rina lives in Tokyo, and Sumire is from Osaka, it is a small world. Perhaps many pros knew that Nakamura Shinya had a daughter who looked pretty good. Rina's father, Fujisawa Kazunari is a bit older than him, but perhaps they know each other. Maybe this is just gossip, but a new promising new dan, thinking about a 5 yo girl... that was news to me.

I don't know what's Sumire's secret ( ), but... her father is a 9-dan, probably one of too many, and her mother is a go teacher too. They know about the go world, and have probably taken a lot of care in protecting her, aside from teaching her. I can think of Rafa Nadal's case, how his family and environment have a lot to do with his mental strength. Seems to me that Sumire is not someone who would rate herself with a 10, but rather would think about how to improve.

I don't know about any match between pros coming from go playing families. Cho U is married to Kobayashi Izumi, and fought Hane Naoki a lot. This is the closest I can think about.

As for the result, ability-wise, I expect a 2-0 for Rina. I am sure everybody, including the players, expect the same. That means that the pressure will be 100% one-sided. The surname Fujisawa is a lot heavier than Nakamura.

He definitely is strong but you must be right. Strength without composure probably doesn't get 7 titles.
I saw a twitter post by Fujisawa Rina showing off her fashion as a kid playing in amateur pair go championships. Michael Redmond was a ref for that tournament. So it's possible that Fujisawa has been a ref for kids amateur tournaments. Maybe even likely since she was involved as a kid herself. So yeah, I'm not surprised that the word gets around pretty fast when there is a new Go Prodigy. People were probably saying similar things about Fujisawa -- and they were right.

https://mobile.twitter.com/rinafujisawa ... 3578240001

With the recent success in preliminaries, Sumire has broken into top 30 female players! She is now #28 globally and #4 in Japan (having passed Xie Yimin)!

She was actually top 30 at the beginning of the year, according to this.

In talking about ratings, I am way out of my field, but I do remember talking to Nathan Divinsky and Ray Keene about them. They produced a book (?Warriors of the Mind) which aimed to show who was the strongest chess player of all time. They backtracked Elo ratings by adding all known results.

As far as I can recall, they said there are, nevertheless, major problems inherent in the methodology. For example, you get different results if you take a player's whole history or his recent history. In addition, there was a special problem with young people who were improving fast.

I suppose there may also be problems with which games you include e.g. official only, or time-dependent. I infer this is especially crucial from the fact that chess produces separate ratings for classical, rapid, blitz and online games - and the results are indeed very different in each case.

The go rating list above is based on whole history, I believe. Does this disadvantage Sumire, a very fast improver? Does it favour, say, Rui Naiwei, who doesn't play much now and certainly doesn't win much now, but who has a huge and stupendous back catalogue she can call on?

In terms of very recent games, official or otherwise, Sumire seems to be ahead of both Xie Yimin and Suzuki Ayumi. She would, however, be behind Rina and Asama, but, strangely, also Mukai Chiaki.

The old question seems to apply: if it were not a rating list of go players but a list of surgeons and you had to undergo life-saving surgery, would you trust what the list tells you?

The historical ratings are not fixed. If she wins a few games now, all the historical ratings will get higher too. For example, in this post on 15th March she was only ranked #35 in the same beginning of the year ranking list. This makes interpretation of the historical snapshots a bit difficult.

It is a bit related to some of the problems John is highlighting in his post above. Players tend to become stronger or weaker over time. Goratings is trying to take that into account and provide an estimate of the ratings at different times. It's not easy because when a player defeats a stronger opponent, we cannot really tell if it was because of better luck or because they've actually gotten stronger. We will know better once we get more data (ie. when the player plays more games). Only then the estimates become more accurate and then goratings will also update its earlier estimates. That's why the historical ratings are fluctuating too.

Understanding the math behind goratings (or WHR) is beyond my paycheck, but more details here:
https://www.remi-coulom.fr/WHR/

According to the WHR description as used in goratings.org, all games played by all players are taken into account. So, if Rui Naiwei played and won a lot, and then nearly stopped playing, she doesn't get a lot of punishment. The usual is that an active player wins more games in its prime, then loses more often, and naturally, the number of loses taken into account increase compared to the wins. The paper explaining the algorithm doesn't say that old games are discarded. Actually, in KGS, if you stop playing, your ranking doesn't drop. It is the server that marks you as ?. Then, you are off the ratings. In goratings, I just checked, Cho Chikun has rating and games from 1971.

In the case of players who improve fast, I feel that the rating can't follow the player. Sumire is now over 3000, but not too long ago, she was under 3000, while other young players (boys) were over 3000, with not so good results. I think that, even though she plays and wins a lot, many of those wins are against weaker players, so her rating is dragged to that level. Eventually, her rating will improve.