My Return to Go

Lanrose · Post by **Lanrose** » Sun Aug 16, 2015 5:17 pm

Guys I have some great news!

I finally got ranked today on KGS. I ended up playing a game against a 9k giving him 2 stones and made a huge mistake at the very end. It didn't really cost me the game, I had been losing by about 15 points prior to it, but it did make the loss a lot worse. The game is shown down below if you would like to comment and help me progress towards my other goals.

GOALS:
1) ~~Play enough games to become ranked on Go servers - right now I have only played on KGS but I know there are many others out there I hope to explore~~
2) Play 100 games - this may be the biggest challenge, I know i love the game and learning but I have always had an issue playing, but I'm jumping in
3) Rematch against Rabitz - hopefully I can win this time
4) Attend a Go club meeting - The biggest issue I have with this is I currently live in Warsaw Indiana and the closest active go club I can find is 2 hours away in Kalamazoo Michigan
5) Reach Dan level - I know this may be a long shot but I've started my path and I'm not going to stop

1 down only 4 left to go.

I also ended up playing another game which I won by .5 points. This game was really close and the only reason I won was because I was able to invade and make life. I was really happy that I was able to figure it out. I actually didn't know how close the game really was, but I knew i was behind and had to try to do something.

I still haven't been feeling very well but I'm glad I was able to play the last game to get me ranked. From now on I will be able to play with some of the people that I have met on a regular basis and once I get over feeling sick study more problems.

Today was a good day but I'm looking forward to the future and towards progress down the ranks of Kyus

Progress:
8 Kyu - 8/16/2015

I hope that I will be able to solidify my rank and make it to 6 kyu by the end of August.

Thanks for reading everyone! Hope to see you tomorrow!

EdLee · Post by **EdLee** » Sun Aug 16, 2015 7:26 pm

Hi Lanrose,

:w7:

Get a sense this is bad shape for White.

Proverb: Hane at the head of two (enemy) stones:

Click Here To Show Diagram Code: [go]$$B Hane head of two stones $$ . . . . . . . . . $$ . . . . . . . . . $$ . . 1 O O . . . . $$ . . . X X . . . . $$ . . . . . . . . . $$ . . . . . . . . .[/go]

In general -- yes, there are infinite exceptions --
this local shape is good for B, and not good for W.
Thus, the proverb (general guideline): Hane at the head of two stones.

Let's count liberties.
The :black:

string has 4 libs (1 shared); :b1:

has 3 (1 shared) --
Black has a total of 6 libs.
White has 3.

The following shape is even better for B, and worse for W:

Click Here To Show Diagram Code: [go]$$B Hane head & tail of two stones: tenuki $$ . . . . . . . . . $$ . . . . . . . . . $$ . . 1 O O 3 . . . $$ . . . X X . . . . $$ . . . . . . . . . $$ . . . . . . . . .[/go]

Liberties -- B: 8. W: 2.

The tiger's mouth is a good shape (barring the infinite exceptions

):

Click Here To Show Diagram Code: [go]$$B Tiger's mouth $$ . . . . . . . . . $$ . . . . . . . . . $$ . . . 1 . . . . . $$ . . X . X . . . . $$ . . . . . . . . . $$ . . . . . . . . .[/go]

Therefore, locally (ignoring the rest of the board),
the following :w1:

-

exchange is good for B, and bad for W:

Click Here To Show Diagram Code: [go]$$W Bad for W $$ . . . . . . . . . $$ . . . . . . . . . $$ . . . 2 1 O . . . $$ . . X . X X . . . $$ . . . . . . . . . $$ . . . . . . . . .[/go]

In general, you don't want to do this exchange as White.
(Yes, there are exceptions.)

The situation in your game is not an exception:

Click Here To Show Diagram Code: [go]$$W Real game: Bad for W $$ ----------------- | $$ . . . . . . . . . | $$ . . . . . . . . . | $$ . . . . 8 7 O . . | $$ . . . X . X X . . | $$ . . . . . . . . . | $$ . . . . . . O . . | $$ . . . . . . . . . |[/go]

To avoid the above bad shape for W, you first hane the other side;
if B blocks, you connect:

Click Here To Show Diagram Code: [go]$$W Variation A $$ ----------------- | $$ . . . . . . . . . | $$ . . . . . . . . . | $$ . . . . . . O 3 . | $$ . . . X . X X 1 . | $$ . . . . . . 4 2 . | $$ . . . . . . O . . | $$ . . . . . . . . . |[/go]

Next, the following exchange is still bad for White:
(which is the result in your real game)

Click Here To Show Diagram Code: [go]$$W Variation B: Bad for White $$ ----------------- | $$ . . . . . . . . . | $$ . . . . . . . . . | $$ . . . . 2 1 O O . | $$ . . . X . X X O . | $$ . . . . . . X X . | $$ . . . . . . O . . | $$ . . . . . . . . . |[/go]

So, don't do it! Do something else. For example: jump to :w1:

:

Click Here To Show Diagram Code: [go]$$W Variation C $$ ----------------- | $$ . . . . . . . . . | $$ . . . 1 . . . . . | $$ . . . . . . O O . | $$ . . . X . X X O . | $$ . . . . . . X X . | $$ . . . . . . O . . | $$ . . . . . . . . . |[/go]

EdLee · Post by **EdLee** » Sun Aug 16, 2015 8:18 pm

Hi Lanrose,

:w15:

Bad habit. Either Q18 solid connect or Q19 tiger's mouth is better.
Your P19 descend is a bad habit. (Yes, there are exceptions, but this is not one.)

:b22:

Confused. Small; very slow, like a snail. Not quite a pass, but almost.

:w23:

Also confused. Don't throw good money after bad.
That's exactly what you're doing with :w23:

.

Bad, like

.

Attack the heavy W string; good.

:b28:

-

Bad habit, bad exchange for Black.

:w31:

Strange. If you plan to connect, at least atari at R11 first.
If B blocks at S11, then you ponnuki at Q10.
If B connects at Q10, then you connect; you have a chance with S11 later.

:w37:

Solid, but slow. Locally, you can jump ahead to N8.

:w45:

Difficult to call this Go. The timestamp says you spent 2 seconds on this move. Find a better local move (there's more than one candidate,
depending on global considerations.)

Due to :w45:

, end of notes.

Lanrose · Post by **Lanrose** » Tue Aug 18, 2015 8:17 pm

Hey everyone!

So if you haven't noticed the past couple days have been pretty slow in terms of posts. I haven't posted much when I do and I am only writing every other day. This is mostly due to being ill and work, but I hope that I will be able to start posting more and putting more effort into my posts really explaining what I am doing.

Thanks for the comments EdLee, I have spent a lot of time reviewing everything you said and hopefully I won't make the same mistakes.

Other than that today's post isn't going to be too long. I have decided that tomorrow I am going to get back on track and continue posting games that I have played and tell more about problems I am working through.

I have decided that I want to finish going through Graded Problems Vol 3. before I move on to working through 501 Tesuji, which I finally took a look at. I ended up getting the first 10 correct but each one took me a while to work through so I'm going to go back a little and work my way back up. So tomorrow I hope to report back on how many problems I have worked through and how I have been doing.

I've also started learning a new language, which I feel like is a bad thing to do while concentrating on playing GO but I like languages and have always wanted to learn Italian. Maybe ill learn korean next so I can understand when I watch Baduk Tv.

Anyway have a great day everyone. I hope that tomorrow I will be able to post something better than what I did today.

Lanrose · Post by **Lanrose** » Wed Aug 19, 2015 8:26 pm

So I'm back today. I said I would try to post again today and it just so happens I am doing that.

Today i played a few games but I think the game where I learned the most was a teaching game I played. I ended up asking for a teaching game so I could practice reading the openings and learn where the big places to play were and I learned so much more. I ended learning about attacking and splitting groups, both of which I had done just not very well. We ended up stepping through a few variations to show me more about how to successfully cut and what to look for while cutting. I was also told a few more points about the openings, like taking big points and making opponent's groups weak, which i hope to be able to use in my future games.

After that game we also took a look at a game between a pro and an amateur. This was just to look at the openings and show how the different ideas would be put into practice in a higher level game. I was really excited about doing this because I was able to reinforce what I learned and also better understand what was happening in the game. I think I really learned a lot about the game today.

I also took a look at some Go Problems from graded go problems vol 3.

I decided to start over, because i haven't looked at it much recently, and was able to solve the first 20 rather quickly all correct. Only about 20 seconds were spent per problem. After I finish this post my plan is to work on a few more problems before heading to bed. I'll report on those either tomorrow morning or with my next post tomorrow night.

Until tomorrow have a great rest of your day and hope to see you tomorrow!

Lanrose · Post by **Lanrose** » Thu Aug 20, 2015 8:33 pm

So today's journal is going to be a little different. I'll start off by saying I played a few games today everything went well, and also took a look at some problems. I also got all of the copies of Go World magazine that I purchased from someone that was getting rid of them and am looking forward to going through them.

But the rest of this post isn't going to be strictly about Go. I mean the overall idea will be focused on it but I wanted to share something with everyone that I think is important when it comes to following what you want to do.

A few years ago I heard of something called the Dan Plan. The idea behind it was a guy named Dan decided to quit his job and focus on playing golf. Now it wasn't that he just didn't want to work anymore, but he read a book in which the author said that 10,000 hours of deliberate practice would allow for mastery of an activity. Now people first commented that 10,000 hours isn't enough time to master anything. I mean if someone were to play golf for 4 hours a day (average time of an 18 hole round), that would mean golf could be mastered in 7ish years.

That's where people struggled to believe the author, but Dan decided to try it out. He had never played a round of golf and decided to quit his job to master it. Currently he has about 4000 hours left and can now shoot scratch golf. Many people play for decades and never get that good, but he did. How? It's because he followed the rule of deliberate practice.

When people here the word practice in the case of golf they think oh ill just go hit some balls for a little thats practice. In the case of Go I generally think practice is oh ill just go do some problems or play a game. But there are certain elements missing from that type of practice. Deliberate practice involves, having the motivation to improve, being intentional, designed for the skill level, have immediate feedback and repetition. While I would know how to this with golf or other activities I think with Go it will be a little harder to do. But I think that doing this journal and making sure that I meet each of the goals I set will be a good way to get in that deliberate practice.

Now chances are some of you are really bored with the fact that I keep talking about golf, so I'm going to switch to something I saw today. In our daily lives we spend 8 hours working, approximately 4 hours cleaning, cooking, and spending time with family or friends. This leaves about 12 hours in a day. Now humans can generally get by with about 6 hours of sleep each day, so that comes to 6 hours to do anything else. 360 minutes a day to spend however we want to. And yet most of the time people will spend that watching tv and then wondering why they never have time to do what they want. Well I had that thought today and decided I wanted to change that. I want to spend my 6 hours a day in the most productive way possible to improve, or at least a portion of it because i also want to continue learning a new language.

Now I don't know how much of that 6 hours i want to spend on each activity, but I think that 2 hours on each of deliberate practice would be a good amount. I want to start my 10,000 hours of deliberate practice. From now on I will be recording my hours of deliberate practice and counting down on my journey to "master" go. I know that it will take many years to accomplish but I want to try.

So this was a little different of a post but it shows the new direction that I want to take this journal and if you have read all of this I commend you. Thanks for taking the time to read this and tomorrow I will begin my journey of 10,000 hours.

EdLee · Post by **EdLee** » Fri Aug 21, 2015 1:05 am

Lanrose wrote:tomorrow I will begin my journey of 10,000 hours.

Over the years, there have been on-going threads and discussions about the Dan plan and the 10K hours.

Knotwilg · Post by **Knotwilg** » Fri Aug 21, 2015 2:33 am

Ben Larcombe tried it out with Sam Priestly in table tennis in 2014. The idea was to get a newbie into top 250 in 1 year. Here's an excerpt of his blog:

I then wrote a fairly comprehensive blog post (4,000 words) reviewing the challenge, talking about how I came up with the idea, the theory behind it, some inspiration from other challenges and authors, and why I think Sam was unable to achieve a top 250 ranking.

Is It Possible to Master Table Tennis in 12 Months?
http://www.experttabletennis.com/possib ... 12-months/

Sam also wrote an article, on his own blog, about his experience of the challenge.

Spectacularly Failing to Become an Expert in a Year
http://www.arbing.co.uk/failing-expert-in-a-year/

Such a time constraint is even more severe than just spending 10 000 hours, but it involved deliberate practice with a very dedicated teacher.

Abyssinica · Post by **Abyssinica** » Fri Aug 21, 2015 4:00 am

EdLee wrote:
Lanrose wrote:tomorrow I will begin my journey of 10,000 hours.
Over the years, there have been on-going threads and discussions about the Dan plan and the 10K hours.

And here I thought the dan plan was about Go.

Lanrose · Post by **Lanrose** » Sat Aug 22, 2015 9:20 pm

1 down 9,999 to go.

I have seen the other posts about the Dan Plan and the 10,000 hours but it doesn't seem like anyone ever really focused on trying to apply it to Go. Rather it seemed like everyone was concerned on if it would work or not without actually thinking about trying it themselves. I only glanced over the posts so maybe they did discuss more, but it didn't seem like anything much.

So I realize I didn't post anything yesterday, it was kind of an odd day. I didn't end up actually starting my studying yesterday due to not being home for most of the day, but I did end up starting today. Although the start of today was also quite weird. At 5 this morning my smoke detector started beeping and I didn't have batteries so I had to take a battery out of a different detector so it would stop beeping. I then fell back asleep only to wake up at 7:30 by a train, fall back asleep again and wake up at 9. But then everything was pretty fun I ended up having my first Italian lesson, which had some issues with connection but overall went very well. But once that was over I finally got to studying.

I ended up spending some time going through Graded Go Problems Vol 3 and through 501 Tesuji.

Results:
Graded Go 19/24 (79%)
501 Tesuji 4/6 (66%)

I was able to go through the graded go problems pretty quickly only taking about 20 minutes to solve the problems and review. I spent 15 solving and 5 reviewing ones I got wrong. The 501 Tesuji took more time to go through each problem I averaged about 5 minutes for each of the problems. For each of the problems I spent 3-4 minutes reviewing and for the two that I missed I ended up spending a little more time to make sure I understood why my answers were incorrect. I wasn't able to do as many Tesuji problems as I wanted to do, but I realized that I can solve these problems even if they do take a bit of time. I'm hoping that as I continue solving them I will be able to get all of the problems right but more importantly take less time to read through each of the situations to come up with the right answer.

I also ended up playing today and looking at a few pro games but not super in depth and so i am not planning on counting the time spent on those as deliberate practice. Therefore as I started before I have completed the first hour of my 10,000.

Tomorrow, assuming I don't have to wake up to my smoke detector going off again, I plan on doing more Tesuji problems and more Graded Go problems while also hoping to review some games with a few stronger players.

Thanks for reading today. Hope you will join tomorrow as I continue my countdown.

Lanrose · Post by **Lanrose** » Sun Aug 23, 2015 8:32 pm

2 more hours down, Only 9,997 left.

So I may have spent more that 2 hours studying today, but am only going to count the 2 hours. I figure better low ball the hours than not get enough practice time.

Today I decided to take a look at a specific part of the game today and focused primarily on the Endgame. I have a book from the Elementary Go series about the endgame and have really wanted to take a look at it but never really got past the first chapter. Well today I decided to start working through it. I didn't really get very far because I got confused about somethings and so I looked online for a little bit more basic explanation.

I ended up finding a lesson online that focused purely on counting endgame. I ended up watching the entire video and learned quite a bit from it and think I understand a little more about counting in the endgame. Overall I spent about 1.75 hours working through both the book and the lecture video. I think the lecture video helped my understanding more than than the book at this point but after going through the problems in the video and getting a few correct i have a firm basis to work from. I think tomorrow I will continue to work through the Endgame, mostly because even though I never fully understood the counting everything it was still my favorite to look at due to the complex math involved.

After the lecture video I worked through some more problems. I ended up doing 9 from 501 Tesuji and doing 18 from Graded Go problems. I know it's not a lot of problems but because of the time focused on the endgame, which now that I actually think about it was more like 2.25 hours, I didn't spend much time on problems.

Results:
501 Tesuji 4/9 (44%) - I didn't do very well on these not sure if it was because I wasn't super focused or just because I didn't read everything out fully. for the 5 i missed I actually picked the move that was supposed to be played second for each of them. I'm assuming that mainly means I wasn't read each option out correctly but spent time reviewing why my options didn't work as the first move. I spent about 26 minutes working through these problems both solving and review.

Graded Go Problems vol 3 16/18 (89%) - I found working through these pretty easy only missing two and spending only about 20 seconds per problem. Overall only spent about 10 minutes with going through the problems and reviewing the problems I missed.

Overall Results:
Graded Go 35/42 (83%)
501 Tesuji 8/15 (53%)

I didn't actually play an games today but did watch a few games on KGS being played and reviewed a little bit with the players after. Overall today was a pretty good day studying and am happy with the progress I have made in learning more about the Endgame.

With 9,997 hours to go I still have a long way but will continue to work tomorrow.

Thanks for reading today. Hope you will join tomorrow as I continue counting down.

Knotwilg · Post by **Knotwilg** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 3:23 am

The first years of my university career I approached the study in a quantitative manner. I made a planning in terms of number of pages. If I lost some time, I increased the speed with which I went through the pages. Obviously this didn't work at all because I didn't really understand let alone internalize what was on those pages. I just "did" them.

Later, when I started all over again, I approached my studies as a day job. It was my first priority. I assumed I would have enough time anyhow and if not, I'd work overtime. This time I approached the topics differently: I tried to understand everything. I really studied the subject, without worrying about the pace. I realized the obvious fact that some pages go slower (the ones that introduce concepts, an important theorem) and others go faster.

I think this is the same for problems. In general we should just try to solve problems completely, without bothering how much time it takes. Sometimes the problem will be too hard and then you just look at the solution and move on. (Or we should take an easier collection.) Later, similar problems will become easier. And the same is even true for games. It's all very well to "lose 1000 games as quickly as possible", if you don't invest what you have into those games, you might as well not play them.

A qualitative approach is key. Play good games. Solve problems completely. Don't bother too much how many of them you did or which time ratio was spent on it.

Cheers

Bill Spight · Post by **Bill Spight** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 9:12 am

Knotwilg wrote:I think this is the same for problems. In general we should just try to solve problems completely, without bothering how much time it takes. Sometimes the problem will be too hard and then you just look at the solution and move on.

I generally agree with this note. However, I do not think that you should just look at the solution and move on. You need to study the solution and why it works and how you might have found it. (And what was wrong with your thinking.) At the very least you should be able to play through the main line of the solution and and key variations in your head before moving on.

I also think that it is realistic to set a time limit. When I was in training as a 4 dan I worked on 4 problems per hour, 15 min. per problem. That is because I was willing to spend that much time on a problem position in a real game. And the problems were that hard.

As a casual kyu player I would think that 2 to 5 min. would be a good maximum. As a beginner, 30 sec. to 1 min.

As I have indicated a number of times, I think that the right level of difficulty is such that you can solve around half the problems. That implies a time limit. It also implies that people who can solve 80 - 90% of the problems they try should move on to harder problems.

Abyssinica · Post by **Abyssinica** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 9:31 am

I love the tasuki collection for the reason that there is no answer and, if you're doing them properly, there can be no incentive to check the answers before you've exhausted your reading because there is no answers. Even if you get the problem wrong because of something you missed, you still put in the effort to read it.

Knotwilg · Post by **Knotwilg** » Tue Aug 25, 2015 3:38 am

Bill Spight wrote: When I was in training as a 4 dan I worked on 4 problems per hour, 15 min. per problem. That is because I was willing to spend that much time on a problem position in a real game.

That's a lot of time. Do you think this would still make for proper practice for a 4d in today's online regime? Even pros don't seem to pause for such a long while in the modern game.

(I agreed with the rest of your post)

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