Stockholm Open 2009 - Day 2

So the second day of Stockholm Open weiqi tournament is over. How did it go? Very well I must say. After two losses and one win in the first day, I managed to get two wins in the second day, leading up to a total of three wins out of five! This was my goal and I am happy to have achieved it.

My losses both came from two 3 kyu players and my wins came from a 4 kyu and two 5 kyu players. This clearly shows that I am stable at my 4 kyu for the moment, which is kind of a relief.

The first game of today was not very interesting. My main worry was my opponents large potential territory. I made some invasions and one was quite successful but I played wrong which could have led to a ten thousand year ko but I played wrong again and it became a regular ko. But my opponent ignored my first ko threat so it ended quite soon. Instead I could play two moves in a row to make life in another corner. In the end I made quite a lot of territory in the middle of the board and I won by 19,5 points.

The second game was much more interesting. I opened as black with a chinese opening. White started direct with an invasion of the upper left and left some stones there without a base. I left them too, waiting for a good opportunity to attack. Next to this group I had a not so secure group myself. Halfway in the game my stones got cut of but I managed to get enough space for eyes. After some preparations I managed to cut of the group of white stones that I had my eyes on for such a long time and I captured eight stones. You can see the hole after them in the upper left in the picture. As a price I had to pay with the stones in the top middle. Then white made some small attacking moves around the board and then I realize that the whole center is white. Oh... I must get in to the center... now! So I put a stone quite deep with hope of easy escape. It turned out to not be so easy. As you see in the picture, they are not free yet. For a moment I believed that I was safe and I forgot to think of my stones... we played a bounch of stones until I wake up and realized that I was not connected with the outside. Oh no... I have to capture something! Lucky for me I had the liberties on my side and my opponent was forced to resign. An interesting game with a very nice opponent (Chibisai).

Yes... how did it go for Girlwing? She won the whole tournament! All five games! :D

Before the tournament I promised her a boat cruise if she won the tournament... So sometime during the summer you might see some blog entries from that adventure. So far I only know that she want to go with a big, new and fancy boat. I guess there are not so many of that kind but we'll see what we'll find.

Stockholm Open 2009 - Day 1