by Bob Bacon
Forty Go fans entered the woods at Umstead State Park in Raleigh, North Carolina last week, and 40 winners emerged after seven days of camping, lectures, simuls, game reviews, teaching games and, yes, six long tournament games.
Lectures were provided by our long-time favorite author, teacher and strong Go player Yuan Zhou. Teacher Zhou clearly explained and helped us appreciate a number of games, and provided details such as the etymology of Ko: Disaster! Simuls, game reviews and teaching games were wonderfully done by Korean pro Eunkyo Do 1P, who’s visiting the US for the first time and will be attending the US Go Congress in July. She has a strong presence on YouTube (Go Inside) and would be happy to gain more students.
Participants enjoyed the usual Burning Board camaraderie and s’mores around the ceremonial board burning Saturday night.
Although everyone attending was a winner, the tournament champions were as follows: 1st place in the open section was won by local star player Sheng Huo. 2nd was Jeremiah Donley and Derek Zhou took 3rd. Section A was won by organizer Paul Celmer, with tournament director extraordinaire Devin Fraze taking 2nd. Bart Jacob nobly represented Texas with a 3rd place
finish. Justin Su continues to shine seizing 1st place in section B, followed closely by Paul Mendola in 2nd with Katie Oh close behind in 3rd place. Another local, Neal Siekierski clearly won Section C, although Daniel Chiquito was close behind in 2nd. Jeff Martyn rounded out the section in 3rd place. D division was won by Andrew Rush, with Elliot Pahel-Short placing a very strong 2nd and Jacob Rush at 3rd.
Tournament winners took home cash prizes as well as custom made trophies created by Frank Salantrie and Bob Bacon. See pictures of this event within the next few weeks at www.trianglegoclub.org.