im not sure exactly what my rank is because i mostly play on tygem. but im 16kyu after 7 games on igs and 13kyu on kgs (but i play on kgs even less than igs).

anyway i just wonder if you guys noticed a point when you started to see pro games a bit differently, when you could realize how great a move was versus just seeing noise. also being able to notice the kind of style a person plays, etc.

i mean, i can kind of following a pro game broadly near the end but everything else is so complicated to me right now. especially the openings which just seem crazy and so wild compared to my games!

but i am really looking forward to the day when i can admire pro games for what they are.

also i wonder, is it a certain rank, or is it when you understand certain principles better? i guess maybe the two go hand in hand

Have a look at commented games. Seeing the variations that were being read out during the game is often quite awe inspiring.

cherryhill, that's an interesting question.

It takes level to see level.

Draw from your own experience in certain other professions.
For example: professional mathematician, professional pianist,
professional golfer, master carpenter, professional writer,
physician, professional tennis player, brain surgeon,
professional F-1 driver, 747 passenger plane pilot, etc.

(*) Have you studied any of the "basic" Go books ? The Dictionaries of Basic Joseki
by Ishida and Takao ? Various Life-and-Death and Tesuji problem books ?
You can get an idea: Go pros may not know every single variation
in Ishida or Takao, but they can certainly read
at least as far as any variation in the books.

Think about (*) for a moment.

It's a continuum. Your understanding, if you're around ~10k,
is ~10k understanding. Later, if you get to ~1dan, your understanding
will be ~1dan. If you get to ~3dan, your understanding will be ~3dan.

Go back and think about (*) for another moment.
Think about what this means. Really.

It takes level to see level.

Appreciation, understanding, and focus of study changes with each rank and between each individual. As long as you know the rules of go and have played a few games, then you're never too weak to appreciate a professional game.

Beginners often find it easier to study classical games and players with a solid style such as: Yasui Chitoku, Honinbo Shusaku, Honinbo Shuwa, Honinbo Shuei, Yamashiro Hiroshi, Yamada Kimio, Lee Changho and Chen Yaoye.

Every five ranks or so that you advance, you see the game rather differently. To appreciate the nuances of pro play, you need to be within a couple of stones of pro level. But you can still appreciate pro play as a double digit kyu.

There is one school of thought that says that the best way to advance is to study pro games. Certainly everything is there. Just because you do not understand everything does not mean that you understand nothing. Nor does it mean that you cannot improve your understanding by study.

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Visualize whirled peas.

Everything with love. Stay safe.

Hi Bill,

Many times I've seen advice that for weak players (under dan level?) studying pro games is a less than optimal way of studying, generally being compared as less productive than the advised holy trinity of play, review, problems.

Do you, or anyone else for that matter, have experience with kyu level players that have spent a reasonable amount of their study time on pro games and their experiences? Do you have any recommendations, or can you point me/us in a direction on how it would be best to study pro games?

Personally I enjoy looking through pro games, sometimes searching through for fuseki ideas, or continuations arising from common joseki, but I mostly view it as recreation rather than study, and it doesn't hold a regular place in my go/study time.

My feeling is the only definitive way to answer the questions I have is to start studying pro games regularly, and then maybe I should report back on my own experieces

a number of years ago when I was a double-digit kyu, my primary go activity was to memorize pro games - usually a different one every week or two.

I gained 4 stones in strength over the course of about 4 months into single-digit kyu

Its not the only thing I did (I did other study and play), and it was mostly recreational and for fun. I can't say with a certainty that its the cause of my sudden rise in my skill level, but I can't help feeling like that was mostly it for me.

I didn't really study the games, or commentary if there was any. The simple act of memorizing was my "study".

But I can't help thinking of other famous pros who when they were just starting as kids, all they had for study was collections of other pro games and would spend hours just playing through those games

I studied pro games, mostly trying to memorize them, starting in my DDK. Played a lot as well, but have always been lax in my tsumego. Lately I've been less focused on memorization and more on just reading variations and trying to understand. Sadly, I can't relive my DDK days and see if I'd have improved more quickly replacing the professional games with problems. My guess is problems would have been more effective, but this way was more fun for me, and that's all I'm after.

I'd credit the study of pro games with making my play more sophisticated. It made me less greedy about potential territory and more inclined to look for ways to attack an opponent's position. There are also times when I'm not satisfied with any move, and look harder and see something clever. I think that ability was helped by seeing how creative professionals are in solving problems. It's also really informative to see how they protect when it looks unnecessary, and let severe attacks through to play elsewhere. The really surprising moves help show where our understanding is wrong.

I'm only 16k, but I like to watch a pro game every once in while.

I really couldn't tell the difference between a 1k game and a 6d game, but just thinking what I would play and then see these players make a completely different move(that accomplishes a lot more) is still kinda cool. But I guess it'll take a lot more until I can fully appreciate them^^

First, I doubt if one size fits all.

Second, there are many go skills. I imagine that different skills are best taught in different ways.

Third, most people can only tell you what has worked for them. I think that it is silly to denigrate what worked for someone else. Go learning has not been scientifically researched, and even if it were known what is best for most people, that would not mean that it is best for you.

Honinbo Shusai recommended studying 1,000 pro games. My own go learning has mostly come through studying games: my own, other amateurs', and pros'. Nearly all of my learning to 4 kyu was through studying my own games, mostly by going over them immediately with my (stronger) opponents. (I did not play anyone weaker than I during my first year of play.) Most of my book study has been of pro games. When I was 4 dan a typical study day was 1 hour of joseki study, 1 hour of problem solving, and 1 hour of pro game review. My own feeling, however, is that the main thing that allowed me to advance above 3 dan, when I had no opponent stronger than shodan, was putting out a quarterly go newsletter in which I analyzed an amateur game, usually with a dan player as White. I worked hard to make my analysis stand up.

_________________
The Adkins Principle:
At some point, doesn't thinking have to go on?
— Winona Adkins

Visualize whirled peas.

Everything with love. Stay safe.

I started replaying pro games seriously when I found I was able to remember/anticipate sequences on the second play-through. I'm not sure how I would have gotten anything out of studying them before that. Studying games requires reading out hard sequences at every step. If I couldn't read out at least some sequences that were actually played when I've already seen them, how can I hope to read out any of the many sequences that were not played?

From about 30kyu to 8kyu or so it was my primary form of study. Later on I really had to change the ratio in favor of more concrete study L&D, tesuji, and endgame.

I don't believe it's the most efficient way to improve, but it is fun.

As you say, many pros and strong amateurs feel it's not really efficient until you get pretty close to pro strength, but opinions vary. Janice Kim 3p at one time recommended spending most of one's study on professional games, but I think that may be because the method she suggests for L&D is so tiring one can't do it for long.

Here are some benefits of pro game study even for kyus:

1. Exposure to a variety of moves / ideas. It's helpful to break out of just playing by basic instinct to understand that many more moves are possible than you may be considering.

2. Better shapes.

3. Better ideas of sacrifice.

4. Improved willingness to tenuki / sense of sente and gote.

5. Better endgame (but requires very tedious study to understand why pro endgame sequences are the way they are.)

6. Better notions of big points in opening.

7. The fun of recognizing things you've seen before when following current professional games.

8. Better feeling for the variety of styles. I think players who haven't seen enough pro games have exaggerated ideas of, e.g., how territorial Cho Chikun is. Pros do have different styles, but not so much that they really play bad moves to fit their "style." Ultimately they are trying to win at leas a little bit.

9. Better feeling for lines of play / longer sequences that are self-consistent.

10. Better feeling for how choices earlier in the game affect how it turns out later. (E.g, what looks like territory now might change later, etc.)

11. Better feeling for timing of forcing moves.

12. Better appreciation of aji.

What pro games are not so good for is preparing you for punishing common amateur mistakes.

Advice for study:

Play through each game at least twice, once thinking from Black's point of view and once from White's. People may think that they can take into account both sides at once, but that's not so easy. (I credit this idea to Bi Jang, Korean ex-insei.)

Think about a few candidate moves before you see what they pro plays. If a play appears that you'd never play in a million years, be very surprised. Try to cultivate this idea of being surprised. It's a chance to learn.

If you have time to go through a game multiple times, do so focusing each time on only one aspect of the game. Just go through only thinking about sente and gote, and how that changes hands. Then again only thinking about liberties. Then again only thinking about how thickness is used. Then again only thinking about sacrificies. Etc., etc. for any concept you want to work on. It's too hard to think about everything at once. Maybe only very strong players can do that.

Another piece of advice I like I got from James Kerwin 1p. It's about positional judgment and I think it's pretty insightful. The idea is that if you are replaying a pro game and you are wondering who is ahead, the answer is that it's even most of the time, at least to your level of understanding. So it really helps you understand what an even exchange looks like. I think what he said was that if you can play as well as the losing player in a pro game, you're already stronger than the vast majority of amateurs, so unless you have a commentary that says that one side made an enormous mistake, you should just assume the position is even for your purposes.

Have fun!

I'm about 2 kyu and I enjoy replaying pro games. I'm sure I misunderstand the point of a lot of moves, but that doesn't stop me from appreciating the game.

While I agree (at least to a point), I think the examples are poorly chosen.

I don't play any instrument or sing, but I can certainly appreciate professional pianists.

My HCP is 13 (9 at best) and yet I can appreciate many, if not all finesses of a professional golfers ability.

I suck at all kinds of crafts, but I recognize and appreciate the work of a master carpenter

I'm just moderately skilled driver, but I surely can appreciate the skills of my countrymen Räikkönen, Kovalainen, Bottas, Salo, Häkkinen, Rosberg etc.

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TJ, it depends on what "appreciate" means to you. A quick search on its definitions:

(1) Recognize the full worth of.
(2) Be grateful for (something).
(3) To esteem or value highly.

Of course, for most of us who are not professionals at various fields --
we may not be a movie maker, but we can "appreciate"/enjoy a good movie;
we may not be a professional writer, but we can "appreciate"/enjoy a good book;
we may not be a professional carpenter, but we can "appreciate"/enjoy beautiful Go equipment;
etc. etc.

But, referring to (1). "What's the meaning of this move?"
"What exactly was Wiles' proof of Fermat's Last Theorem?"
"What exactly was Feynman's work in QED?"
"How exactly did Tiger Woods win all his championships -- what exactly did he do differently than others?"
"How exactly did Michael Schumacher win all his championships -- what exactly did he do differently than others?"
"How exactly did Lance Armstrong win all his Tour de France titles?" (Oh, wait, this one is different )

If you pick any of those fields and ask me, my honest reply is, "I don't know."

That's why it's a continuum. If you think you can "appreciate" certain experts
in their respective fields, OK, that's one level of understanding.
But there are infinitely more levels.

It think it makes more sense to say that you can admire the result without understanding how someone accomplished something. Normally once you understand how they accomplished it, you can analyze the final result into sub-steps - and at each step, you can admire the result without yet understanding that preliminary accomplishment.

So for example, you can see that someone killed a healthy group and admire their marksmanship, without having the first idea how he did it. Later he'll understand the tesuji to kill, but not the initial attack that left the group vulnerable. Then he'll understand the attack, but not how the killer kept the game so tight that his opponent had no time to defend... and so on.

Why say that if you don't know exactly how some did something, you can only "appreciate" it? Sometimes the most intense admiration lies closest to the surface (you don't always want to know how the sausage is made), sometimes it lies hidden below the surface. Go has some of each. I used to think the crane's nest was really cool.

By the way, "it takes level to see level" is an awfully ugly phrase. Possibly because of the connection to the juvenile taunt, "It takes one to know one"? Combined with the use of a position in a hierarchy as a metonym for a human being? If it needs to be metonymy, I vote for something that can double as the verb as well, like "You need reading to read reading".

I more or less got which meaning you meant originally, although I wouldn't emphasize the word "exactly".

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