Sumire Defeated Ueno Risa(1p, 2837) on Oct 8th in 1st round of Female Kisei. This puts her in the top 8 of that tournament.

2020 results: 16-13, overall: 33-20

For those who like to keep track of records, Sumire's game with Ueno Risa in the Women's Kisei (the Docomo Cup) was the youngest ever match-up in an official tournament in Japan (probably anywhere). It was 11+14 = 25.

Sumire, in what is her first tournament at the finals level, next faces Aoki Kikuyo.

She has also just won a special award in the annual Kansai Go and Shogi Clubs Prizes.

Elsewhere among the women, Fujisawa Rina (just turned 22) has just won the 1st Hakata Kamachi Cup, defeating Ueno Asami in the final on 9 October. This is one of the few events that has a 3rd place playoff: Mukai Chiaki beat Nyu Eiko. The sponsors also made an important announcement at the final. The Hakata Kamachi Cup itself will now cease, but they will take over the Women's Meijin which terminated last year. Conveniently, Rina is also the current holder of that title. The current event was her first trip Fukuoka, s place she found "delightful". She'll probably be back many times. The new Women' Meijin will surely be held there, because Hakata = Fukuoka, and local pride is generally re-asserting itself and blossoming there.

A partial update:

After going 7-10 for the year 2020 up to April, Sumire seemed to go up a notch after games resumed in June. She qualified for the main events of three tournaments (i.e. qualified via the preliminaries): the Senko Cup, the Women's Kisei and the Young Carps. In September she was undefeated, with 5 wins. Her score for that period, June to end September, was 8-2. Her victims included Ishida Atsushi 9-dan.

In terms of the official tally of wins (which is currently only as of 20 September), Sumire has now moved the top of this year's queue of 1-dans trying to get to 2-dan, despite being the youngest and one of the very newest to enter the lists. She is on 15-12. Interestingly one of her closest rivals in this race is Ueno Risa (14) who is on 8-8, and she also qualified for the Women's Kisei finals, and as luck would have it she has been paired with Sumire in Round 1. That game is scheduled for 22 November, but at premium rates for those who want to watch it online.

While Sumire and Risa are steaming ahead in the 1-dan section, the foreigners are having a tough time. Antii is on 0-7, Indonesian-born Rafif Shidqi Fitrah is on 0-2 and Chang Fukang of Malaysia is on 1-2. Given her pedigree back to Kitani Minoru, we might also have hoped for a brighter start by Cho Kosumi, but she's on 0-3.

Two other things caught my eye in this week's go news. One was Cho Riyu commenting on the all-female Hakata-Kamachi games said the content of the games was "of extremely high quality". The other is that the two major puzzles of the accuracy of Dosaku's game records have now been solved. And not by researchers but by two young pros! Nice to know they are not all AI obsessed

Sumire lost her 2nd round game in Female Kisei 24 vs Aoki Kikuyo (8p) on Oct 26, so she is out of Female Kisei 24.

According to my calculation, that puts her 2020 results as 16-14, Overall: 33-21.

She seems to be in Rookie of the year 46 qualifying. See frame 7 of https://www.nihonkiin.or.jp/match/shinjin/046.html. Will play Tsuji Hana (?) 1p

The other tournament she's still in is Hiroshima 15 (main tournament: https://www.nihonkiin.or.jp/match/wakagoi/015.html).

Nakamura 1-p against Hoshikawa 4-p [KK], at the Kansai Kiin's Open. The sgf can be downloaded here and I found some commentary (without any sort of even AI-translated subtitles, I'm afraid) here.

Take care.

_________________
一碁一会

October games:

[1] Lost on Oct 1 to Takabayashi Masahiro (7p, 2784) in Oza 69
[2-3] Won on Oct 5 two games against Yamada Zhibao 7p and Shunta Utani 2p in class C preliminaries of Kansai Go Open
[4] Won on Oct 8 against Ueno Risa(1p, 2837) in 1st round of Female Kisei 24
[5] Lost on Oct 26 to Aoki Kikuyo (8p) in 2nd round game of Female Kisei 24
[6] Won on Oct 29 against Kori Toshio 8p (2658) in 1st preliminary game of Kisei 77. He seems to be semi-retired and well past his prime, because goratings has one of his games every 2-3 years and all seem to be losses going back to 1992.

November games:

[1] Lost on Nov 10 to Xingchuan Hangyang (?) 4p in Kansai Go open 1
[2] Lost on Nov 16 to Tsujika (?) "early stage" in 1st qualifying game in Shinjin-O 56. What is "early stage"? A 1p who just started playing as a pro?
[3] Won on Nov 19 against Mihoshi Taguchi 1p in 1st qualifying game of Female Meijin 32.[/color]

Here is a summary of all her tournaments:

Male+Female tournaments:

• Kisei 45 - eliminated in Jan 2020. Kisei 46 should start in Oct 2020.
• Meijin 46 - eliminated Mar 5, 2020. Meijin 47 should start in Dec 2020
• Honimbo 77. Won 1st game on Oct 29 vs Kori Toshio 8p (2658). Will play Iramaruhei(?) 7p next. See Kansai 11 from https://www.nihonkiin.or.jp/match/honinbo/077.html.
• Oza 69 - eliminated on Oct 1st by Gao Lin (Takabayashi?) 7p (?) on Oct 1st, 2020. Oza 70 should start in March 2021
• Tengen 47 - eliminated Apr 2, 2020. Tengen 48 should start in Apr 2021
• Gosei 46 - eliminated Mar 26, 2020 by Muramoto Wataru 2p. Gosei 47 should start in Jan 2021
• Judan 60 - should have started in Sept 2020
• Ago/Kiryama 27 - eliminated on Feb 24, 2020 by Sakaguci?. Kiryama 28 - should start in Feb 2021
• Ryusei 30 - Defeated Araki Issei 4P on June 29, 2020 in final of prelim B. Lost to Nakano Shoya 1p in Prelim A. Ryusei 31 should start in April-Jun 2021?
• NHK - Has pretty restrictive criteria (no preliminaries). She will probably have to win a women's title to qualify.
• Shinjin (King of New Stars) 46 - lost to Tsujika(?) on Nov 16, 2020. New Rookie 47 should start in Nov 2021.
• Hiroshima 15 (Young Carp). Waiting for the drawing of the main bracket: https://www.nihonkiin.or.jp/match/wakagoi/015.html.
• Thanks Cup 11 - eliminated on Apr 6, 2020 by Xie Yimmin. Thanks Cup 12 should start in April 2021
• Okan (Crown) Cup - Not eligible (seems to be for Nagoya branch only).
• SGW Nakajima 3 - did not participate? SGW 4 should start in Aug 2021
• Kansai Go open 1: Won on Oct 5 two games in Qualifying 3 of C class vs Yamada Zhibao 7p and Shunta Utani 2p. But then lost on Nov 10 in 1st round of final round to Xingchuan Hangyang (?) 4p. See https://www.nihonkiin.or.jp/match/k_open/001.html

Women-only tournaments:

• Honimbo 40: Will play Saeka Iwata 1p in 1st qualifying. Saeka Iwata seems to be in good form because I keep seeing her winning against men in big tourmanents on gotoeveryone site. See Kansai 7 of https://www.nihonkiin.or.jp/match/fhoninbo/040.html
• Meijin 32: won 1st game vs Mihoshi Taguchi 1p on Nov 19, 2020. See frame 6 of https://www.nihonkiin.or.jp/match/fmeijin/032.html
• Aizu 8: Will play 1st game of qualifying against Chiharu Miyamoto 1p. See West block 3 of https://www.nihonkiin.or.jp/match/aidu/008.html
• Kisei 24 - Lost in 2nd round of main tournament to Aoki Kikuyo 8p on Oct 26. Kisei 25 should start July 2021.
• Senko/Saikyo 5th: Lost to Ueno Asami (3p, Female Honimbo, #398 3121) in 1st round of main tournament on July 13, 2020. Saikyo 6 should start Dec 2020.
• Camachi 1: lost in 1st round (Jan 13, 2020). Hakata/Camachi 2 should start in Dec 2020.

My calculations show her results to be as follows:
In 2020: 20-16
Overall: 37-23
Promotion to 2p: 16-12 (?)

Tsuji Hana, who was made 1-dan like Sumire by special recommendation, but at age 18.



With this game, which featured a 52-year age difference and a slightly embarrassing 10.5 points winning margin, Sumire reached (according to the Mainichi Shinbun) 25 wins in her quest to reach 2-dan (i.e. 5 games to go). Her next opponent there is Iwamaru Taira.

Today's draw (20 November 2020) for the upcoming Young Carps saw her pitted against Son Makoto.

Thank you for the update, John. Looks like Tsuji Hana deserved her recommendation.

Alas, it looks like Ueno Asami defeated Sumire in the Aluminum Cup 15, so she is out of that one.
So the updates are:
[Nov game 4] Lost on Nov 21 to Ueno Asami 3p in 1st round of Aluminum Cup 15.

Results:
In 2020: 20-17
Overall: 37-24
Promotion to 2p: 25 wins

They have posted the qualifying matches for Senko 6. Sumire got a bye in the first round and will play straight into 2nd round. She will need 2 wins to get into the main tournament. She is in West 4 https://www.nihonkiin.or.jp/match/senko/006.html

Iwamaru Taira defeated Sumire on Dec 3 in Honimbo 77 prelims, so she is out of that one.

The updated stats:
Results:
In 2020: 20-18
Overall: 37-25
Promotion to 2p: 25 wins

I just realized it's easier to search in the Nihon Ki-in pages for Sumire's japanese name (仲邑　菫初段). I used to think that the Nihon's pages use nicknames, but I realized that they just use fewer characters for the winner (usually only 1st char of one of the names) and the google translator has difficulties in this case. In Sumire's case, if she wins, they write 仲邑　菫 (dropping 初段 from the name).

So, my apologies to the Nihon Ki-in webmaster.

I think that's the rank, shodan, first Dan.

Take care

_________________
一碁一会

Yeah, her full name is 仲邑 菫, and they add the rank 初段 (or 二段, 三段, etc. )

Thank you. I didn't realize "初段" means 1 dan. But the part I don't understand is why the google translator getting confused by 仲邑菫. If you go to https://www.nihonkiin.or.jp/match/fmeijin/032.html (frame 6) using Chrome and translate it into English, you see that they figure out that "仲邑　　菫初段" means "Nakamura Kaoru First Stage" (I guess they do get a little confused, because they say Kaoru instead of Sumire). But on after the win, "仲邑菫" becomes "Nakamura 菫". I guess 仲邑 is Nakamura. But why donesn't the translator know what to do with 菫? Is it because of the lack of spaces?

It makes no sense to me that 初段 is somehow helping the translator understand 菫...

Sumire's win in the female meijin prelims on Thursday made into the papers.

_________________
Dave Sigaty
"Short-lived are both the praiser and the praised, and rememberer and the remembered..."
- Marcus Aurelius; Meditations, VIII 21

After winning two games on the same day (Dec 10) vs Chihiro Chujo 1p and Hiromi Mizuno 5p in Female Meijin 32, Sumire's updated stats are:
In 2020: 22-18
Overall: 39-25
Promotion to 2p: 25 wins

She needs two more wins to make it into gotoeveryone's list Japanese players with most wins in 2020. There are 20 players on that list and the last in the list have 24 wins.

But her chances in Female Meijin don't look good: if she wins her next match, she will play Ueno Asami in the last preliminary game.

Just to underline that (though I wouldn't rule out an upset by Sumire), Ueno Asamai has just (10 Dec 2020) become the 11th woman in Japan to reach the finals of a Big 7 title. She beat no less than Akiyama Jiro 9-dan to earn a spot in the 47th Tengen.

It's a slightly odd fact that 14 occasions on which a woman has reached a Big 7 final, 8 have been in the Tengen. It's only slightly odd because the Tengen does not have a league system, and indeed the other occasions where women have been able to swim in the big pool have been in the other non-league events. The first was Honda Sachiko way back in 1979 (Tengen), and the player with the most such successes is Fujisawa Rina, who has made it to the Tengen or Gosei finals three times. The only to make it beyond the Last 32 though has been Kobiyashi Izumi, who made it to the Last 15 twice.

Although these successes are not hen's teeth rare, what is rare is to have several women vying at the same time. Ueno and Fujisawa have already established a fascinating rivalry but must already be looking over their shoulders at Sumire. (Ueno has just beaten Fujisawa in the Women's Meijin challenge final, and now goes on to defeat Suxuki Ayumi, whose name is another to add to the roster of high-performing ladies at present.)

A reminder that Sumire switches to Tokyo soon and so will face a distinctly tougher level of competition.

Sumire defeated Chiharu Miyamoto 1p (宮本 千春) on Dec 17 in Aizu 8 prelims. She will play Fumiko Sakakibara 6p (榊原 史子) next in that tournament.

Updated stats:
In 2020: 23-18
Overall: 40-25
Promotion to 2p: 25 wins

I believe she is 3-1 in Dec games.

Oh, those 40-25 are won lost? I thought it was played-won. How many of those qualify? Ie, when does she rank up?

Take care.

_________________
一碁一会

Sumire has just donned her first kimono for a special New Year interview of breathtaking banality - typical question: what do you like to wear when not wearing kimonos; answer: dresses. We learn she's 4 foot six and her parents call her Sumi-chan. This type of interview is common in the J-Pop scene, of course. Nuff said.

Only a couple of go-related answers caught my attention. One was that she prefers thickness over profit. That interested me because that hadn't come over to me in watching her games. my impression was that she preferred fighting over either thickness or profit, but she did at least concede that her style is "fighting" and that she prefers the middle game.

The other was that she listed her rivals. That list surprised me a little, not just the content but in the forms of address. The list was:

1. Fukuoka Kotaro-kun, who turns 15 next week and is trailing Sumire in the race to 2-dan. She is now on 18-15 (the target is 30 wins) and she is well ahead of everyone else except Terada Shuta who is on 18-10. But Terada is 23 and twice as old as Sumire, so it's understandable she didn't put him in her list.

2. Risa-pu, who is Ueno Risa and obviously her pal from the -pu ending. Risa is 14 and so is close in age. Risa is on 12-10 in the race to 2-dan.

3. Kosumi-chan. This is Cho Kosumi, the player, also 14, with the best pedigree in go bar none: great granddaughter of Kitani Minoru, granddaughter of Kobayashi Koichi and Kobayashi Reiko, daughter of Cho U and Kobayashi Izumi. But she's on 0-6 so needs still to get into her stride. She only came on the scene this year, so hasn't had much interaction with Sumire.

4. Xu Jingen-kun. From Taiwan (the Rin Kaiho Institute). He'll be 14 on Boxing Day and is already 3-dan. The mainland Chinese have got their eye on him.

5. Wu Yiming-san. She's just about to turn 14, too. Now 2-dan, she beat Sumire in a special match in China a year ago to earn an invitational place in the LG Cup, and they seem to have struck it off with each other, Sumire regarding Wu as Big Sis.

And that's it. No mention of Kim Eun-chi (the alleged cheatress) or any other Korean, despite the fact that Sumire has now been to Korea seven times. And thankfully no mention of any rivals with the -obnoxious tan suffix (translatable as "fellow geek").

While we are on names, it may be worth mentioning another name for Sumire: Peko-chan. Look at the photo below and you'll see why.



Peko-chan biscuits have been around for quite a few years now, and there's even a cult for collecting "biscuit dolls" at high prices. The Peko-chan biscuits themselves are just biscuits with her face on them, but the dolls are plastic figures. There's a male equivalent. Poko-chan. (Peko is a word associated with being famished in Japanese BTW)

They are not unique but Peko-chan has come into the forefront lately for two reasons. One is Sumire's emergence, of course, but preceding that was the sponsorship, from 2017, by the confectionary company, Fujiya, of one of the top shogi tournament, the Eio (which can be translated as King of the Eggheads). This in part was inspired by the emergence of a young genius in the shogi world, Fujii Sota, who captured his first big title at the age of 14 just a few months ago. Fujii burst on the scene as a new 4-dan pro by winning a record 29 wins on the trot. Shogi pros start at 4-dan. That reflects the old days (in both go and shogi) of live-in pupils when a new pro-grade player had to turn over all his prize money as a 1-, 2- or 3-dan to his teacher as part-payment for his tuition. Shogi chose to mark that distinction formally. So if we extrapolate Fuji backwards to 1-dan, he would be comparable in age achievement to Sumire. He has ignited a boom in popularity for shogi (which has always been more popular with kids anyway), and Fujiya jumped on the bandwagon. Gaudy boxes of their products are placed beside each player during games. They seem to remain untouched but the PR guys at Fujiya get round that by stressing the players are allowed to take the boxes home. Peko-chan also pops up in shogi-related imagery, holding a biscuit in one hand and a shogi piece in the other. The biscuit is meant to be the main item so is in the right hand. That has led to shogi wags pointing out that Peko is a "southpaw".

How log will it be before Fujiya jump on the go bandwagon via Sumire? She said in her interview she likes Peko-chan. Hint, hint.

Somebody asked for an update about the foreign 1-dans in the Nihon Ki-in recently. Chang Fukang (Malyasia) is on 2-3, Ratif Fitrah is on 1-3 and Antii is on 0-8. Generally almost every 1-dan struggles massively (viz. Cho Kosumi). People like Sumire are the outliers.

Overall 40-25 means 40 wins and 25 losses, out of a total of 65 games. But to be honest, I am not totally sure about these numbers since I took some numbers posted here by John Fairbairn and updated them. I don't know Japanese, so I don't have access to most of the information. I get the results from the nihon Ki-in web site which is in Japanese and I use the google translation into English, which is not always accurate.

She is 5 wins away from promotion to 2p. She has 25 wins and needs 30, so 5 more. Only wins in some mixed tournaments are eligible for promotion, which is why only 25 of those 40 wins count. There is a second way to promote by being in top 2 for the year of money won. I don't know how she stacks there.