Why are Korean Go players so strong?

[tezza]

Hi,

The eminence of Korean players in the international Go scene reminds me of Russian players in Chess.

Is it because of their playing style or intensity of their Baduk schools? Just curious.

Cheers
tezza

[Magicwand]

i dont want to generalize certain group of people...but i have heard a theory that says..
"it is because our people had to be strong and aggresive in order to survive."

[tchan001]

Obviously eating, sleeping, and breathing go 24/7 along with having the proper instruction will have a big impact on your go ability no matter what nationality you are.

[Magicwand]

Obviously eating, sleeping, and breathing go 24/7 along with having the proper instruction will have a big impact on your go ability no matter what nationality you are.

hum..many japanese did same thing and they are not aggresive as korean...

if you know korean history then you will agree with the theory i stated..
it is a generalization but true.

[jswm]

Korea is strong after later 1980s, before that Japan absolutely was the number one.
The Korean did a playing style reform, in short, they broke many thinking restrictions made by Japanese orthodox system, the game is much free than before.

[lovely]

Japanese insei play games on the weekends. Korean insei play several games per day in addition to their daily studies.

[ACGalaga]

Korea is strong after later 1980s, before that Japan absolutely was the number one.

It's the same as the huge K-Pop boom; Korea's the new Japan

F'AKB少女時代FTW

[tapir]

With all due respect, last time I looked at the news half the international title holders were chinese, in the year before most title holders were chinese if i recall correctly. If you look at the preliminaries you find the top chinese / korean players there, yi chang'ho himself doesn't shy away from the preliminaries (e.g. lg cup), but from japan you have basically a team of youngsters and rarely a 9 dan / recent title holder competing in the preliminaries (which makes me profoundly unhappy) - so it is probably in place to say korean / chinese are more hungry for international success (literally -> prize money) - although the seeded players from japan usually don't do too well as well. Either way, japanese dominance in the 80s or korean dominance in the late 90s/early 2000s was probably limited to 3-4 players in each case and while those players are truly admirable I wouldn't nationalise their success too much. While this is plain obvious with say Cho Chikun, it holds for Cho Hunhyun and Yi Chang'ho as well, I mean, even if they had moved to Denmark, Denmark would have "dominated" international go for a period.

[Mef]

Hi,

The eminence of Korean players in the international Go scene reminds me of Russian players in Chess.

Is it because of their playing style or intensity of their Baduk schools? Just curious.

Cheers
tezza

Not to take away from the intensity of Korean training but, as others have mentioned Chinese are quite successful on the international scene (and Japan fairs reasonably, though recently not perhaps quite as well as Korea or China). One reason often given for Japan's players frequently faring worse on the international scene is the difference in incentive structure for the different systems. Japan's big tournaments often have much longer time controls than international tournaments (sometimes almost 3 times as much time...), they are typically more lucrative and will have a smaller field of competitors than international tournaments. To illustrate -- The Kisei, Meijin, and Honinbo all pay out more ($350,000 - $500,000) than the major annual international tournaments (BC card cup pays ~$300,000, LG & Samsung $250,000). If you are an up and coming Japanese professional, it makes more sense for your bank account to aim at winning Japanese tournaments. For Korean and Chinese players, the international tournaments represent the biggest purse.

[pwaldron]

People who look for genetic or cultural reasons are kidding themselves. Korea is good at go for the same reason that Russia was good at chess and Canada is good at hockey--they have lots of people (usually children) playing at the amateur levels that feed into the pro leagues.

John Power summed it up in twelve words: "Go is popular because Korean mothers think it makes their children smarter." In Korea go is regarded as an activity that can improve the brain and so Korean mothers don't mind shuttling their kids to go schools etc. In Japan, it's regarded as a past time, along with video games. If parents are encouraging their children in one country and discouraging them in another, it is going to have an effect at the top levels.

[jts]

With all due respect, last time I looked at the news half the international title holders were chinese, in the year before most title holders were chinese if i recall correctly.

And with all due respect right back at you, that still speaks for Korea. The population of S. Korea is 50 million; of China, 1.3 billion. If interest and talent in the game were spread and cultivated evenly around the world, you would expect China to win twenty times as many titles as Korea (and ten times as many as Japan).

Japanese insei play games on the weekends. Korean insei play several games per day in addition to their daily studies.

Can we quantify this? I know a little bit about how the Japanese system works these days from Antti's amazing blog, but I don't know the age at which Korean insei are recruited, how much they play as part of the program, whether they get lectures on manners, and so on.

[hyperpape]

The last go census said that there were about as many go players in Korea as in China: http://web.archive.org/web/201105122106 ... ensus.html.

[jswm]

Not to take away from the intensity of Korean training but, as others have mentioned Chinese are quite successful on the international scene (and Japan fairs reasonably, though recently not perhaps quite as well as Korea or China). One reason often given for Japan's players frequently faring worse on the international scene is the difference in incentive structure for the different systems. Japan's big tournaments often have much longer time controls than international tournaments (sometimes almost 3 times as much time...), they are typically more lucrative and will have a smaller field of competitors than international tournaments. To illustrate -- The Kisei, Meijin, and Honinbo all pay out more ($350,000 - $500,000) than the major annual international tournaments (BC card cup pays ~$300,000, LG & Samsung $250,000). If you are an up and coming Japanese professional, it makes more sense for your bank account to aim at winning Japanese tournaments. For Korean and Chinese players, the international tournaments represent the biggest purse.

You brought us two questions.
Do you think professional players care money more than honor?
Do you think Japanese players can beat Korean/Chinese in two-day games?

[nagano]

I think the primary reason is the focused curriculum, and the general Korean focus on the importance of education.

[by78]

The pecking order is: China > South Korea > Japan. China swept all the international titles in 2014 and won most of them in 2015.

China is home to the strongest players and by far the deepest talent pool. It's scary how China produces wave after wave of young, exceptionally strong players. South Korea and Japan are simply outgunned and overwhelmed. This situation is not going to change anytime soon.