Life In 19x19

I think every Go player out there has hit multiple plateaus when improving - a lot of us are probably stuck in one right now. I'm just wondering when L19 readers have hit plateaus, and whether we can see similarities.

As for myself, I hit plateaus when I was 21k on the old KGS ranking system (over 2 months; this was super long considering I was improving from 25k to 22k in less than a week and it wasn't until I was SDK or so before it would take months at a time to improve a stone). Another point was when I was 5k (also on the old KGS ranking system); this was at a point in my life where I lost almost all interest in Go and was on the verge of quitting - until I went to Go'n'Games for the summer of 2006. Not only did I improve 4-5 stones in just 2 months (I wish I could have saved a graph on my old KGS account to show the progress) but my passion for Go returned and I was hooked again...

...until college kicked in. This was when I was around AGA 3d/KGS 2d or so. The plateau lasted for about 6 months, then I slowly started improving again by fitting in time to do tsumego and play more games with classes (this nearly slaughtered my GPA). Slowly crawled up to AGA 5d/KGS 4d and stuck since (it's been about 2 years now), though recently a few of my anon KGS accounts have upgraded to 5d, though they haven't had a chance to weather through too many games just yet.

I think I've reached that point where I'm kind of "settled" about it. I still enjoy Go, but nowadays I just lack the time and the passion to continue improving again - I hope to change this after I'm done with college...yeah right . Or at least go on another summer trip to Korea or China.

So what about you?

ive been at 8-9k since the start of the year. college + being lazy about playing games doesnt help, not to mention i dont like doing tsumego. summer break begins in 2 weeks, im hoping i make more time for go because i really do want to improve but i dont know if my mind is willing to put in the effort.

Don't complain. If you are in college then my rank probably has not changed since before you were born.

I had a very slight plateau at around 19-18 kyu, a noticeable one around 15-14 kyu, again at 10-9 kyu and most recently at 5 kyu. It would not be honest to say I'm stuck at 4 kyu right now because I have not been playing or studying all that much over the past several months and I seem to actually be flirting with 3k in spite of that.

12-13k, 8k, 4k, and 1k. I really need to play more to get out of this current slump...

I'm currently having a hard time distinguishing "plateau" from "ceiling."

Previously, however, I felt one around 14k and around 10k. Currently breaking 7k is feeling daunting.

I had a smaller plateau at 12k, and now I have one at 7k, slightly deteriorating.

IAmNotWhoYouThinkIAm wrote:Don't complain. If you are in college then my rank probably has not changed since before you were born.

According to your statement I suggest you to become the honorary chairman of the grumpy old men at L19

I had a plateau around 16-18k, a long one around 12k. I was extatic when i broke that to get SDK, but I hit a serious one again at 8k. I think I'm FINALLY starting to get better again, as things are just starting to click and I've drifted to 7k for a little longer this time.

I plateau whenever I start using go forums too much... So I'm probably at a plateau about now

Seriously, though, here are some of the places I got stuck for awhile at:

Old kgs:
21k, 18k, 15k, 12k

kgs rank jump:
5k, 2k

IAmNotWhoYouThinkIAm wrote:Don't complain. If you are in college then my rank probably has not changed since before you were born.

If I am who you think I am then I am probably not who you don't think I am.
In fact, I challenge anyone to figure out who I am. You all know me, one way or another. I posted 4312 messages to GoDiscussions over the years.

Wow!!!
You are both DrStraw, DrStraw's Book Sales and Sakata. At the time of this writing their posts add upp to axactly 4312. Well played over a long period!

Indeed

What gave it away was:
Postcount being higher than any single person.
Sakata and DrStraw having suspicious similarities over the years.
His Oro 5d rank. I vaguely recall Sakata mentioning something like that a long time ago.
...and posting such a challenge seems fitting for DrStraw.

The fact that I didn't find it hard to figure out should probably tell me to spend less time on the forums and more time doing productive things, but who's listening to that inner voice anyway

I was KGS 7 kyu when I joined GoDiscussions in late 2007, and only convinced myself of having broken through it last winter.

CarlJung wrote:The fact that I didn't find it hard to figure out should probably tell me to spend less time on the forums and more time doing productive things, but who's listening to that inner voice anyway

Personally, I don't think I've ever played consistently enough to say I've hit a plateau. Mostly just kept playing on and off and found that my rank has (very) slowly increased. If I had to say a specific range, I'd probably say 10-12k. I was there for a while longer than most other times.

Currently I'm sitting some where around 8-9k, but I don't really consider this a plateau yet. Only played a couple of games since I would consider myself some where in this rank.

I'm at a plateau right now.
I kind of quickly went down to 12-10 Kyu (stuck at the beginning a little with no one telling me what to do and read and so on), then progressed to... well guess around 5-7 Kyu. And here I am now, playing some games with friends and tend to lose all the time ^^ I had a little peak a while ago, as I was able to beat a Dan-player with four stones. Nowadays I just lose with 30 points again.

As a result I stopped doing Tsumegos or reading Go-related books for a while, but interest is slowing increasing again.

In the end, a tournament is coming up in june, so I've to stop being weak and start being awesome instead! ; )