Despite playing in a holiday village in Wujiang, Chang Hao found it no vacation to defend his title in the 14th Tianyuan final, which started on 14 February 2000 and finished on 2 March. The 3-1 victory belied a very close contest where endgame plays were crucial. But Chang took home the newly hiked 20,000 yuan first prize, so he can afford to take his wife and new baby girl on a proper holiday.
Challenger Dong Yan, playing Chang for the first time in a major event, appeared to be kicking himself for missed opportunities, but defiantly declared he could challenge again.
Dong made his way to the main challengers' knockout as one of the sixteen qualifiers. Remarkably, all four semi-finalists took the same qualification route. The semi-final results were: Dong Yan 1-0 Wu Zhaoyi 9-dan; Qiu Jun 5-dan 1-0 Hu Yaoyu 6-dan. Other prominent new stars also qualified, including Huang Yihzong 5-dan, Kong Jie 5-dan, Gu Li 4-dan and Liu Xing 4-dan. The cast list of Chinese go seems on the verge of wholesale change.
Click on the four title games in to get them in downloadable sgf format.
The critical points in this game were Black 127, a mistake by Chang Hao that made the outcome unclear after he had established a lead, and Black 173 - a good move that put him back on top. This game finished at 6 pm, after its early morning start (a sealed move is taken over lunch), which is hard work by Chinese tournament standards.
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Older News From 24 October 1999: CHANG HAO HOLDS ON TO TIANYUAN AGAIN
In the 13th Tianyuan final, new star Chang Hao 8-dan held on to his title by defeating Liu Xiaoguang 9-dan, now approaching veteran status, by 3-1.
Liu had to overcome Yu Bin 9-dan to earn the right to challenge.
HOW DOES THE TIANYUAN TOURNAMENT WORK?
Sponsors are the Zhongguo Weiqi Xiehui (Chinese Go Association), Xinmin Wanbao-she (New People's Evening News, Shanghai) and Xinmin Weiqi (New People's Go - originally Weiqi) monthly magazine.
A two-stage knockout is used to find the challenger. After a variable preliminary, 32 players compete in the main knockout tournament (originally held, with the final, over five consecutive days, but now spread out). The winner of this challenges the holder in a final best-of-five in the spring.
In Term 1 the final was a best-of three as were the semi-finals. First prize, as of 1996, was 10,000 yuan. They also play for the Guomai Cup. It is a quickplay event. Komi is 2.75 (Chinese rules).
Tianyuan, like the Korean Chunweon, is borrowed from the Japanese word Tengen (origin of Heaven) which, in its go sense of centre of the board, is attributed to the Imperial astronomer Shibukawa Shunkai (1639-1715; he was 7-dan in go). For this reason the tournament is sometimes known as the Chinese Tengen.
