KOBAYASHI WINS 6th ACOM/AGON
FINAL
Kobayashi Koichi 9-dan beat Takao Shinji
6-dan in the one-game final of the 6th term of the quick-play event now
known as the Agon-Kiriyama Cup (used to be the ACOM Cup) on 10 October.
He won by 3.5 points.
Takao can perhaps take some consolation
from being the only player under 9-dan ever to appear in this
final.
The venue was the austere but dignified Agon sect's temple in the hills
of Kyoto, the Daibodaiji on Buddha Mountain, about 15 minutes drive
beyond the famous Kiyomizu Temple. It was enlivened on this occasion by
a large-board commentary by Rin Kaiho 9-dan, and visitors enjoyed ample
opportunities for teaching games with pros.
To download the final game in sgf format, right click here.
FINAL KNOCKOUT RESULTS 1999
Round 1: Takao 1-0 Cho Chikun; Yamashita 1-0 Nakamura S.; O
Meien. 1-0 O. Rissei; Hane Y. 1-0 Ishida Y.; Hikosaka 1-0 Yamashiro;
Hane N. 1-0 Yokota; Kobayashi K. 1-0 Awaji; Imamura 1-0 Tamaki
Shinobu.
Quarter-finals: Takao 1-0 Yamashita; O Meien. 1-0 Hane Y.; Hane
N. 1-0 Hikosaka; Kobayashi K. 1-0 Imamura.
Semi-finals: Takao 1-0 O Meien; Kobayashi K. 1-0 Hane N.
HOW DOES THE AGON-KIRIYAMA CUP
WORK?
The Agon-Kiriyama Cup is the 1999 successor to the ACOM Cup which ran
for the first five terms as the usual name of an event more properly
called the All-Japan Quickplay Open Tournament. As there used to be an
IBM Quickplay Open, and there still is another Quickplay Tournament, the
chances of confusion were rife, and ACOM Cup was a handy way to
distinguish. We can still use Agon-Kiriyama Cup, but note that the
series is still being numbered in the original way, so the first event
under the Agon banner is Term 6.
The event is a uniquely organised tournament. Its most distinctive
aspect is that amateurs can play. Initially they made little impression,
and despite some improvement have still to get beyond the first couple
of hurdles. But this tournament did produce one notable result in 1998
when Sakai Hideyuki became the first amateur to defeat a pro 9-dan
(Ishii Kunio) in an even-game tournament.
Top prize is 5 million yen. Second prize is 2 million yen.
An ever increasing number of amateurs (initially 12, currently 20
including the top 8 from the Mainichi's Amateur Honinbo tournament, the
first two from the Women's Amateur Honinbo and the first two from the
Students' Honinbo) join pros of 4-dan and below in a series of three
preliminaries. The first is organised as a pro-am match, each amateur
playing a pro. The top players after second and third preliminaries join
the seeds (title holders) in a final knockout of 16 players.
The final is a single game held in October, usually held at a hotel in
Tokyo where a live commentary is given to the public. Thinking time is
1.5 hours each in the final and semi-finals, 2 hours elsewhere in the
main knockout, and 1 hour in the preliminaries. Komi has always been 5.5
points.
The original sponsors were ACOM, a consumer credit organisation, and
the Mainichi Shinbun newspaper. NHK and the newspaper Kyoto Shinbun have
added their support but the main change is that ACOM has been replaced
by the Buddhist organisation Agon, based in Kyoto, which has
sponsored many other cultural activities, including the Pacific Rim Book
Prize. It has also established Chairs for Pacific Rim studies at
universities in China and the USA.
The go tournament has a counterpart in
China, and the winners of the Japanese and Chinese events will play each
other in a match. The cup (like the book prize) is named in memory of
the Reverend Kiriyama Seiyu and bears the inscription "Unmoved by the
Eights Winds." The eight winds in Buddhist lore refer to the eight
emotions that disturb men's hearts and minds.
Though it is unusual for a religious
organisation to be so involved in sponsoring go, the links with
Buddhism and go are old and strong. The first go master, Honinbo
Sansa, patronised by the Tokugawa Shoguns was a monk and his name came
from the name of his temple lodge.
The go schools then founded were all
required thereafter to observe at least the outward appearance of the
Buddhist priesthood. There have been several go players (e.g. Handa
Dogen, Suzuki Sen) who have been Buddhist lay priests.
Agon is the Japanese form of the Sanskrit Agama, referring to teachings
of the Smaller Vehicle doctrine.
ALL JAPAN QUICKPLAY OPEN TOURNAMENT FINALISTS
(Terms 1 to 5: ACOM Cup; thereafter Agon-Kiriyama Cup)
|
Year |
Term |
Winner |
Score |
Loser |
| 1994 |
1 |
O Rissei 9d |
1-0 |
Cho Chikun 9d |
| 1995 |
2 |
Kato Masao 9d |
1-0 |
Kobayashi Satoru 9d |
| 1996 |
3 |
Kato Masao 9d |
1-0 |
Yoda Norimoto 9d |
| 1997 |
4 |
Yoda Norimoto 9d |
1-0 |
Kato Masao 9d |
| 1998 |
5 |
Kobayashi Satoru 9d |
1-0 |
Cho Chikun 9d |
| 1999 |
6 |
Kobayashi Koichi 9d |
1-0 |
Takao Shinji 6d |
|
