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Commentary & photos from 10th CSA, Tokyo 8-10th March 2000
Jeff Rollason
The article published with permission of author
Part III: Day 1 - Round 1
Suzuki and Pauli Misikangas concentrate as their 6th game closes out.
Examining the application lists it looked as if the first round might not be the "easy" ride that round one might expect to offer. Along with the previous non-qualifiers there were the re-entry of the previous strong programs Yano and M-Brain, which had reached the finals in previous years. However they withdrew and suddenly Shocky and SPEAR found themselves the top seeds. From this position the authors were optimistic that both of these programs would progress. However each year provides new strong and unknown programs. Last year the new Korean KCC (Silver) program had progressed through both qualifying rounds to take an impressive 5th place, after dispatching 3 other final round programs. This year the program "Dragon's egg" would be the strongest new program, finishing top of the table with an impressive 7 wins.
These two first days should have been easy days for me with no more responsibility than that of a spectator role. However it is easy to get involved in the progress of my western colleagues, so I felt little better than if I had also been in these rounds. I divided my time between the progress of each and standing infront of the scoreboards calculating probabilities of progressing. However these calculations were not needed as both comfortably qualified: SPEAR ending on 6 wins 1 loss and Shocky on 5 wins and 2 losses.
Yoshikazu Kakinoki, Reijer Grimbergen and Hitoshi Matsubara watch as SPEAR completes its 6th win.
The game above attracted much attention. A press photographer watching this must have used 3 whole rolls of film just taking photographs of this game. At that time Reijer was the highest placed western program in this qualifying round.
Image: Good humour and smiles all round after Isobe Shogi's last round defeat of Shocky.
Part IV: Day 2 - Round 2
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