When I decided last October to travel to the European Student Championship in Durham, England, I thought I might manage to qualify for the student Oza in Japan. It never occurred to me that, besides this event, I would receive two more invitations to Asia: to Shanghai for the World Student Championship, and once again to Japan for the World Pair Go Championship, which Czechs surely know well. My journey began two days before the event. I wanted to visit Nara again to see the famous deer that roam freely all over the town. Besides that, I always prefer to arrive in Asia a bit early, so I have plenty of time to get over the jet lag and don't have to fight it the day before the tournament. Much like last year, this year's pairs championship was not held in Tokyo, as had been the custom for decades. Last year it moved to Osaka for the first time on the occasion of Expo 2025, and this year the organizers decided to link the event with the Asian Games in Nagoya. These are essentially the Asian Olympic Games. For the professional group, the organizers arranged truly majestic premises right in the Nagoya Palace. The amateur part of the event, on the other hand, was held at a different venue each day. On the first day we played in the premises of the local Nihon Ki-in, which was a very pleasant and lovely place. The building has several floors with various spaces devoted to Go lessons, playing, and a small shop with Go supplies. On the second day we moved to a luxury hotel comparable to the traditional venue in Tokyo, where Lukan and I, eight years ago when we qualified for Japan for the first time, dubbed the conditions "Edmund Rulz." Unfortunately, these conditions decline a little every year. Eight years ago, for example, it would have been unthinkable to change the playing venue or to receive lunches in the form of lunch boxes. The "Edmund Rulz" standard of those days meant a choice of three restaurants for breakfast, lunch, and dinner with unlimited buffets, plus a spectacular opening and closing ceremony for the whole event. I wouldn't like this to sound like complaining, though, because even with these changes, the conditions at the championship are still far above standard, and we are looked after like babies… The Student Championship, or "We Beat Korea!" Since I had qualified for the event through the student championship, I represented Europe this time, playing as a pair with Mihailo Jacimović (4d) of Serbia, whom I had beaten at the student championship in Durham. Right at the start of the event, we agreed that we were of similar strength and that something like kikashi (forcing moves to gain tempo against the opponent) would not exist in our case. What surprised us after the first game, however, was how similar our playing styles were. In almost every part of the review we had the same or at least similar ideas, which we certainly did not expect, considering that it was our very first pair go game together. After the first round, in which we lost to China, we went for a walk to the castle mentioned earlier. Our initial goal was to try to get into the professionals' room, but given the short time between rounds, we eventually gave up and just took a stroll. During the walk, though, we discovered that we understand each other not only at the goban, but also on many other topics in life. We were supposed to be back for the next round at 3:15 p.m., but the organizers moved it 15 minutes earlier without any prior warning, and we didn't arrive until 3:05. So we had to sit down for the second game against Korea immediately upon arriving, soaked from the rain and a bit thrown off by this unexpected change. Perhaps it was precisely this unpleasant surprise that later showed in our play, where we cut the Koreans a bit more aggressively early in the game and then chased a group almost flawlessly across the entire goban, ultimately managing to kill it. Those of you who are more experienced in this discipline surely know that killing groups in pair go is one of the most difficult parts of the game. Usually some kind of compromise is reached, or the group lives anyway. Keeping up the whole sequence of moves leading to the kill while alternating with your partner is truly a tough nut to crack. But Mihail and I managed it, and after this sequence, when there was no longer any way to get the group out, the Koreans actually resigned. Incidentally, the Korean player had wanted to resign a few moves earlier, but his partner forbade it. A few moves later, however, she too admitted that it was time to end the game. At that moment, Mihail and I looked at each other with completely wide eyes, and the first thing that came out of us was that neither of us would probably have resigned in that position, since in pair go anything can happen. But the very next sentence was already the realization: "We beat Korea!" And that stayed with us throughout the whole tournament… We were both absolutely thrilled with the result. The funny thing was that when the other players asked us at lunch how we were doing, most of them started laughing, convinced we had to be joking and that we couldn't possibly have beaten Korea. But once they checked the result, the other players' vocabulary suddenly gained a new phrase: "Omg, you beat Korea!" Heading into the last game after this performance, we had high expectations, and we really did play a very good game against the Japanese as well. This time, however, we didn't manage to carry it through to a winning finish, and the time pressure of 30 minutes + 10 seconds eventually caught up with us. Probably the only thing that bothered me a little about playing with Mihail was his longer thinking. He uses up a lot of time already in the first half of the game, so we always had to play most of the remaining game in 10-second byoyomi. With Lukáš, I'm used to the fact that, given the difference in our levels, he has no claim to spend time, and Honza and I set up a similar arrangement at our debut at this year's World Pair Go Championship. So it's quite possible this is just a habit on my part and that I'm asking for too much. With a 1:2 score, we thus finished the student championship in 5th place, and we are taking home one of the most valuable scalps. In the entire history of the student world championship, no European pair has ever managed to beat the Koreans, and Korea has often been among the overall winners of the event. Araki Cup and a bronze-medal finish The next day, a new tournament awaited us. All the students were entered into the Araki Cup, a handicap tournament that also includes local players. We did well in this tournament too, and with a 2:1 score we ended up taking home the prizes for 3rd place. In the last game, the only one we lost, we also ran into a significant misunderstanding between our ideas, probably for the first time. First I softened a bit in the game, and Mihailo immediately responded by cutting somewhere I couldn't see at all what he had in mind. We thus ruined each other's plans, which unfortunately turned around a game we had been leading the whole time up to that point. At such a late stage of the game, we were no longer able to reverse the result. When You Draw Iyama Yuta (井山裕太) as Your Pairs Partner The last event on the program was the so-called friendly games, which all players take part in, professionals included. At that point, Mihailo and I discovered that we were both big fans of Fujisawa Rina (藤沢里菜), so while Mihailo was praying to be drawn into a pair with her, I was scanning the room so that we could at least catch her for a moment…But once the pairings were announced, my thoughts turned in a different direction. While Mihailo's prayers went unanswered, with Rina being drawn with Martin Stiassny, I was drawn into a pair with Iyama Yuta (井山裕太). For those of you who aren't as familiar with the professional scene, he is one of the best players in the world, and, for example, the only one in Japanese history to have managed to hold all seven major titles at the same time. So it was a pleasant surprise and a responsibility at the same time. We played against Japanese players of 7d and 5d strength, so I was definitely the weakest in that circle. A funny moment came right after about ten moves, though, when Iyama mixed up the order of play. The rest of us at the table noticed and started glancing at one another, each wondering who would be the one to tell him. Fortunately, Iyama apparently sensed that some eye signals were passing between us and realized what had probably happened. In the end, he reacted on his own with an apology and a "payment" of three stones. Honestly, I'm not sure whether any of us would have told him about the mistake otherwise. After the game, Iyama showed us one moment in the game that he said was our main mistake. What was funny, once again, was that he pointed out his own bad move and kept repeating "sorry" with a smile. Unfortunately, we didn't manage to play the game all the way to the very end, because it was already time to go to the announcement of the results. By the time we stopped, however, we were already ahead, so we would most likely have won. You could tell that the Japanese players who played against us were completely blown away by him. That was especially true of the young boy who, like me, had taken part in the student championship. News from the World Scene Overall, I really enjoyed the event, and I'm glad I got to spend my last year as a student taking part in all of these events. Last Monday I successfully passed my state exams, so this time it really was the last time for me. As I mentioned back in February in my report from Oza, I hope someone will take up the torch after me and make use of these absolutely fantastic opportunities offered to university students. In the future, two more events are also expected to be added, which Europe will be in charge of. As I learned during the championship, the IGF has approved the creation of a European Headquarters for student world championships. Under this new structure, people are to be employed in full-time positions to handle the agenda, and the World Junior Championship and the World Student Championship should thus be created directly under the IGF's umbrella. Like the WAGC, both events should rotate among different countries, with this new European "branch" responsible for their sponsorship and organization. After the unsuccessful attempt to bring the WAGC to Europe, this is very welcome news, and I hope it will actually be realized. A certain amount of skepticism is warranted for now, however. The World Junior Championship under the IGF has been talked about for at least a year, and Europe was informed of this new initiative without any prior discussion or any question as to whether it would agree to it at all, during the AGM at the last WAGC in Korea. So when I went to ask about Martin's situation, he was quite surprised that, in his view, I had managed during this event to get more information out of the Japanese than he or the EGF leadership had known until then. We'll see, then, in what form the EGF manages to negotiate this initiative. But if everything is actually carried out, it will be an absolutely fantastic opportunity for the next generations of European players. As for me, I still have a few days ahead in Singapore and Malaysia before moving on from Asia straight to London for the European Women's Championship, where we'll definitely check in with you as well, along with the other girls! Complete results Student Championship Podpěrová (2d) + Jacimovic (4d) vs. Xu Huier (徐慧尔) (5d) + Tang Zhenghe (唐正和) (8d) (CN) Podpěrová (2d) + Jacimovic (4d) vs. Sehee Na (7d) + Park Kihyeon (7d) (KR) Podpěrová (2d) + Jacimovic (4d) vs. Haraoka Sara (6d) + Otobe Masanari (6d) (JP) Araki Cup Podpěrová (2d) + Jacimovic (4d) vs. Japanese players (6d) + (3d) Podpěrová (2d) + Jacimovic (4d) vs. Japanese players (7d) + (2k) Podpěrová (2d) + Jacimovic (4d) vs. Japanese players (8d) + (1d) The post 2026 World Pair Go Championship appeared first on Goweb.
