We started our club in February 2023 in a sleepy town called Anderson in South Carolina. Three years later -- we hosted our first tournament, and actually, the first one in the state. With 26 participants across 4 states, everyone had a wonderful time by playing all 3 rounds. There were 4 kids, as young as 8, competing for prizes, and a total of 4 divisions with the highest rank being 4dan and the lowest being 30kyu. We had lunch with homemade bread, provided by Matthew Martin Makes, one of our sponsors. We hosted this tournament at Empire Games, a game shop, in the heart of the Electric City. In order to support the venue, the club bought a lump sum of snack tokens, which were given to each participant. The 1st place winners from each section were: Richard (4d) from SC, Oliver (7k) from GA, Matt (20K) from SC, and Mai (30K) from GA. They all got a 3D-printed hand trophy and got to choose their prize, with the top prize being Yellow Mountain Import’s bamboo 0.8-inch reversible 19x19 / 13x13 game set. Second place winners got GoMagic’s gift certificates, and additional prizes were handed out to the youngest participant and to the person who drove from the farthest away. Tournament Results: Section 1 4D Richard Malcolm 3-0 2K Paul Celmer 1-2 4K Nolan Curtis 2-1 5K Fei Li 1-2 5K Robert, Lazenby 1-2 5K Xingyu Li 2-1 Section 2 7K Andrew Boyd 1-2 7K Jared Donboch 1-2 7K Oliver Meeus 2-1 8K Patrick Rymer 2-1 9K Jeffrey Kubach 1-2 10K Glen Peterson 0-3 Section 3 12K Ziyi Guan 1-2 12K Yun Luo 2-1 14K Marta Zakharchuk 1-2 16K Brad Davenport 2-1 20K Matthew Martin 3-0 22K Isaac Morehead 2-1 Section 4 25K Bud Henderson 0-3 25K Yuji Ichihashi 2-1 25K Jamie Newman 1-2 25K Kai Northcott 2-1 30K Masamitsu Kikuchi 0-3 30K Will Ryan 1-2 30K Itsuki Ito 2-1 30K Mai Ichihashi 3-0 Sponsors and gifts from: @matthewmartinmakes @yellowmountainimports @GoMagic.official @stonedonthegoban Interview Responses: So what do you think about this tournament? "It was great. I didn't participate in the tournament, but my kids and the kids from the same school participated, and two of them, for the first time. They had a fun time, so it was great. The atmosphere is so warm and nice and it's so comfortable." - Asahi, mother, Georgia "It was a lot of fun, filled with a lot of wonderful moments." -Jamie, 25k, Alabama "It's been a lot of fun. I think the organizer did a really good job preparing everything. Didn't take very long to get started. I'm having a good time here. I love the location. Empire Games is really impressive. I'm looking forward to playing my last game." -Jeffrey, 9k, GA "I think it was a lot of fun. I was very impressed by the turnout for the first time that we held a tournament here." - Patrick, 8k, SC Why did you decide to participate in this tournament? "Because it's Go, and it was only 4 hours away. There aren't a lot of tournaments, so they're kind of worth driving to." - Andrew, 7k, Alabama "I just really like over-the-board play. It's cool to play with people in person. It's fun to do in a setting, too, where it's competitive, and you know, everyone's got a timer and you're working on the AGA rank." - Brad, 16k, Georgia "I haven't played in an in-person tournament in a long time. I've just been missing the last couple of tournaments that were available to me in Atlanta, so being able to come up here was great. I haven't played in a tournament in about a year." - Jeffrey, 9k, GA "Again, I haven't played a live tournament in probably around 11 years, so where I live, there's not many go players, and I play online, but I like playing with actual people." - Nolan, 4k, SC Our Obstacles: There's never been a go tournament in South Carolina before, so we didn't know exactly how to structure or advertise for it. We had to look outside of the state, such as the Atlanta Go Club. We're thankful to them for lending the timers. Several of their go members also decided to participate in the tournament; all around, it was good to make this connection. This was our webpage to advertise the event: https://thecuttingboard.my.canva.site/ Here is our website: https://upstatescgo.wixsite.com/club
