Understanding How to Play Go: An AGA 7-Dan Explains Some of His Games Yuan Zhou

Yuan Zhou is one of the strongest Go players in America. Before coming to the US in 1989, he was recognized in his native China as having unusual talent and received professional training for three years. Shortly after settling in Maryland, Zhou began to rise to the top of US Go. Among his achievements are winning the mid-Atlantic Championship in 1990 and 2000, the Eastern Open in 1992, the University of Maryland Open in 1993 and 1994, a NOVA quarterly tournament in 1993 and 1999, the New Jer­sey Open in 1995, 1996, and 1997, and the Pennsylvania Open in 2000. In 1992 Zhou placed 5th in the World Youth Championship Senior Division as the US representative, and he has been an invited participant in the North American Fujitsu tournament five times, in 1992, 1995, 1996, 1997, and 2001. He is also a regular participant in the annual US Ing Invitational Tournament.

Zhou's commentaries on his games included in this book were first pre­sented to the HoCoGo Club in Maryland in the Summer of 1995, with the exception of the Fujitsu game with Jimmy Cha, which was presented to the Greater Washington Go Club in January of 1996. Since the commentaries are directed at both kyu and dan level players, they are unusualy acces­sible as well as quite thorough. This book is based on video tapes of these presentations.

Zhou discussed each game with his opponent and also went over every game with a professional. As a result, he is able to talk about what both players were thinking at each stage of the game and also provide a high level critique of the play. In order to make the commentaries easier to follow and enjoy, we show very few moves per game diagram, usually only one or two. This way it is not necessary to set the games up on a board in order to study them effectively, although doing so allows you to consider variations more thoroughly.

001 Game 1: Versus Peng Liu (Black)

Final round, New Jersey Open, February 19, 1995

041 Game 2: Versus Michael Zeng (White)

Furth Round, US Open, August 1994

079 Game 3: Versus Jimmy Cha (White)

Second Round, North American Fujitsu, November 12, 1995

113 Game 4: Versus Jae Moon Kim (Black)

Fourth Round, Maryland Open, May 26, 1995

139 Game 5: Versus I-han Lui (Black)

Open Section, HoCoGo Picnic Games, June 11,1995

167 Game 6: Versus Soo Il-kim (Black)

Third Round, North American Fujitsu, November 22, 1992

187 Game 7: Versus Kevin Young Lee (Black)

Open Section, HoCoGo Picnic Games, June 11, 1995