Words from the new world champion Hyunjae Choi:

“Naturally I am delighted to have won the World Amateur Go Championship this year in Sendai. My game with the Chinese representative Hu Yuqing was the tightest battle and this turned out to be a decisive victory. To be honest, I did not think the European players were of a comparable strength, however I still felt a responsibility as the Korean representative to show my best game.

My first encounter with go was from an early age. Rather than playing with my classmates at elementary school, I preferred to absorb myself in ‘gomoku’ – five-in-a-row on a go board. My mother saw how much I enjoyed playing and suggested that I might be interested in go. It went from there. Winning the championship means I gain 40 rating points in the Korean professional qualification system to add to my existing 90. This brings me over the 100 required to be guaranteed a place in the professional world.

At the moment I am still a student at Myongji University, where I am enrolled on the only course in the world for go, although I am currently taking leave from study. There I study go theory and issues in the cultural, historical and educational aspects of the game. My actual practice playing go is not done at college but rather at a famous go club, which I attend from six in the morning until nine at night almost every day.

More than the game itself, I love just sitting down and concentrating on playing. If you were to ask me what kind of a professional I am striving to become, it would be one who works very hard and can inject every last ounce of energy into the game.”

Visit Ranka online to find out more about the 34th WAGC.