Nakamura youngest Go player to achieve 100th win

The Yomiuri Shimbun

13:16 JST, June 7, 2022

Junior high school student Sumire Nakamura, 13, has become the youngest professional Go player to achieve their 100th win in an official match.

Nakamura defeated sixth-dan player Keiko Kato, 43, on Monday in the second round of the 41st Women’s Honinbo tournament at the Nihon Ki-in in Chiyoda Ward, Tokyo.

At 13 years and 3 months of age, Nakamura is the youngest professional Go player in the history of the Nihon Ki-in, the Japanese association for the traditional board game, to reach 100 official wins. She broke the previous record held by honorary Meijin Cho Chi Hun, 65, which he set at 15 years and 11 months.

At a press conference after the match, Nakamura said: “I’m not really conscious of my wins. It was like, ‘Oh, I see.’”

Asked about her remarkable accomplishment, made three years and two months after she became a professional Go player, Nakamura smiled and said, “I don’t know, but it seems fast.”

A second-dan player, Nakamura steadily built up a lead from the beginning of Monday’s match and maintained her advantage. She has reached the top eight in the Women’s Honinbo tournament, just three wins away from the right to challenge Rina Fujisawa, 23, the Women’s Honinbo title holder.