Cătălin Țăranu born March 31, 1973 in Romania

Romania

Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...

, is one of the very few professional

Go professional

A Go professional is a professional player of the game of Go. The minimum standard to acquire a professional diploma through one of the major go organisations is very high. The competition is tremendous, and prize incentives for champion players are very large...

 players

Go players

This page gives an overview of well-known players of the game of Go throughout the ages. The page has been divided into sections based on the era in which the Go players played and the country in which they played. As this was not necessarily their country of birth, a flag of that country precedes...

 of the board game

Board game

A board game is a game which involves counters or pieces being moved on a pre-marked surface or "board", according to a set of rules. Games may be based on pure strategy, chance or a mixture of the two, and usually have a goal which a player aims to achieve...

 of Go

Go (board game)

Go , is an ancient board game for two players that originated in China more than 2,000 years ago...

 from outside Asia

Asia

Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.7% of the Earth's total surface area and with approximately 3.879 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population...

.

Biography

Catalin started learning go

Go (board game)

Go , is an ancient board game for two players that originated in China more than 2,000 years ago...

 from Cristian Cobeli in 1989, at the age of 16. His first tournament was for players in the 10 to 4 Kyū

Kyu

is a Japanese term used in martial arts, chadō, ikebana, go, shogi such as Japanese traditional culture, and academic tests and in other similar activities to designate various grades or levels or class of proficiency or experience...

 range, when he was a 6 kyu. He won all eight games. He moved up to amateur 1 dan

Dan (rank)

The ranking system is a Japanese mark of level, which is used in modern fine arts and martial arts. Originally invented in a Go school in the Edo period, this system was applied to martial arts by Kanō Jigorō, the founder of judo and later introduced to other East Asia countries.In the modern...

 in a year, and just a year later moved up to 4 dan. He started winning small tournaments in Romania around this time. He was invited to Japan

Japan

Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

 by Saijo Masataka in 1995. He quickly joined the Nagoya branch of the Nihon-Kiin and became an insei

Insei

In Japan, an ' is a student at an institution, usually a graduate school. The word may also refer to a student of Go at the Nihon Ki-in or the Kansai Ki-in seeking to become a professional player....

. After two years, he became the first European to pass the professional examination. It took Catalin just 4 years to reach 5p (5-dan professional).

He won the European Go Championship

European Go Championship

The European Go Championship or Congress is the annual and main event of many organised by the European Go Federation for players of the board game Go. It consists of a 2-week open competition, one round per day, making a total of 10 rounds with a champion ultimately emerging - the player with the...

 in 2008.

He was the president of the Romanian Go Federation for 2009 to 2011.

External links

• Catalin's Go school