World Amateur Go Championship - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The World Amateur Go Championship (WAGC) is an international tournament for amateur Go

Go (board game)

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

players, held once a year since 1979. The organising body is the International Go Federation (IGF). Each participating country sends one player, although in the beginning of the contest there were multiple players from the stronger Go Countries (Eg: Japan, China); in 2007 there were 68 participants. Some of the participants have gone on to become top 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.

Past Champions

Ordinal	Year	Champion	Champion's Country
1^st	1979	Nie Weiping Nie Weiping Nie Weiping in Shen, Hebei, China) is a professional Go player.- Biography :Nie began learning Go at the age of nine and won the inaugural World Amateur Go Championship in 1979. Nie was given 9 dan rank in 1982. He became famous in the Go world after leading China to victory in the China-Japan...	China China Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
2^nd	1980	Imamura Fumiaki	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...
3^rd	1981	Shao Zhenzhong	China
4^th	1982	Cao Dayuan Cao Dayuan Cáo Dàyuán , born January 26, 1962) is a professional Go player.- Biography :Cao started learning Go when he was 11. He won the 4th World Amateur Go Championship in 1982 and turned professional in 1985. He was promoted to 9 dan in 1986....	China
5^th	1983	Ma Xiaochun Ma Xiaochun Ma Xiaochun is a Chinese professional Go player.- Biography :Ma was born in Zhejiang, China. He began playing Go at the age of nine and was awarded 7 dan rank in 1982. In 1983, Ma was promoted to 9 dan. He visited Japan in 1982 and later won the World Amateur Go Championship in 1983...	China
6^th	1984	Wang Qun	China
7^th	1985	Wang Jianhong	China
8^th	1986	Chan Ka Yui	Hong Kong Hong Kong Hong Kong is one of two Special Administrative Regions of the People's Republic of China , the other being Macau. A city-state situated on China's south coast and enclosed by the Pearl River Delta and South China Sea, it is renowned for its expansive skyline and deep natural harbour...
9^th	1987	Imamura Fumiaki	Japan
10^th	1988	Zhang Wendong	China
11^th	1989	Che Zewu	China
12^th	1990	Chang Hao Chang Hao Chang Hao is a professional Go player. He is a 9 dan Go player from China. He is China's best player of the 1990s and one of the best in the world. Growing up he was a prodigy in China. He has won many titles, two of them international titles. He is best friends with Lee Chang-ho, whom he most...	China
13^th	1991	Imamura Fumiaki	Japan
14^th	1992	Kikuchi Yasuro	Japan
15^th	1993	Sun Yiguo	China
16^th	1994	Hiraoka Satoshi	Japan
17^th	1995	Hirata Hironori	Japan
18^th	1996	Liu Jun	China
19^th	1997	Liu Jun	China
20^th	1998	Kim Ch'an-u	Korea South Korea The Republic of Korea , , is a sovereign state in East Asia, located on the southern portion of the Korean Peninsula. It is neighbored by the People's Republic of China to the west, Japan to the east, North Korea to the north, and the East China Sea and Republic of China to the south...
21^st	1999	Yu Chae-seong	Korea
22^nd	2000	Sakai Hideyuki	Japan
23^rd	2001	Li Daichun	China
24^th	2002	Fu Li	China
	2003	Not held due to SARS Severe acute respiratory syndrome Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome is a respiratory disease in humans which is caused by the SARS coronavirus . Between November 2002 and July 2003 an outbreak of SARS in Hong Kong nearly became a pandemic, with 8,422 cases and 916 deaths worldwide according to the WHO... outbreak.
25^th	2004	Kang Wook Lee	Korea
26^th	2005	Hu Yuqing	China
27^th	2006	Hiraoka Satoshi	Japan
28^th	2007	Shan Ziteng	China
29^th	2008	Ha Sung Bong	Korea
30^th	2009	Hu Yuqing	China
31^st	2010	Hong-suk Song	South Korea
32^nd	2011	Baoxiang Bai	China

Past Champions

See Also