Chang Hao
He was born in Shanghai on 7 November 1976. He learnt go when he was five.
Chang Hao first encountered go when his parents, both beginners, were playing over moves from a television series. After a while he announced "I want to learn how to play go" - so at least we are spared the usual story associated with Oriental prodigies who master the game just by watching adults play.
Even more realistically, his mother applied to the local leisure centre go school. That year's course had already begun so she was told to come back next year. Little Chang stamped his foot and insisted, so mother returned to the school and Chang was allowed to watch. The teacher thought that as the rest of the class were already beyond the first steps, Chang woud be confused and lose interest. Instead his eyes lit up with excitement. His enthusiasm and, above all, his powers of concentration marked him out for special attention by the coach. Of course Chang was lucky in one respect. He lived in Shanghai, probably the No. 1 city for go in China. The city already had a policy of nurturing young talent and it was the easiest place for vsiting Japanese players to reach (The GoGoD database has a 7-stone game against Yasunaga Hajime when Chang was seven years old). With that sort of background it was hardly likely they would let someone like Chang slip through their fingers.
There was a problem, though. In 1986, just ten years old, Chang Hao qualified for the national training squad. No matter how much Shanghai might preen itself, there are times when it must kowtow to Beijing. This was such an occasion. If Chang was to take up his squad place, he had to move to Beijing. The system didn't make that much allowance for prodigies.
Mother (Zhou Yueyuan) came to the rescue again. She gave up her job - not an easy thing to do in pre-capitalist days - and moved with her son to Beijing. She joined a school for sightseeing guides so that she could work and support him.
This was the year when China held its first Go Prodigies Cup. Most countries would be happy to have one prodigy, but China had so many it could afford to hold a tournament! The winner was Chang. His impressive game in that event against Luo Xihe, a year younger but now 8-dan (and 4th in the national rankings) is also in the GoGoD database.
At this time Chang was taking 3 or 4 stones from the top players. Early in 1985 he played Chen Zude twice on 4 stones and lost. In October that year he played him again on 3 stones and won by 1 point. It was adjudged that he had improved a stone and half in about 9 months. His special talent was such that the great Nie Weiping unusually also took him under his wing. It was in this year, too, that he qualified as 1-dan, but in China that did not make him a pro as it would in Japan. Too much competition. He would need to reach 4-dan even to contemplate that.
As it happened, the year he made 4-dan, 1990 was the year he became (though still as 3-dan) China's entrant to the 12th World Amateur Championship in Japan. Once again his talent was too much to ignore, for he had, unusually, been awarded the entry by special recommendation rather than having to go through the usual process of the qualification tournament - a major event in the Chinese calendar then. The reason? He had just finished seventh in the National Individual Championships.
Chang won the World Amateur in Hiroshima with 8/8 and in the process became the youngest ever winner, lowering the record previously held by 18-year old Ma Xiaochun. His game against the runner-up is in the database.
But dragons soar ever upwards, and Chang continued his ascent, slow but sure. As he laboriously caught up with the higher ranked players, in 1993 he unsuccessfully but tenaciously challenged Ma Xiaochun for his Daguoshou title and in 1995 he won the National Championship as 7-dan, ahead of Yu Bin 9-dan. Then a little more consolidation before taking the Tianyuan title 3-1 from Ma in 1997, and after that there was no looking back.
1997 was a tough year for Ma. He lost his Bawang title to Wang Lei 6-dan. But that set up a showdown of classic proportions between Chang and Wang, a year younger, because Wang also won the right to challenge Chang in a best-of-five for his new Tianyuan title while Chang won the challengership for the new Lebaishi Cup, also a best-of-five final. Since this was the immediate replacement for the Bawang, Wang was made the sitting tenant or de facto title holder.
Ten-game match with Wang
The showdown was naturally billed as a Ten-Game Match. It as a dream match for the new sponsors who had just made the Lebaishi Cup by far the most lucrative tournament in China (128,000 yuan winner's prize). And the big-time atmosphere was fortuitously accentuated that year, because the national training squad camp was held in Kunming and Lijiang in Yunnan Province. Lijiang, capital of the Naxi Minority, had suffered a massive earthquake in 1996, and was being rebuilt. Part of the rebuilding was the Lijiang Grand Hotel, a five-star monster financed by a Chinese-Thai joint venture and run by Europeans - a sign of the times in China. It opened early in 1997, just in time to house the training squad (at the locals' expense) of 34 pros and six helpers. It was inevitable that the "Ten-game Match" began there.
Chang Hao made sure there was no doubt about where the record prize money was going, by clocking up a 3-0 victory in the Lebaishi Cup, but maybe his attention wasn't so focused on the 1,000 yuan prize in the Tuanyuan where he was taken the full course to a 3-2 win. The rivalry with Ma resumed in 1999, however, when Chang took the first Qisheng title by a whisker.
Yet the really big prize for a Chinese player is the street cred that goes with performing well in international tournaments. Chang had yet to prove himself there. Indeed, in this area he was perhaps behind his contemporaries such as Zhou Heyang who was beating Yi Ch'ang-ho, Ch'oe Myeong-hun and Takemiya Masaki in the Fujitsu Cup. But a dragon hides in the clouds, only to re-emerge in greater splendour, and Chang has recently started to make his presence felt on the international stage. He had already cut his teeth against the Japanese in the Japan-China Supergo series, where, in martial arts style, the winner of the most recent match keeps his place in the ring while taking on newcomers from the other side until he loses. He notched up an impressive 6 wins in a row in the 10th Supergo.
That was only the Japanese, however. The Koreans provide the real benchmark at present. Recently Chang was the only Chinese left in the semi-finals of the 1st Chunlan Cup, against three Koreans, and he reached the quarter-finals of the 4th LG Cup and the same stage in the 4th Samsung Cup, falling to Koreans in each case. Yet he has remained at the top of the Chinese Elo-type ranking list for a good two years, consistently improving his score. This is the sort of consistency that surely betokens some sort of international success in the future.
Or is his age against him?! In some respects the Chinese system creates a deceptive impression of the strength of the new kids, for the truth is that the constant travelling is better suited to young, unattached people than it is to the older players. Chang Hao is the first to stress that his place at the top of the Chinese rankings must be influenced by the fact that rivals like Ma Xiaochun no longer play in all the events that attract ranking points. And it has long been noted that pros' results taper off dramatically when they lose their powers of concentration, i.e. get married. Chang Hao has recently married Zhang Xuan 8-dan!
Career milestones:
1-dan: 1986
2-dan: 1988
3-dan: 1989
4-dan: 1990
5-dan: 1992
6-dan: 1994
7-dan: 1995
8-dan: 1997
9-dan: 1999
(The above was as of the time of writing, 1999-11-18.)
from the GoGod Encyclopedia.
An interview with Chang Hao, “GOAMA”, International Go Newsletter, 67th issue
- The Chinese City League is not yet finished (Editors note: The final round was played on August,25. Chang Hao lost his game to Liu Xing, 7-dan, but his team still won the tournament), but you already showed an outstanding result by winning 9 games straight. What do you think about your achievement?
- I take part in Chinese League every year and it was not the first successful league I played. During the 2nd League I also won 9 games from 10, by losing only to Xie He, 7-dan.
- Your score in the previous Chinese League was not good. Did you prepare well this time?
- I cannot feel any difference. This time I was just luckier. After losing the first game to Lee Sedol, 9-dan, the member of the Guizhou team, the position of our team was difficult and it was necessary to play every game seriously.
- What do you think about the recent shape of Lee Changho, 9-dan?
- He is still the strongest one in the world. His recent score is not so good, if we compare it with his past results, but we can see that his score is still outstanding, if we compare it with the score of any other master in the world
- What is the main weak point of his Go?
- His endgame is getting weaker. He was the strongest endgame skill holder of the past and won lot of his games by 0.5 points. Nowadays he is often losing his games in endgame
- Can we say that Lee Sedol, 9-dan is not much weaker than Lee Changho, 9-dan?
- Do you really think so? Lee Changho, 9-dan won more than 20 World Go Championships and I bet that nobody will be able to break his record in next 10 years. Lee Sedol, 9-dan is a difficult opponent for Lee Changho, because of his aggressive playing style, but we cannot say that Lee Sedol, 9-dan is stronger, if you look at his results with other players.
- You won the Samsung World Go Championship in the beginning of the year, but later you was not able to win any important tournaments. What was the reason?
- I spend all my power in Samsung cup. You may know that it's hard to play many tournaments straight. It’s necessary to find a goal and reach it. I don’t feel that I am getting weaker. Please wait for my next goal!
- Will you try to win the Samsung cup again? ( Editors note: The first round will be played tomorrow)
- Yes, I will make my best. This time there are not many Chinese players in the main tournament, so the task will be harder (Editors note: 9 Chinese will take part in Samsung cup this year and last time they had 11 players in the main tournament)
