Oscar Selby "Top Boy" at UK Challenge; Roella Smith "Top Girl"
Tony Collman | Published on 7/11/2013
Oscar Selby was the overall winner at the UK Go Challenge 2013 finals, played Saturday July 6. Selby (right), a 10-kyu from Epsom recently featured in the “Ultimate Child Genius” Competition (UK Youth Champ Oscar Selby In “Ultimate Child Genius” Competition, 6/22 EJ) also won the U10 Boys' category. Roella Smith 13k of Cambridge was Top Girl, also coming first in the U14 Girls'. David Robson and Melchior Chiu were second and third respectively overall. The UK Go Challenge is a 13x13 nationwide event mounted by the British Go Association (BGA) since 2004 and modeled on the similar UK Chess Challenge, with the aim of encouraging youngsters to take up the game. Heats were run in schools through the year culminating in this weekend's finals, in which children not taking part in the heats could also participate. They were held at Milton Church of England Primary School in Milton, near Cambridge, and were organized by BGA VP Tony Atkins. Click here for full results. Though Selby was given a good chance of winning the (British) Channel 4 TV Child Genius competition, he lost out in the final to 11-year-old wordmeister and world Scrabble champion Shrinidhi Prakash. Click here for the episode, with playback (total playing time about 45mins with commercials; may not play everywhere), including footage (at about 5:30) of Selby at this year's British Youth Go Championship. - Tony Collman, British correspondent for the E-Journal; photo by Tony Atkins; courtesy of British Go Association website