In the star-studded world of Go, if you want to judge the brightest comet, it is Kong Jie. His brilliant time is relatively short, only two and a half years, but the achievement of the six major championships in international competitions is something that many masters have never achieved in their lifetime.
Kong Jie's six laurels are made up of three world champions and three Asian Cup winners, and he has two world runners-up in the account. The process of picking gold and silver is as follows:
First, the glorious beginning of 2009. Kong Jie won a world championship, a runner-up, and an Asian Cup. The specific time is that in January, the 13th Samsung Cup final lost to Lee Sedol to win the runner-up, which was the first time in Kong Jie's Go career to stand on the stage of the World Series final; in June, he won the Asian Cup for the first time by winning the Asian Cup with three consecutive Korean superstars such as Kang Dong-yun, Lee Chang-ho and Lee Sedol; and in December, he won the first world championship title in his life.
Second, the glorious year of 2010. Kong Jie has won two world championships and one Asian Cup. The specific process is that in February, the 14th LG Cup final defeated Lee Chang-ho and reached the top of the World Series for the second time; in June, he defeated Lee Chang-ho and Satoshi Yuki for the first time to defend the Asian Cup; in July, he defeated lee Sedol, the world's first person at the time, and laughed at the third world champion.
Third, the glorious and lonely year of 2011. Kong Jie has won a world runner-up and an Asian Cup winner. In order, in February, he lost to rising star Park Moon-yao in the final of the 15th LG Cup, ranking second, which was Kong Jie's last Trip to the World Series finals, and in June, he defeated Yamada Norisabi and Baek Hong-mi to win the Asian Cup for the third time.
Kong Jie nine paragraphs
Kong Jie's most noteworthy thing is that he won three world championship titles in eight months (December 2009 to July 2010), which is an extremely rare record in the history of world Go, and Kong Jie at that time was simply a god in the chess world. Alongside them are Lee Chang-ho and Gu Li, who won four world championships in a row in the 12 months from May 1998 to May 1999, and Gu Li won four world championships in the 10 months from July 2008 to May 2009.
The short-lived brilliance reflects Kong Jie's shortcomings, that is, the peak period is maintained too short. Among the top performers who are similar to him, Masaki Takemiya won two world championships and four Asian Cups in the four years from 1988 to 1992; Tang Weixing's three world championships were won in six years from 2013 to 2019; Chang Hao's three world championships were won between 2005 and 2009; and the triple champion Chen Yaoye was achieved in five and a half years from 2013 to 2018.
After all, the Asian Cup is a fast chess tournament, and the scale of participation is very small, but the gold content of Kong Jie's three world champions is still very good. The 14th Samsung Cup was Kong Jie's first crown, and although Lee Sedol did not participate because of his suspension, Kong Jie knocked down all the way. He defeated Lee Won-pi, Lee Chang-ho, Yamashita Kyung-go and Park Yongxun to reach the semifinals; in the semi-finals, he defeated Gu Li, the first Chinese Go player at the time, with a score of 2:0, which was very crisp and clean; the opponent in the final was Qiu Jun, and Kong Jiebing won the opponent without bloodshed.
Kong Jie's second world champion is the 14th LG Cup, he won the LG Cup from the first round in a row against Lee Sedol, Kang Ru-taek, Choi Chul-han and other three major players to reach the semi-finals, and then won Park Yong-hoon and Lee Chang-ho in succession to win this year's LG Cup.
Chinese players won the final four of the LG Cup
Kong Jie's third World Series Gold Cup is the 23rd Fujitsu Cup, and under his butcher's knife are Yoshio Ishida, Kim Ji-seok, Qiu Jun, and Lee Sedol. In the final, the world's first man Li Shishi was defeated, which fully reflected the strong strength of Kong Jie.
If Kong Jie's peak state can be maintained for a longer time, then his light will be even brighter. But history has no ifs. So, why did Kong Jie fail to become an evergreen tree in the chess world, but a flash in the pan?
Personally, I think there are three main factors. The first is that it is not the right time. The period when Kong Jie rose up was the era of "Gu Li" when Li Shishi and Gu Li were facing each other, especially Li Shishi, who repeatedly let Kong Jie swallow bitter fruit in the world competition, and even had the bad luck of the cooked duck finally flying away.
The second reason is that in December 2009, the year Kong Jie first won the world championship, he was close to the "senior age" of 28 years old, and the Chinese Go community is known to be a veteran above 25 years old, and Kong Jie is obviously overage.
The third reason is that after the success of the achievement, Kong Jie had the idea of ship to dock car to station, and the end of contentment and happiness was that the lax will and the collapse of the spirit of struggle, the achievements were not surprising.
There are few evergreen trees in the Chinese Weiqi community like Japan and South Korea, which is a major issue that the whole society, the leaders of the Go community, the players themselves and their families should face, and it is expected that in the future, all aspects of the problem can be properly solved, so that there will be more champions and more pure chess players like Kong Jie in the chess world.