Japanese chess | Satoshi Yuki reached 1300 wins

On January 20, in the 78th edition of the Battle of Honinbo Preliminary A, which was scheduled to be held at the Kansai Chess Academy, Satoshi Yuki won because Yasuhiro Mitsune abstained due to ill health. He thus achieved his 1300th career win. Kansai Chess Academy said Yasuhiro Mine sent an email at 7 a.m. on January 20 saying that he had abstained for health reasons.

With this victory, Satoshi Yuki became the fifth player in the history of Japanese Go to achieve 1300 wins (575 defeats and 2 draws), and the first Kansai chess player to achieve 1300 wins. The previous four chess players were Lin Haifeng Honorary Tianyuan, Zhao Zhixun Honorary Celebrity, Kobayashi Koichi Honorary Chess Saint and Otake Hero Honorary Qisheng.

Satoshi Yuki, who is now 49 years old and 11 months old, has been a professional chess player for 37 years and 10 months, breaking the record of the youngest and fastest 1300 wins set by Cho Zhixun in 40 years and 11 months at the age of 51 years and 11 months. And the win rate at 1300 wins is 69.3%, which is also the highest win rate.

Satoshi Yuki said: "It is not easy to feel that I have accumulated 1300 wins, and now every victory is very difficult. Now I don't care much about the number of wins, but I still play the chess well. It is a great honor to be in line with these great predecessors."

Satoshi Yuki was born in Suma-ku, Kobe City, and belongs to the Kansai Chess Academy. He became a professional chess player in 1984 at the age of 12. In his career, he won the title of 1 period of Tianyuan and 1 period of 10 paragraphs. He has won the NHK Cup 5 times. The player with the most Go wins in Japan so far is Cho Ji-hoon's 1567 wins (as of January 26, 2021)