Kyoto Chess Championship 2026: Kobayashi Atsuhiko Champion of Kyoto
- davidgn0
- 20 hours ago
- 3 min read
On 22 March, just before the opening of cherry blossoms in Kyoto, 32 players gathered for a 4 round 30m+30s Standard time control, National JCF rated, and one of the few last qualifier tournaments held this year: the Kyoto Championship 2026.
Players and Prize Winners Group Photo
With 32 players this event qualified to select 5 seeded players to go to the Japan National Championship in Tokyo during Golden Week - among whom there would be one of the 8 Kyoto local players with seeding rights.
Registration, Opening and Name Check at Boards
Round 1 did not see any major upset although noteworthy was youth player Itokazu Antonio’s win over Ide Daisuke who was 350 points higher rated.
Impression of Round 1
The round 2 pairing had become more intense, also evident from the 4 draw results. On board 2 Bold Tsogt-Ochir with white delivered a hard-fought draw against Kyoto local Yanai Yuya. Karasawa Yuta with slightly less material on the board claimed a threefold repetition draw against Matsuyama Takefumi.
Start of Round 2
Kyoto’s very own Ide Daisuke had to accept a draw against Maeda Kotaro in a King + Bishop + Pawn vs. K endgame because the pawn was on a rook file with the “wrong colored” bishop.
Another draw was fought out between Inukai Kazunori with white and Sheldon Donaldson. Deep into an endgame with few pawns and minor pieces left, Sheldon managed to sacrifice his knight for the last standing white pawn to reach a K + B vs K draw.
Lunch was scheduled between round 2 and 3, but given the fact that every round a handful of games extended well over 60 moves, lunch time was short for Terasawa Koshiro and Zhao Zilang who played the longest game of the day, which resulted in a win for Terasawa Koshiro.
Going into round 3 there were 5 players with 2 points. In the board 1 game, the top rated player Kobayashi Atsuhiko (2214) with white made no mistake against the strong playing Tanaka Ryosuke (1858) to win the game.
On board 2 Taga Hiroto managed to stop the winning streak of the female player Sakai Azumi and on board 3 we saw Yamamichi Atsuya in a highly positional endgame slightly outmaneuvered by Sakai Enju who collected the full point.
In round 4 Sakai Enju on board 1 lost against Kobayashi Atsuhiko who with this win was crowned Champion of Kyoto 2026!
Round 4
On board 5 there was a high-octane match between Sakai Azumi with white and Itokazu Antonio in which Sakai Azumi sacrificed a piece for 2 center pawns and a strong lead in development, so much that in the middle game the white King had appeared on the middle of the board, joining the attack against the restrained black pieces. Although the attack was about to result in a win, it was Itokazu Antonio who cleverly found a way to checkmate white in the middle of the board.
The prize giving took place right after the last round and we congratulated Kobayashi Atsuhiko for his Champion title, congratulations also to the other prize winners and a big thank you to all players for the sportsmanship shown during the entire event.
Prize Winners (who stayed on)
