The purpose of Irish National Go Championship is twofold:

• to award the title of Irish Go Champion
• to award points towards go players competing in the World Amateur Go Championship held annually in Japan.

The Irish National Go Championship is regularly referred to as the “Top 8“, as it contains the top eight eligible players in any given year. The points awarded at the end of the tournament are referred to as “Japan points“.

Top 8 Tournament Rules

Eligibility

1. The Irish National Championship is open to all Irish nationals, and to non-nationals who have been permanently resident in Ireland for at least five years, and are eligible for Irish citizenship.
2. All representatives from Ireland to the WAGC must be Irish citizens. Hence, a non-national participating in the Irish Championship, as allowed by the above rule, would have to take out Irish citizenship before being allowed to travel to the WAGC.

Qualification

1. The Top 8 is composed of the four top finishers from the previous year and four additional qualifiers.
2. The qualifying system is decided annually based on number of potential participants, chosen by minimum strength criterion plus extras by invitation.
3. The qualification tournament should finish by the end of November and the Top 8 tournament itself should finish by the end of March to allow time for the play-offs.
4. Games not finished after six months are void and no extra points awarded to either player.
5. Rules committee to have final adjudication.
6. In practice every allowance should be made to get people to play as many games as possible; however, at some stage it may be necessary to give players a strict deadline to complete their remaining games.
7. Games are played under the rules outlined in the Top 8 section below.

Top 8 Tournament

1. The Top 8 play an all-play-all league.
2. Time limits for the games are 60 minutes each per game with Canadian overtime of 15 stones in five minutes.
3. There is no handicap.
4. Komi is set at 6.5 points for white.
5. Players decide colour by nigiri.
6. All games are played according to the ruleset used by the International Go Federation’s WAGC rules.
7. Players with the same number of wins at the end of the Top 8 play a single play-off game as a tie-breaker.
8. The top two players play a best of three game final, with time limits of 90 minutes plus Canadian overtime of 10 stones in five minutes.
9. Colour is chosen by nigiri in the first game of the final, and reversed in the second. Colour is again chosen by nigiri if there is a third game.
10. The winner of this match is declared the Irish Champion.

Playing Online

1. Players can, by mutual agreement, play their games through an online service such as IGS or KGS.
2. All other rules stated here are still valid for such games.
3. Both players should retain a record of such a game, in the event of a dispute arising.

Japan Points and the WAGC

1. The Irish Champion receives 10 Japan points. The runner up receives seven Japan points.
2. Players finishing from third to eighth place receive from six to one Japan points respectively.
3. Japan points accumulate year-on-year until a player goes to the WAGC (see below).
4. At the end of the Top 8 tournament, the player with the most accumulated Japan points (who may or may not be the Irish Champion) is granted the opportunity to represent Ireland at the World Amateur Go Championship.
5. That player loses all of their Japan points after the visit, and starts the following year’s Top 8 tournament with zero points.
6. If two or more players are tied on the same number of Japan points, the preference is for the player who has not previously gone to the WAGC.
7. If both have been to the WAGC before, then the player with most points in the current year goes.
8. A player may defer their trip to the WAGC, in which case the next most eligible player will be offered the trip. However, no player may travel in consecutive years.
9. The committees decision is final in adjudicating on matters not covered above.