Tengen (Go)

Tengen (天元, center or origin of heaven) is a Go competition in Japan.

The name Tengen refers to the center point on a Go board.

The event is held annually, and has run continuously since its inauguration in 1975.

Tengen competition (天元戦)
The Tengen competition is a Go tournament run by the Japanese Nihon-Kiin and Kansai-Kiin. The Tengen is the 5th of the 7 big titles in Japanese Go.

It has the same format as the other tournaments. There is a preliminary tournament, which is single knockout, where the winner faces the holder in a best-of-five match.

Before the 6th Tengen, the format was different. Instead of the title holder waiting for a challenger, it would be the two Go players left from the single knockout tournament who then played a best-of-five match to determine the holder.

The tournament was formed from a merger between the Nihon Ki-in and Kansai Ki-in championships. The former ran from 1954 to 1975.

Trivia

 * The first player to defend the title was Kato Masao who won four consecutive terms in the 4th-7th Tengen.
 * Rin Kaiho surpassed this with a record five consecutive wins in the 15th-19th Tengen.
 * Iyama Yuta equaled this record in the 41st-45th terms, and has won the title a record eight times over nine terms starting with the 37th.