The time came to mid-October 2000, and this year's "Samsung Cup" qualifiers were about to start. On this day, Li Xiangping was going to Seoul, South Korea, together with more than 20 other Chinese chess players, to participate in this competition, and this day happened to be Li Xiangping's journey through a full 2 months.

In the first 4 competitions, in addition to the first championship was taken away by the Japanese chess player Ita Kiki, in fact, the 3 championships were all taken away by Korean chess players without exception, and were taken away by Li Canghao Jiudan.

In other words, "Stone Buddha" Li Canghao has just achieved three consecutive championships in this competition!

This is also the first time since the inception of the World Go Championship that a player has won three consecutive championships in the same competition.

In the previous competitions, the most impressive thing for Chinese chess fans, or the most regrettable for everyone, was the just-concluded 4th "Samsung Cup" final.

This final was won by Chinese chess players Ma Xiaofei Jiudan and Li Canghao, and when I first saw this final combination, basically no one was optimistic about Ma Jiuduan.

After all, Li Canghao is Ma Jiuduan's super bitter hand, since the two met for the first time in the World Series finals in 96, Li Canghao won the "Toyo Securities Cup" that year with a score of 3-1, Ma Xiaofei was basically suppressed by him and couldn't move, in the next few years, Li Canghao even reached a wave of 10 consecutive wins against Ma Xiaofei that made Chinese chess fans very depressed.

However, in this year's "Samsung Cup", Ma Jiuduan burst out with high fighting spirit----- and in hindsight, Li Xiangping even believes that this is the last highlight moment of China's generation of Go geniuses in the international arena.

In the first three games of Wuban chess, Ma Xiaofei led 2-1, he not only took the lead in the score, but also played very substantially from the content of the chess. But just when the spirits of Chinese chess fans were lifted, the South Korean side arbitrarily revised the schedule and postponed the last two games of the final.......

This small action of the South Korean greatly affected the sensitive Ma Xiaofei, who was like deflated, and lost all two games in the final, achieving Li Canghao's three consecutive championships.

This year's Samsung Cup started in this context, according to common sense, the Chinese delegation at this time should be a bit of a "tragic" atmosphere, but no, when Li Xiangping and the army boarded the plane together, he did not feel any "tragic", some were just relaxed.

Li Xiangping thinks about it, Chinese chess players have not won the world championship for 5 years, so the runner-up won by Ma Xiaofei last year is already the best result of Chinese Go in recent years, not to mention that it is now the qualifiers, and it is still very early to win the championship, so at this time, how can everyone be "tragic".

"Maestro, come on, let's chat, huh! Why do you look a little nervous? Hehe, I said what are you nervous about, if you want me to say, with a high chess player like you participating in this competition, it should be someone else's right, everyone said yes......."

It was Gu Dali who made such a joke with Li Xiangping. If you want to say that among the more than 20 chess players who went to South Korea to participate in the competition, Li Xiangping is undoubtedly the most eye-catching. First of all, because of his young age, he is the second youngest in the Chinese delegation except for Chen Yaoyue, and secondly, because he is an amateur chess player, the only amateur chess player among all the participating chess players.

Of course, what really makes him so concerned is because now everyone knows that this is the "mastery", the one who has won all the victories in Qingfeng.com, has repeatedly defeated the national team masters, and has a unique chess style, novel moves, and an endless stream of new types of novices.

Now that such a person appears in the Chinese delegation, of course, it is difficult not to attract attention, and those older chess players may be a little more reserved, but the members of the national junior team led by Gu Dali can't manage so much, after all, these people are on average 3 to 5 years older than Li Xiangping, and when everyone just got on the plane, these people surrounded Li Xiangping.

No, to be precise, Li Xiangping and Chen Yaoyue were surrounded, because since they met Chen Yaoyue in the "Fangyuan Chess and Card Room" that day, the two have been mixed together every day for the past few days, and the future "leopard head" has almost become Li Xiangping's little follower now.

"I wasn't nervous, I just.... Just thinking about something else. ”

When he first got on the plane, Li Xiangping was just communicating with Lao Shi in his body, so he might seem a little absent-minded to outsiders, and now when he heard Gu Dali talking to himself, he could only suspend communication with his plug-in.

"What do you think? Hehe, you kid is playing chess so weird, can't you be thinking about some strange tricks? ”

Of course, Li Xiangping knew that Gu Dali was joking, but he was also kind and responded in a joking tone:

"Yikes! Brother Gu is amazing, you can see this, I see that even a plane ticket is so expensive, and I am about to think of a few new tricks to earn the ticket money back. ”

Hearing Li Xiangping say this, everyone laughed, of course, no one would believe that he was really thinking about some "strange tricks", but Li Xiangping's words led to a new topic for outstanding chess players, that is, about "making money for air tickets".

Because the Samsung Cup adopts the "Open" competition system, and this system is considered a pioneering achievement in the Go world in this year, different from the previous world series, the Samsung Cup is characterized by "high prize money, low game fee", take the qualifiers that start immediately, although the qualifiers also have game fees, but the game fees are extremely low.

Some chess players once calculated that only by winning 4 games in the qualifiers can they barely earn back the money for a round-trip air ticket, and only by winning 5 games can they earn back the accommodation and food expenses during their stay in Korea.

Since the entire qualifier usually only needs to be played in 5 rounds, in rare cases it will go to the 6th round. In other words, you can only make sure that you don't have to pay for it when you go to South Korea this time.

It is precisely for this reason that Li Xiangping's words will resonate with all chess players. Because most of the professional chess players in these years are not wealthy, and only the top ones can really earn high prize money. So in this kind of tournament, when many chess players are considering whether to participate in this competition, they will really weigh it in their hearts.

Of course, some of these players are confident in their own strength and think that they are sure to pass the qualifiers, while others can think that they are "ambitious" and want to make a difference in the professional chess world, so they are not willing to miss any opportunity to play.

And there are some chess players, such as Chen Yaoyue, who went to participate in the competition this time, but he was unanimously favored by everyone because of chess, and he belonged to the key training opponents in China, so his club paid for him to go to South Korea to participate in the competition.

"Haha, you kid, you want to earn back the ticket money so early, you seem to be very confident in your qualification?"

"Hehe, nonsense, where do I have any confidence, isn't this precisely because I have no desires and no desires, so I can put this on my lips, but I look at you, Brother Gu, you must be holding back a lot of energy to make a breakthrough, right?"

As soon as Li Xiangping's words came out, everyone laughed, and Gu Dali's face was slightly red when Li Xiangping said, and he smiled embarrassedly:

"You kid ......."

Li Xiangping hehe, hey, he said in his heart, "Gu Yi Round", Gu Dali in this year is still "Gu Yi Round", and what he just said can be regarded as a point to his acupoint.

Amidst everyone's laughter, South Korea soon arrived. After a short rest, when Li Xiangping was the only one left, he took a deep breath and said to his plug-in:

"Brother Ding'an, please get ready, you also heard it just now, if others still have many opportunities, and we only have this one chance!"