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**Lee Sedol**
Lee Sedol
Full name	Lee Sedol
Hangul	이세돌
Hanja	李世乭
Revised Romanization	I Sedol
McCune- Reischauer	I Sedol
Date of birth	February 3, 1983 (age 26)
Place of birth	Sinan County, Jeollanam-do, South Korea
Residence	South Korea
Teacher	Kwan Kab Ryong
Turned pro	1996
Rank	9 dan
Affiliation	Hanguk Kiwon

Lee Sedol (Yi Se-tol or Lee Sedol, born on February 3, 1983) is a South Korea professional Go player of 9-dan rank.

[edit] Biography

Lee is known to be a risk-taker who reads very carefully. A very strong player, he reached the highest rank of order, 9 dan, when he was only 21 years old. A prodigy, Lee turned professional at the tender age of 12, but had a rocky start to his career and took 3 years to reach 2 dan. His career started to accelerate, however, when he was promoted to 3 dan in 1999. In 2000, he had an exorbitant 32 game winning streak. After his impressive run, he won his first title, the 5th Chunwon (equivalent to the Tengen title in Japanese Nihon-Kiin). Lee Sedol, only 17, was becoming famous in Korea, and was given the nickname "Boy, the Unbeatable". The Hanguk Kiwon changed its promotion rules in 2003, to give more credit to the players who were doing well at the time. Lee Sedol saw this and took it as a chance to move up the ranks, which he did. In that same year, he moved from 6 dan to 9 dan. This happened after he won the 7^th LG Cup over fellow Korean baduk player Lee Chang-ho, and came in second place in the 2^nd KT Cup. Add another title, the Fujitsu Cup, and now Lee Sedol is among the top players, not just in his age group, but in the world.

In June 2009, Lee Sedol shook the Go world by announcing a leave of absence from professional Go for one and a half years. This decision arose from several controversies between himself and the Korean Baduk Association: He did not attend the awards ceremony for the previous year's Korean League, and he declined to participate in the current year's tournament, electing instead for the China Weiqi League. The Korean League was not happy about this, as it disrupted their planned schedules, and the loss of their biggest star seriously hurt sponsorship interest, now more important than ever during the global economic crisis. He also refused to hand over copyright of game records, and to pay 5% of his earnings from playing in China to the Korean Baduk Association. Some, most notably legendary player Cho Hunhyun, publicly denounced his behaviour. The players in the Korean Baduk Association put forward a vote to give Lee Sedol an unspecified punishment, which passed 86 to 37. Despite his announcement of leaving the game, he would still play out his commitments for that year's Fujitsu Cup and Asian TV Cup, and China Weiqi league. After that, he is set to emerge from retirement in January 2011.

[edit] Promotions & Career Record

Rank	Year	Notes
1 dan	1995	Promoted to professional dan rank after passing qualifying test.
2 dan	1998
3 dan	1999
4 dan	2003
5 dan	2003
6 dan	2003	Won the LG Cup against Lee Chang-ho.
7 dan	2003	Runner up in the KT Cup against Yoo Changhyuk.
8 dan	2003	Skipped over because of the Hanguk Kiwon promotion rules.
9 dan	2003	Won Fujitsu Cup against Song Tae Kon.

Year	Record	%
1995	6-6
1996	33-21
1997	55-20
1998	40-16
1999	47-20
2000	74-20
2001	53-25
2002	53-28
2004	43-23
2005	61-21	74%
2006	74-28	73%

[edit] Titles and runners-up

Ranks #6-t in total amount of titles in Korea.

Title	Years Held
Current	14
GS Caltex Cup	2006
Guksu	2007, 2008
Myungin	2007, 2008
Chunwon	2000
KBS Cup	2006
Prices Information Cup	2006, 2007
BC Card Cup	2002
SK Gas Cup	2002
Maxim Cup	2005 - 2007
Defunct	4
LG Refined Oil Cup	2002
Baedalwang	2000
Paedal Cup	2000
KTF Cup	2002
Continental	3
Asian TV Cup	2007-2008
China-Korea New Pro Wang	2002
International	10
LG Cup	2003 2008
Samsung Cup	2004, 2008, 2009
Fujitsu Cup	2002, 2003, 2005
World Oza	2004, 2006

Title	Years Lost
Current	8
GS Caltex Cup	2007
Wangwi	2002, 2004
Prices Information Cup	2008
KBS Baduk Wang	2001
Chunwon	2006, 2008
SK Gas Cup	2000
Defunct	1
KT Cup	2003
Continental	1
China-Korea Tengen	2001
International	2
LG Cup	2001, 2009
Zhonghuan Cup	2005

[edit] Trivia

Based on the original meaning of the Lee's real name "Se Dol", he is meant to be the world No.1 go player since he was named because the meaning of the name is "The stone of the world class".

Another one of Lee's nicknames is Sendol which means powerful stone. He was given this name due to his style of play.

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

Interview