How I Became A Champion – Ans Hoogland
Ans Hoogland was recently crowned Dutch Riichi Mahjong Champion 2010. It was well-deserved and she has also kindly agreed to write a little about how it came to be. More after the jump…
I play mahjong for about 5 years now and Riichi Mahjong since 2008. In tournaments I am always very glad when I end up in the first half.
To qualify for the European Championship in Hannover 2010 I needed some more points so I had to play very well at the Cherry Blossom this year and I did. I ended on place number 8. One special hand gave me an extra price; I had 7 pairs with at least 2 doras.
After the Cherry Blossom we played lots of evenings to practice for Hannover and in-between we were in Guildford. To my own surprise I was very lucky that day and I became the British Champion 2010.
In Hannover I had some very good rounds but also very bad. First day I lost 52.000 in one round and the next day I won a round with 53.000. My final result was place 33 from 80 players, so I was satisfied.
Then it was time for the Kinryu Majan Taikai in Utrecht. The accumulated results in both the Cherry Blossom Tournament and the Kinryu Majan Taikai count for the Dutch Riichi championship.
First round I had to face 3 cracks. No problem, I love it. The stronger my opponents, the more fun I have. Gert-Jan Davies, a very good Riichi player and Dutch Champion 2008; Maurice Demmer, European Riichi Champion 2010; Robert Rijnders, president of the EMA and also a very good player. I was playing good and until the last game on top, but then Robert made a good hand, so he won the table and I was second.
Second round I played with Chris Scheffler, who was on top of the ranking after round 1. But that table was mine and I had a good score.
Third round was for Harry Kal, Rick Moorman and Cor and Ans Hoogland. The last 3 are “Roode Vijven” (red fives) members and Rick was very excited to play with us. “Now we can start playing Riichi Mahjong” he said. It was very sad Rick made a Chombo this round. East was Dora and he made a pung East wind, only he forgot that the round wind was already South. Gemma’s story about Rick you can read on this site.
Then the last round started. I was on the second place in the ranking after 3 rounds, but the last table was not very lucky for me. We played 10 games and 8 of them were Tsumo’s. I had one nice Tsumo myself, but was twice East when someone else did. In the end I became 3rd on that table, enough to reach the third place of the tournament. So, 6th place in Nijmegen with 51.900 points and 3th place in Utrecht with 51.300 points, together enough to call myself the Dutch Riichi Mahjong Champion 2010.
For all results you can look on Mahjong News.
