My Go Teacher: BenKyo Baduk

This is the fifth entry in my series of posts about my go teachers.

Today's post is about Ben Mantle better known as BenKyo Baduk.

About a year into my lessons with Clossius I became aware of BenKyo Baduk. A good friend of mine from AYD was taking lessons with Ben and spoke very highly of him.  I wanted to learn about Ben's style of teaching and considered starting lessons with him, However, by the time I tried to do so I found out that the only way to get lessons with Ben was to sign up to one of his Patreon Tiers with lessons, and so I carefully looked at all of his tiers.

I cautiously started with a membership to the BenKyo League. The league largely functions on Ben's Discord Server with games played on OGS, the Online Go Server.  I also started to watch Ben's Twitch Stream. 

I was dipping my toes very carefully into the water with Ben before committing to a higher level Patreon Tier. I was cautious only because I tend to keep my teachers once I employ them. I don't like to fire anyone, and I was already paying Clossius for four one hour lessons per month, subscribed to The Internet Go School, and making regular payments for membership in The American Yunguseng Dojang. It wasn't a small thing to consider another regularly occurring go expense for Private Lessons I would get at the higher tiers of Ben's Patreon.

In spite of my caution, it didn't take me long to fall in love with Ben's community and with Ben himself. I mention the community first because I've never seen a go community as active and supportive as the one that Ben offers through the BenKyo League. It is hard to explain how good it is because words just don't do it justice.

I upgraded to a Patreon Tier with one private 90 minute lesson per month very shortly after joining BenKyo League. Within a month after that I upgraded to the next level Tier with two 90 minute private lessons per month, and there I remain. My tier also includes three 30 minute Semi-Private Lessons per month, bi-yearly reports, the benefits of the Study Group which comes with three interactive Group Classes per month and an extensive library of class videos. Of course, it includes the league I initially signed up for. I consider Ben's Discord Server to be my go home.

Ben and I finally met at the 2023 U.S. Go Congress at Kent State in Ohio.  Here we are cropped out of the photo I recently posted of AYD students in my post about In-seong Hwang. Ben is right above me and I am the elderly woman with the gray hair near the bottom left of the picture. The AGA, President Gurujeet Khalsa, is pictured on the far right.

Ben and I were planning to play Pair Go together two days after this picture was taken, but I was holed up in my dorm room suffering from Covid at that time. We never did get the chance to play, but we had a great time hanging out for the first few days of the Congress.

I enjoy Ben's style of teaching. I always feel comfortable telling him anything and asking him anything. He never makes me feel stupid, and he's never made me cry. I can't say for all of my go teachers. He is always patient and takes the time to rephrase things if I am not understanding something. I consider my Private Lessons with Ben as much Go Therapy as Go Learning, and have heard other students say that they feel the same way. Ben is my Go Psychologist. He respects my recent decision to focus on fun and community rather than seeking improvement. He and I are currently working on a trick joseki which I am playing primarily for fun. It might lead to improvement in the process, but that isn't the goal.

Back to the value of the BKL community... Because games are not played on a regular schedule members are often able to watch the games of other and add comments and variations as the games take place. It is not unusual to find a number of players kibitzing active games and providing variations. It is an ideal environment for the weakest players because they can get a lot of attention from the stronger players in the league who are very generous with their time.

You owe it to yourself to at least join Ben's Discord where you can access many free channels. You also owe it to yourself to take a look at the promotional page for the BenKyo League which is a great value for $25.00 a month. We have players from 4d to 15k in the league. You can join at any time. There is no need to wait for the end of a month or a season to join. In fact, the ideal time to join is probably about ten days before the end of a month so you can be properly placed into the BKL Rating System in time for the beginning of the next month. You will be ready to play in the Main League and the Title Tournament at your newly achieved BKL rank for the whole month.

If you decide to join BenKyo League please Tell Ben that buzzsaw sent you. We have a generous referral program which provides me with a free 30 minute Semi-Private Lesson with Ben if I bring in a new member at the league level or above.

BenKyoLeague Patreon Discord Twitch YouTube

Now for my usual Go Activities content:

It was a moderately active week with nearly 17 hours devoted to Go Activity. Live Play came in as the top activity which is something I always like to see.

I played six games and spent about four and a half hours on Live Play.

I will admit to being a bit depressed about my results this week.  The only game I won was an even game against a 15k player.  

I felt a bit better about my week after my lesson with Clossius.  He managed to review all but the AYD games which were previously reviewed by In-seong Hwang.  Clossius reviewed some games from pervious weeks as well for a total of five games during our two hour lesson.

Here is an update on my Go Resolution:

I've increased my Vacation Days at the Internet Go School by one for a total of 19, and I have not used a single vacation day since I started my resolution to remember to do my go problems every day.

When I had my lesson with Ben on Thursday we went over my NAOL game which was played against another OGS 7k who is listed as an NAOL 11k.  We spent the entire hour reviewing that game, and Ben suggested that I take a look at the games I lost last week to see if I can find some of the things that I did in those games that were good.  I am going to try to make time to do that this week.