2002 World Championship in Mahjong

The 2002 World Championship in Mahjong was held at the Hotel Grand Place in Tokyo, Japan, from 23 to 27 October in 2002. The title for this competition was "The Festival for Culture and Sport in Mah Jong".

The competition ran in cooperation between the Ningbo City Mahjong Sport Association and the Japan Mahjong Organizing Committee (JMOC). JMOC was formed with four Japanese organizations including the Japan Mahjong Federation, the All-Japan Mahjong Society, the Japan Health Mahjong Association, and the Mahjong Museum.

Competition

This championship is not certified as the official first worldwide championship in mahjong because it had been held before the World Mahjong Organization was formed in 2006.

Although it was offered to China at first and was going to be held in Ningbo, which is known as the origin of mahjong, the location was moved to Japan because a large event was going to be held there.^[1]

For this reason, the competition was held at the Hotel Grand Palace in Iidabashi, Tokyo. 100 competitors with 25 teams from 8 nations, Bulgaria, China, Japan, Netherlands, Russia, Sweden, Taiwan, and the US, took part in this competition. JMOC held primarily tournaments in Tokyo and Osaka.^[2]

Results

The names are ordered as given name and surname.

Individual

Best individual players

Rank	Name	Nationality	Table points	Mini points
1	Mai Hatsune	Japan	26	898
2	John J. O'Connor	United States	26	759
3	Yūichi Ikeya	Japan	24	892
4	Aki Nikaidō	Japan	23	893
5	Jin Li	China	23	443
6	Tomohiro Yoshida	Japan	22	691
7	Quanze Wu	China	22	622
8	Caofang Huang	China	22	583
9	Masashi Saitō	Japan	21	232
10	Junhao Cui	China	20	970

Team

Best team results

Rank	Name	Nationality	Members	Rank	Table points	Mini points	Total table points	Total mini points
1	Young Pros Team B	Japan	Kazutoshi Iwasawa	11	20	787	80	2253
			Ryōichi Kajita	16	20	446
			Kenji Katsumata	24	18	329
			Tomohiro Yoshida	6	22	691
2	Guangzhou	China	Jin Li	5	23	443	76	1113
			Man Feng	25	18	226
			Gangliang Yu	57	13	-139
			Caofang Huang	8	22	583
3	Japan Health Mahjong Association	Japan	Jun Kashiwabara	34	16	43	73	1165
			Noriko Maruyama	33	16	268
			Masashi Saitō	9	21	232
			Ryō Togamae	14	20	622
4	Tianjin	China	Junhao Cui	10	20	970	69	1432
			Baomin Yang	28	17	492
			Jianguo Li	39	15	-182
			Jing He	31	17	152
5	Young Pros Team A	Japan	Takunori Kajimoto	12	20	655	69	1175
			Nobuhiro Kishimoto	56	13	-60
			Dai Osamura	30	17	195
			Tatsuya Suzuki	22	19	385

Participating countries

100 competitors with 25 teams from 8 countries participated. Although Shinnicni Tokuda did not register for this competition and he was Japanese, he played as Kenneth Tokuda for the US team because a vacancy occurred.^[3]

•  Bulgaria (1)
•  China (35)
•  Japan (41)
•  Netherlands (3)
•  Russia (2)
•  Sweden (2)
•  Chinese Taipei (4)
•  United States (12)