is a Japanese

professional shogi player A professional shogi player (将棋棋士 ''shōgi kishi'' or プロ棋士 ''puro kishi'' "professional player") is a shogi player who is usually a member of a professional guild of shogi players. There are two categories of professional player ...

ranked 8-

dan Dan or DAN may refer to: People * Dan (name), including a list of people with the name ** Dan (king), several kings of Denmark * Dan people, an ethnic group located in West Africa **Dan language, a Mande language spoken primarily in Côte d'Ivoir ...

. Hatakeyama's

twin Twins are two offspring produced by the same pregnancy.MedicineNet > Definition of TwinLast Editorial Review: 19 June 2000 Twins can be either ''monozygotic'' ('identical'), meaning that they develop from one zygote, which splits and forms two em ...

brother Naruyuki is also a professional shogi player. They are the only twins to become professional in history and both became (4-dan) professionals on the same day.

Early life

Hatakeyama was born in

Kanagawa Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Kantō region of Honshu. Kanagawa Prefecture is the second-most populous prefecture of Japan at 9,221,129 (1 April 2022) and third-densest at . Its geographic area of makes it fifth-smallest. Kana ...

on June 3, 1969. He earned how to play shogi when he was seven years old after watching his eldest brother playing against his father. Although he and his

brother Naruyuki learned the game at the same age, he always seem to following in Naruyuki's footsteps. He entered the Japan Shogi Association's apprentice school in 1984 as apprentice to shogi professional at the rank of 6-

kyū is a Japanese term used in modern martial arts as well as in tea ceremony, flower arranging, Go, shogi, academic tests and other similar activities to designate various grades, levels or degrees of proficiency or experience. In Mandarin Chin ...

, even though Naruyuki had entered a year earlier and was already ranked 3-kyū. Hatakeyama was promoted to 1-dan in 1986 (the same year as Naruyuki), and to full-professional status and the rank of 4-dan in October 1989 along with Naruyuki after both brothers finished the 5th 3-dan League (April 1989September 1989) with records of 12 wins and 6 losses.

Shogi professional

In 2003, Hatakeyama became the first shogi professional to lose an official NHK Cup NHK Cup TV Shogi Tournament game to a female shogi professional when he was defeated by

Hiroe Nakai (born June 24, 1969 in Wakkanai, Hokkaido) is a Japanese women's professional shogi player ranked 6-dan. She is a former women's shogi professional major title holder, having won 19 major titles throughout her career, and has been awarded the li ...

in Round 1 of the 53rd NHK Cup.

Promotion history

Hatakeyama's promotion history is as follows: * 6-

: 1984 * 1-dan: 1986 * 4-dan: October 1, 1989 * 5-dan: December 24, 1993 * 6-dan: April 27, 1999 * 7-dan: April 1, 2006 * 8-dan: September 12, 2019

Awards and honors

In 2014, Hatakeyama received the Japan Shogi Association's "25 Years Service Award" for being an active professional for twenty-five years.

References

External links

*ShogiHub
Professional Player Info · Hatakeyama, Mamoru
1969 births Japanese shogi players Living people Professional shogi players Japanese twins Professional shogi players from Kanagawa Prefecture {{Shogi-stub