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 5-

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 ...

Early life and education

Ishida was born in

Nayoro, Hokkaido is a city in Kamikawa Subprefecture, Hokkaido, Japan. , the city has an estimated population of 28,373 and a population density of 53 persons per km2 (140 persons per sq. mi.). The total area is . On March 27, 2006, the town of Fūren was mer ...

on December 5, 1988. He learned how to play shogi at school with friends, and entered the

Japan Shogi Association The , or JSA, is the primary organizing body for professional shogi in Japan. The JSA sets the professional calendar, negotiates sponsorship and media promotion deals, helps organize tournaments and title matches, publishes shogi-related materia ...

's apprentice school 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 ...

as a student of shogi professional

Kazuharu Shoshi is a Japanese professional shogi player ranked 7-dan. Shogi Shoshi has written a standard manual on shogi handicap josekis. Promotion history The promotion history for Shoshi is as follows: * 5-kyū: 1978 * 1-dan: 1980 * 4-dan: June 27, 1985 ...

in 2001. Early on, Ishida remained in at home in Nayoro, living with his mother and commuting twice monthly to Tokyo by plane to participate in the apprentice school. He would attend

junior high school A middle school (also known as intermediate school, junior high school, junior secondary school, or lower secondary school) is an educational stage which exists in some countries, providing education between primary school and secondary school ...

during the week, leave school early the day before his schedule games, and fly to Tokyo where he was met by his father. who was stationed in Tokyo as a member of the

Japanese Self Defense Forces The Japan Self-Defense Forces ( ja, 自衛隊, Jieitai; abbreviated JSDF), also informally known as the Japanese Armed Forces, are the unified ''de facto''Since Article 9 of the Japanese Constitution outlaws the formation of armed forces, th ...

. After Ishida finished his games, his father would take him to the airport for the return trip back to Hokkaido. At first, Ishida found the apprentice school quite difficult and actually was demoted from 6-kyū to 7-kyū because of poor results; eventually, however, he started to perform better and obtained promotion to 5-kyū. After graduating from junior high school, he and his mother moved from Hokkaido to Tokyo and he enrolled in a local

senior high school A secondary school describes an institution that provides secondary education and also usually includes the building where this takes place. Some secondary schools provide both '' lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) and ''upper seconda ...

; he continued to perform well as an apprentice professional and was promoted to the rank of 2-dan by the time he was a third-year high school student. After graduating from senior high school, Ishida decided to continue his education at university to not only please his mother, who felt that further education would help his job prospects if he did not become a professional shogi player, but also because he was really interested in

mathematics Mathematics is an area of knowledge that includes the topics of numbers, formulas and related structures, shapes and the spaces in which they are contained, and quantities and their changes. These topics are represented in modern mathematics ...

. He passed the entrance exam for the Department of Mathematics for the Faculty of Science and Engineering of

Chuo University , commonly referred to as or , is a private flagship research university in Tokyo, Japan. Founded in 1885 as Igirisu Hōritsu Gakkō (the English Law School), Chuo is one of the oldest and most prestigious institutions in the country. The univer ...

and began living on his own after his mother moved back to Nayoro. Nishida was promoted to the rank of 3-dan in 2008 while he was a second-year university student, but was still ranked at 3-dan as he entered his final year of university. Being around his fellow fourth-year students who were already going on

job interviews A job interview is an interview consisting of a conversation between a job applicant and a representative of an employer which is conducted to assess whether the applicant should be hired. Interviews are one of the most popularly used devices for ...

and participating in other

job-hunting Job hunting, job seeking, or job searching is the act of looking for employment, due to unemployment, underemployment, discontent with a current position, or a desire for a better position. The immediate goal of job seeking is usually to obtain ...

activities made him wonder if he would ever become a professional shogi player. His mother even said he could come back to Nayoro and look for work if he wanted to after graduation if he still had not obtained professional status, but he decided to continue at the apprentice school, He finally obtained full professional status and the rank of 4-dan in October 2012 after finishing second in the 51st 3-dan League (April 2012September 2012) with a record of 13 wins and 5 losses, thus making him the fourth former student of Chuo University to become a professional shogi player.

Shogi professional

Ishida defeated

Tetsuya Fujimori is a Japanese professional shogi player ranked 5-dan. Early life Fujimori was born in Ōta, Tokyo on May 9, 1987. He learned shogi from his mother Natsuko, who is a retired women's shogi professional, at an early age and eventually was accep ...

2 games to none to win the 4th in 2014 for his only tournament championship.　 In 2016, Ishida advanced to the finals of the 47th tournament, but was defeated by Yasuhiro Masuda 2 games to none.

Promotion history

The promotion history for Ishida is as follows: *6-

: September 2001 *3-dan: October 2008 *4-dan: October 1, 2012 *5-dan: August 15, 2017

Titles and other championships

Ishida has yet to appear in a major title match, but he has won one non-major title championship.

References

External links

*ShogiHub
Professional Player Info · Ishida, Naohiro
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ishida, Naohiro Japanese shogi players Living people Professional shogi players Chuo University alumni Professional shogi players from Hokkaido 1988 births People from Nayoro, Hokkaido