Dating all the way back to 2004, the powers that run this game have been running a giant circuit of tournaments, initially called “Shonen Jump Championships”. These tournaments would move from city to city across America, and later other countries, even other continents, gathering hundreds and even thousands of players in one spot to play the game they love.

After 75 events passed, the name was changed to Yu-Gi-Oh! Championship Series, known most commonly as “YCS”, and today I’m happy to confirm that the 125th YCS will be held in Turin, Italy.

Two months later, the SJC circuit came busting out of the gates in full force, with three events in February alone, from Las Vegas, to Columbus, to Orlando all in the span of 3 weeks. After 9nineevents passed, going through Los Angeles, Houston, New Jersey and Charlotte, the final location you could get a Cyber Stein was the SJC in Seattle. This was won by Osman Ortiz. By this point, Not only had Ryan Hayakawa won two SJCs, but he had won them in a row, in Houston, and then New Jersey.

During this period also marks the beginning of the Pharaoh’s Tour in Europe, which emulated the SJCs. These PT1 Prize Cards would end up becoming some of the rarest in the world, with some being even one of a kind.

The Crush Card SJCs would take place in Orlando, St. Louis, Houston, Columbus, Montreal, Anaheim, Philadelphia, Minneapolis, Phoenix, and Detroit, between January and July of 2007.

These were again given out at Upper Deck Day. the events would take place in Indianapolis, Washington, Chicago, Durham, San Mateo, Orlando, and Houston.

Michael Kohanim, who many of you see at YCSes writing coverage, even won once with Gladiator Beasts too! The circuit this time took us through Costa Mesa, Columbus, Minneapolis, Nashville, St. Louis, Philadelphia, Honolulu, Toronto, Indianapolis, Baltimore, Tulsa, Seattle, Charlotte, Chicago, Atlanta, Detroit, San Francisco, and Houston.

Three months later, the SJC Circuit would come back, by going where it started, in Anaheim, California, with a new Prize Card – “Dark End Dragon“- in what is regarded as the most skillful era of the games history. coming fresh off of the fabled ‘TeleDad’ format, players were more focused on skill than ever before, techs and deck ideas were coming out left and right, and Synchros were taking the world by storm. Dark End Dragon would come out in a Shonen Jump(TM) magazine, making the prize card worthless, and that still didn’t stop people from coming out in the thousands, all fighting to be the best. A win here, means you are very, very good at this game.

The SJC Circuit comes to a phenomenal conclusion, with the seventy-fifth SJC taking place in Edison, New Jersey. Jeff Jones may have won with his Quickdraw Dandywarrior Deck, but the diversity of the top cut, and quality of it’s players are unmatched to this day. The world record for tournament attendance at this time (and for a few years after) was 2,227 people, and this event had 2,712 entrants. The world record is not officially broken by this event.

This was fifty events ago, and since then, YCS’s have had more prize cards, more formats, and even a landmark one hundredth YCS in long beach California that had 4,364 people enter it, devastating the previous world record in it’s pre-registrations alone. At every landmark event, there has been a landmark playmat, and that is the case with with Turin.

“With less than a month to go to the event, many Duelists are already making travel plans and building their Decks. This event is sure to be one that will go down in history and we hope to see you there!”

There is plenty more about this YCS that will be revealed over the next little while, such as side events, and other very special news to celebrate this landmark. Be sure to check back often and check the yugioh-card.com/uk/ homepage often for news!

_{Source: http://www.yugioh-card.com/uk/news/news_ycsturin125.html}