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Apr-18-12
 | | WinKing: A tricky little combination where forks rule the day. 45...Nc5+
46.Kc4 <(if 46.Kb2 bxc3+ 47.Qxc3 <(or 47.Kxc3 Ne4+ winning the queen)> Na4+ winning the queen)> 46...Qe4+
47.Qd4 Bf7+
48.Kb5 Qc6+
49.Kxa5 Qb6# |
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| Apr-18-12 | | legi: Hey Phony, found a slightly different solution: 49...Qa4# :-) Saw you made it onto the newsletter. Congratulations! I always enjoy your posts. btw: pretty hard for a Wed-puzzle, but very nice. |
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Apr-18-12
 | | al wazir: <mmousez: That makes me feel smaller than the little children.> Don't. "Even little children can . . ." is an expression Murph Goldberger, one of my professors at Princeton, used to employ. It's roughly equivalent to "It can be shown that . . .," which usually signals that a page and a half of algebra has been omitted. |
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| Apr-18-12 | | TheaN: Wednesday 18 April
<45....?>
Material: White up,  vs 
Candidates: too many
There is so many going on in this position, I couldn't finish it up. Of course, directly Nc5 with the bxc3 threat is destructive, it's logical Kc4 leads to mate. Though you still have to see it in the final position how to mate with Bf7 and Qc6. |
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Apr-18-12
 | | haydn20: <al qazir> LOL. Reminds me of a prof of mine at Berkeley: when he said "clearly..." it was a sure sign I'd be spending two hours on a closely reasoned argument. |
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| Apr-18-12 | | gofer: When is a knight better than any other piece on the board? In positions just like this! <45 ... Nc5+>
46 Kb2 bxc3+ 47 Qxc3 Na4+ or Kxc3 Ne4+ winning the queen So the king must walk into the open and meet everything that black can throw at
him!
<46 Kc4 Qe4>
<47 Qd4 ...>
Black start using white's own pieces to finish the mating net around the king! <47 ... Qe2+>
48 Kd5 Qe6#
48 Rd3 Qxa2#
<47 Qd3 ...>
White could resign at this point, but one of the continuations is really
something quite beautiful and worth showing!
<47 ... Bf2+>
48 Kd4 Ne6+ (49 Kc4 Qxa2 50 Kb5 Be8#) 49 Kd5 Nxf4+ (50 Kd4 Qe5#) 50 Kxd6 Qe6+ 51 Kc5 Qb6# So the white king has to keep on going up the board and leave his queen defenseless! <48 Kb5 Nxd3>
Now white can resign! The mate threats are everywhere, so white must go a further exchange
down to last even a few more moves!
49 Ra1/Rb1/Rg1/Rh1 Nb2+ 50 Kxa5 Qa6+ 51 Kxb4 Qa4#
<49 Rxd3 Qxd3+>
<50 Kxa5 Qxc3>
The only way for white to prolong his stay of execution is to play Bf6 and that's not
going to happen unless your playing <Crafty EGT>... Time to check... |
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Apr-18-12
 | | sevenseaman: < gofer: When is a knight better than any other piece on the board? In positions just like this!> How will one unfailingly know this to be true of a position 'x'? Could you attach some parameters/characteristics to a position that are a pointer to N being deemed the most valued piece OTB. Or we go just by a hunch, a vague feel. That could be misleading for some, a 50-50 sort of gamble. |
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| Apr-18-12 | | gofer: <Sevenseaman: < gofer: When is a knight better than any other piece on the board? In positions just like this!>> The position is not that unusual. If you know this basic knight fork because you have seen it before then when it crops up in a game then you know you will either win with it or your opponent will have to avoid it, which may force an advantage anyway. 
click for larger viewIn this simple case <1... e3+> forces a win. In today's game white
was forced to avoid this and walked into a simple mate (which I missed and instead found a very convoluted one!) |
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| Apr-18-12 | | abuzic: <al wazir: even little children can find the win.> I gave this to my "little" boy to play black, against me: 1...Nc5+ 2.Kc4 Bf7+ <he didn't play ...Qe4+> 3.Kb5 Qf5 4.Qg2+ <just to confuse him...> 4...Ne4+ <that was pretty easy for him> 5.Ka4 Qd7+ 6.Kxa5 Qc7+ 7.Kxb4 Qxc3+ 8.Kb5 Be8#. |
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| Apr-18-12 | | zb2cr: Missed this. Too little time. |
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| Apr-18-12 | | viking78: 45... a4+ Now if 46.Kc4 then Qe4#, so let's try 46.Kc2(only move) Nf2+ 47.Kc1 Nxd1 48.Qxd1 (if Kxd1 Qb1+) bxc3 and now material is even and I am out of ideas.
So try another line: <45...Nc5+ 46.Kb2> (with Kc4 White King is too exposed via Qe4+ Qd4 Bf7+ Kb5 Qc6+ Ka5 Qa4#) after 10 or so minutes trying to attack with Na4+ then Nxb3 couldn't find a way to mate, then I saw <46...bxc3+!!> which wins the White Queen with either Ne4 or Na4 forks next! This must be it, although the time I spent here means either this is more difficult then a Wednesday, or that my level of thinking is slower that what I try to achieve. |
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| Apr-18-12 | | viking78: <abuzic> how old is your kid?, he played nicely! Can anyone tell me which is the age it's indicated that I start teaching some basics to my boy? (he's too little now...just under 2 years, but I want to know it for the future). Thanks. |
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| Apr-18-12 | | gofer: <viking78: Can anyone tell me which is the age it's indicated that I start teaching some basics to my boy? Thanks.> You can choose to start now by putting a board and pieces in his room, posters of Kasparov on the walls, a chess clock to teach him the time, chess t-shirts from this website for him to wear on special occasions and give him a fluffy rook to cuddle at night... But if that's a little too extreme, then in a couple of years you could buy him one of the many children's chess tutorial CDs and let him learn from that or you can wait until his friends at school start playing. Most schools actively promote chess for obvious reasons. My son has been playing for a couple of years (he is 8) but I am keen not to push him, but instead chose to let him decide for himself whether he wants to take it seriously or not. Ironically, at school he is getting the kind of training that I could have only dreamed of, his chess teacher is Aaron Summerscale (GM) who has over a 100 games in this database! In passing, I would be very interested if anyone has any advice how to teach an 8 year old boy, with the concentration span of about 5 minutes, how to analyse middle game positions without getting bored... :-) |
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| Apr-18-12 | | Gone to Pieces: Why didn't white play 34.Bf3+ winning the black queen for his bishop? Am I missing somethng here? |
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Apr-18-12
 | | Memethecat: At 1st 45...a4+ forcing the K to c2 looked like it must be the answer, but I couldn't find a telling continuation. 45...Nc5+ 46Kb2 (46Kc4 Qe4+ 47Qd4 Bf7+ 48Kb5 Qc6+ 49Kxa5 Qa4#) bxc3+ wins Q & game. |
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| Apr-18-12 | | solskytz: A nice gesture they did for you, Frog - showing such a nice win, and over someone 200 rating points higher. If I were in your place, this would make my day :-] |
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| Apr-18-12 | | Oxspawn: <Gofer> <I would be very interested if anyone has any advice how to teach an 8 year old boy, with the concentration span of about 5 minutes, how to analyse middle game positions without getting bored> Or a 62 year old man! My son, now 20 and twice as intelligent I am, plays with friends but won't play against me any more, because I berate him for charging around the board with his queen and losing. I know I should shut up, but the truth is, I want him to win - but I won't play 'badly' enough to let him win. My father stopped playing as soon as I began to beat him. I think fathers and sons playing chess is problematic. <Once> said something about it recently - he did not seem to have a problem with it, though. Probably something to do with good story telling. |
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| Apr-18-12 | | goodevans: 45 Kb3 immediately was a mistake (even I can see that!). It was necessary to exchange pawns first on b4. After that black cannot really sustain the attack as far as I can see and white will be better. |
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Apr-18-12
 | | benjinathan: <viking78> My kids started at 5 and then started playing in tournaments at age 6 (grade 1). <In passing, I would be very interested if anyone has any advice how to teach an 8 year old boy, with the concentration span of about 5 minutes, how to analyse middle game positions without getting bored...> Bribery? If you get the answer correctly I will give you a kroner/drop candy/yu-go-hi card. |
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| Apr-18-12 | | frogbert: solskytz, well i hope the puzzle/position gave/gives the potd crowd some joy too. :o) actually, i would've thought that someone would've tried the (inferior) piece winning line 45... a4+? 46. Kc2 Nxf4+ 47. Kc1 Qxg5 after which black has two pieces for the rook and the position is (still) a mess - but it's "balanced" with draw being the likely outcome. i guess the number of candidate moves is what contributes most to the difficulty of the puzzle. the "double fork" on c3/a4/e4 and how *all* black's pieces (including the king) cooperate to deliver mate add to the esthetics of the solution. |
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| Apr-18-12 | | newshutz: <viking78: Can anyone tell me which is the age it's indicated that I start teaching some basics to my boy? Thanks.> when the child knows the letters a-h and numbers 1-8, so you can talk about squares. start with mini-games
buy step 1 http://www.stappenmethode.nl/ I got my copy from new in chess |
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| Apr-18-12 | | abuzic: <viking78:>
He is 20, but to me he is still my little boy... he is playing chess for the last 3 years only. |
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Apr-18-12
 | | playground player: It was different in our house. I taught my father and mother how to play chess. That way I always had someone to play with. And when you're nine years old, it's nice to be able to beat adults at something. |
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Apr-18-12
 | | James D Flynn: Black has a number of candidates depending on whether he aims for mate or the win of the Q by
45
Nc5+ 46.Kb2 b4xc3+ 47.Kxc3 Ne4+ forking K and Q or 47.Qxc3 Nh4+ forking K and Q, but does Black have a forced mate?
Lets try 45
.Bh4+ 46.Kxh4 Nc5+ 47.Kxh5 Qe8 threatening Qh4# to which there is no answer but
47.Kb5 Qe8+ 48.Kc4 and the White K escapes therefore Black needs to cut off the c4 square 45
..Qe6+ 46.c4 ( not Kc2 Qxh2#) Bh4+ 47.Kxh4 Nc5+ 48.Kh5 Qd7 threat Qh4# therefore 49.Qd5+ Kh7 50.Qxc5+ dxc5 51.Rd8 Qc6 and White has no defense to Qh6# except 52.Rd7+ when Q d7 still leaves the White Q trapped and Qc6 on the next move again will mate or 52.Rh8+ Kxh8 the e7 pawn cannot queen without the Black Q retaking leaving the White K still trapped and threat Qc6 and Qh6# cannot be prevented. |
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Apr-18-12
 | | David2009: G Henriksen vs H Runde, 2005 Black 45? It took me some time to find 45...Nc5+ 46.Kg2 bxc3+ winning the Q with a N fork. 46.Kc4 fails to ...Qe4+ 47.Qd4 Bf7+ 48.Kb5 Qc6+ 49.Kxa5 Qa6+
50.Kxb4 Qa4#. The alternative 45...Qd6+ 46.Kc2 Bg6 allows 47.Qg2+ with counter-chances e.g. 47...Kb6 48...Qg1+. Time to
check:
====
Got it Here's the puzzle position
click for larger view
colours reversed
click for larger view G Henriksen vs H Runde, 2005 45...? colours reversed
with an interactive link to Crafty End Game Trainer to try out the variations: http://www.chessvideos.tv/endgame-t... The robot spots the mate and fights on Q for R down. Fortunately my human opponents are less obstinate. Enjoy beating the robot without silicon help - if you can! |
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sac: 40...b5