White to move. Is this a win, draw, or loss for White?
3rk3/2p4R/p2pP3/1p2P3/1P6/6K1/8/8 w – – 0 2
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White to move. Is this a win, draw, or loss for White?
3rk3/2p4R/p2pP3/1p2P3/1P6/6K1/8/8 w – – 0 2
1. e7 Rd7 2. e6 Rxe7 3. Rh8#
1. … Rc8 2. Rh8+ Kd7 (Kxe7 3. Rxc8) 3. e6+ Kxe7 4. Rxc8 Kxe6 5. Rxc7 etc.
After 2… Kd7 also 3.Rxc8 is straight forward.
Yes, I missed that, thanks!
I so didn’t explore all the zugzwang possibilities before I noticed Karthik’s tactic. I didn’t write something like
This is a win for White. If it were Black to play a5 would lose to ab c4 a6 c3 Rh8+ Ke7 Rxd8 Kxd8 a7 c2 a8=Q+ Ke7 Qc8
c5/c6 loses to Rh8+ and ed+
R anywhere loses the R
Kf8 loses to e7+
So only Black’s d pawn can move
1.Kg4 d5 2.Kf5 d4 creating an escape square for the BR at d5
3.Kf6 forms a mating net and wins so 1.Kf3 was probably better because White has a spare move in this line.
1.Kg4 ed 2.Rh8+ Ke7 3.Rxd8 Kxd8 4.Kf5 and 1.Kf3 also draws (hate that c pawn).
So there.
Sorry, I didn’t mean to cause anybody any mental anguish with my completely uncorrected lines of play, not entirely sure how I was moving the pawn down the b file in my imagination and writing it as c file moves. I did write out quite a lot more stuff for the drawing lines but I couldn’t see any reason not to delete them at the time.
Yes, the c pawn could move, and c5 was quite threatening, I had quite a lot of determination but maybe a bit too much confidence and I wasn’t thinking precisely enough.
Mirrored position from a very known study
*search into his database*
Aaron Nimzowitsch (!), Deutsche Schachzeitung, 1918, #1639
Note : the study is truncated because of a cook in move 1.
The FEN: 3k3r/4Rp2/3Pp2p/3P4/8/1K6/8/8 w – – 0 1
Solution: 1.Ra7 Re8 and now we have our position.
But 1.dxe6, discovered by the unavoidable Mario G. Garcia in 2012, is also winning, so…
Is Mario’s line really winning, 1.dxe6 fxe6 2.Ra7 Re8 3.Rh7 e5 4.Rxh6 Kd7 5.Kc4 Re6 and the white pawn falls or 2.Rxe6 Kd7 3.Rg6 h5 4.Kc4 h4 5.Kd5 Rh5+ 6.Ke4 h3 7.Rg1 Kxe6