S2 E20 Puzzles

Welcome back to another episode! 

In today’s episode,  I will be providing you with the locations of the different pieces on the board. It is your job to figure out the solution by pausing the podcast before moving on. Today, we will be looking at 3 puzzles each around a different endgame theme starting from Easy and working our way to Hard. 

Here is your first puzzle - White has a king on e5 and a pawn on c5. Black has a King on d8 with white to move. 

Again, that is White has a king on e5 and a pawn on c5. Black has a King on d8 with white to move.

Please pause and find the solution before moving on. 

Solution coming in 5 seconds. 

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This puzzle looks at the concept of opposition. When the white king steps to d6, it forces black to protect the queening square by stepping to c8. White follows up with King to c6. If they could, they would ‘pass’, but black is forced to give up ground and white will procure the queening square by stepping to either b7 or d7. 

Time to move on to the next puzzle, this one is a little tougher. 

White has a King on c4, a rook on f7, and a rook on h6. Black has a king on e8 and a Queen on a5 with white to move. 

Again, that is a King on c4, a rook on f7, and a rook on h6. Black has a king on e8 and a Queen on a5 with white to move. 

Please pause and find the solution before moving on. 

Solution coming in 5 seconds. 

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This one is quite incredible. Even with so few pieces on the board, white is able to sacrifice their rook since the black queen is trapped. Rook to a7 attacks the queen, a queen that has no square to go to without being captured or allowing quite to access the ladder mate by playing Rook to h8 checkmate. Black gives up the queen and allows white to check the king and force it on the same rank as the queen. Then white will win the Rook versus King ending. 

Onto the last puzzle! This one is a little tricky, we’ll be looking at a couple variations. 

White has a king on h8 and a pawn on c6. Black as a king on a6 and a pawn on h5.

Again, White has a king on h8 and a pawn on c6. Black as a king on a6 and a pawn on h5.

Please pause and find the solution before moving on. 

Solution coming in 5 seconds. 

—- - — 

This puzzle is Richard Reti's Famous Endgame Puzzle originally published in 1921. Black has a passed pawn that ‘can’t’ be captured by the white king while white’s passed pawn is firmly under black’s control. 

White needs to utilize the idea of ‘multi-purpose’ moves in order to simultaneously move toward his pawn and track down black’s pawn. 

We are going to look at the second variation now which contains sub-variations. Return to the starting position and remember the position when we enter a sub-variation. 

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There are two main ideas here, but they both start with King g7 to move closer to both pawns. Black now has the option to either try to stop white’s pawn by moving his king closer which gives white time to move toward black’s pawn allowing both pawns to be captured - ending in a draw. Conversely, black could try to advance his pawn, giving white enough time to move toward his own pawn allowing his queen to promote at the same time as black’s - resulting in a draw. 

That concludes our 3 puzzles for this week. Tune in next episode where we will continue to work on  our visualization with another game of the Masters.  

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