When to Avoid a King and Pawn Ending

As a rule, you should never trade down to a king and pawn ending unless you are sure you know how to achieve the result that your are playing for.  If you are playing for a draw, you better be sure that the king and pawn ending is drawn, and you better be sure that it's won if you are playing for a win.  Otherwise, you are better off keeping pieces on the board.

Here is a perfect example from Prospect's match against Barrington.  With rooks on the board, the ending was likely a draw even though White would be down a pawn, but the king and pawn ending with even material was lost for White.

Pos. 1

After 33. Kf4 bxa5 34. Re8+ Kf7 35. Rb8 Rb3, Black is going to find it very difficult to capitalize on his extra pawn.

Pos. 2

The problem for Black is how to get his rook out from in front his b-pawn without losing it once he gets the pawn close to queening as in Pos. 3.
 

Pos. 3

If the White king were on f3, Black could play 1...Rf1+ followed by 2...b1=Q.  If the White king were on f2, Black would have the tricky 1...Rh1! 2.Rxb2 Rh2+! winning the White rook.  However, if the White king stays on g2 or h2, or in front of its pawns on g4 or h4, the Black rook can't move without losing the b-pawn.  That means that the Black king will have to come over to help, which will give the White king a shot at the Black pawns.

Unfortunately, White played 33. Re3?  After 33...Rxe3e+ 34. Kxe3 axb5 35 Kd4 Kf7 36. Kc5 Kf5 37. Kxb5 Kf5, White got his pawn back but his position was dead lost because he could not stop the Black king from getting at his remaining pawns and his king is too far away to get at the Black pawns.

Pos. 4

Even if the Black pawn were a file closer on c5 as in Pos. 5, the position would still be lost for White.

Pos. 5

The problem for White is that it still takes him three moves to get to the Black pawn, which leaves him insufficient time to get back to protect his own pawns. After, 35 Ke4 Kf7 36. Kd5 Kf5 37. Kxc5 Black would just have to be careful to play 37...Ke5 rather than 37...Kf5 (as in Pos. 4) in order to prevent the White king from blocking the Black king's path with 38.Kd4.

Pos. 6

In order to be able to draw this ending, White would need the Black pawn to be both a rank and a file closer on c4 as in Pos. 7.  

Pos. 7

Now the White king has time to capture the Black pawn and to get back to block the Black king from getting to the White pawns.  35 Kd4 Kf7 36. Kxc4 Kf5 37. Ke3.

Pos. 8

Remember:  Rook endings are notoriously drawish.  Don't trade off a well placed rook just to win back a pawn unless you are sure that the resulting king and pawn ending is good for you.

Knights in the Endgame

Knight v. Pawns

A basic idea in an ending with a knight against pawns is that the player with the knight looks for opportunities to force the pawns to move onto squares where they are vulnerable to forks.   Here is an example from a game I played last Saturday in Evanston.  White can draw this position but my opponent only had about a minute left on his clock and those forky things that knights do can be very difficult to visualize when time is running low.

 My opponent played 51.Ka6?? which allowed me to win by driving the e-pawn forward with  51...Nd3! 52. e6 Nc5+ 53. Ka7 Nxe6 and Black had no trouble rounding up the last two pawns.  However, White could still have drawn 51.a4! Ne6 52. b4 Nc7 53. b5+ Kc5 54. Kb7 Ne6 55. Ka6 Nc7+.

Black can do nothing because his king must guard the pawn and his knight has to keep the White king off a6 lest he trade off Black's last pawn by playing a5.

Here's a tricky one from the 1956 Candidates Tournament.  Black has little chance to save his own pawns, but if he can win either the White g-pawn or h-pawn and sacrifice the knight for the other one, his king can blockade the a-pawns.  I stared at it for about an hour recently without coming up with the correct drawing plan for Black, but I don't feel so bad as Efim Geller didn't come up with the right move against Tigran Petrosian either and lost after 51...Nb6 52.a5 Na8.

The correct plan is 51... Nc5+! 52. Kf7 Kb7 53. Kxg7 Ne4 54. Kxh7 Nd2!.

Black is threatening to win one of the pawns with 55...Nf1 and none of White's pawn moves are satisfactory.  If 55.g4 Nf3 56.h3 Ng5+.  If 55.h4 Ne4 56.g4 Nf6+.  If 55.h3 Ne4 56.g4 Ng5+.

Knights v. Bishops

An interesting thing about the three round Evanston tournament is that I got two positions in which I had knight, rook, and five pawns with the Black pieces against White's bishop, rook and five pawns.  The results were exactly opposite, however, which may have something to do with the fact that one of my opponents was rated 2200 and the other was rated 1739.

In the first round, I had the kind of position that a knight loves.  White's bishop is confined by the Black knight and his own pawns.  Nevertheless it took some imagination to convert the advantage.   Here I played 32...h4! 33. Rxe5 h3+ 34.Kg3 (If 34.Kg1 Nf3+ wins the rook) 34...Rxf1 and the first position in the post was eventually reached.

In the third round, I had the kind of position that the knight loathes.  Here the bishop has complete freedom of movement and the Black pawns on light squares are easy targets.  After 36.Rd5 b4 37.Ra5 bxa3 38.bxa3, White can pick off the a-pawn at his leisure.

Chicago Open

I won two games, lost one, and drew four to finish 4-3 in the U2100 section at the Chicago Open over the Memorial Day weekend.  My rating slipped four points to 2007.  Not quite as good as last years 5.5-1.5 finish that pushed my rating up to 2068, but it was nonetheless a pleasant weekend.  Two MSL alumni had strong results in U2300.  Barrington's Zach Kasiurak cracked the master level at 2201 by going 5-2 and Buffalo Grove's Matt Wilber upped his rating to 2183 by going 4.5-2.5.

I was mildly pleased with my performance in the three rook endings that I played, drawing the two when I was a pawn behind and winning the one where I was a pawn ahead.  In fact, I went the entire tournament without badly screwing up an ending which encourages me greatly.  I even managed to generate winning chances in one of the rook ending where I was down a pawn.


After frittering away a strong middle game with some ill conceived tactics, I found myself down a pawn as White in the following position. 

Question:  Should White restore material equality with 38.Rxe5?

Hint: The key to rook endings is keeping the rook active.

Answer:  No.  Superior rook activity is often worth a pawn in these endings.  After 38.Rxe5?!, Black can activate her rook with 38...Rb6 putting it in optimal position to support the advance of her pawn.  White would then be forced to use deactivate his rook by maneuvering it to b2 to blockade the pawn.  On the other hand, after 38.Rb7 Rc5 39.Kg4, White's rook prevents the advance of the b-pawn, keeps an eye on the Black king, and forces the Black rook into the passive task of defending its pawns from the side.

White was eventually able to recover the pawn under more favorable circumstances and could even have gone up by a pawn however Black was able to activate her king and rook to hold the draw.

The Kamikaze Rook

Few things in chess are more frustrating than out playing an opponent for an entire game only to come away with a draw due to falling victim to a stalemate trick.  One of the nastiest such tricks is the "kamikaze rook."  A player whose other pieces have no legal moves can sometimes force a draw by checking his opponent until he is forced either to capture the last rook resulting in stalemate or allow a draw by repetition.  It is an easy trick to overlook, particularly if you have not seen it before.

On his last move, Prospect freshman Marc Graff overlooked 52...Rf1# and played 52...c2?!  Wheaton-Warrenville South's junior Robby Badgley alertly uncorked 53. Rxg5+.  If Black captures the rook, it is stalemate because the White king has no legal moves.

The first thought in such a position is for Black to maneuver the White rook onto a square where Black can capture it with one of the pieces that is confining the White king, thereby avoiding stalemate.  Unfortunately, four out of five of the squares are covered twice so moving one piece won't do the trick.  The only square that is only covered once is d1, the only way for the Black pawn on c2 to capture the White rook is for the Black king to go to c1 forcing White to play Rb1+.  Unfortunately, ...cxb1=Q will still be stalemate.


SOLUTION:  Since there is no way for Black to give the White king any breathing room, the only solution is to free one of the White pawns to move.  This is accomplished by forcing the White rook to deliver check from b5 whereupon Black plays ...axb5 and White's a-pawn has a legal move. 53... Kf5 54. Rg5+ Ke4 55. Re5+ Kd3 56.Rd5+ Kc3 57. Rd3+ Kb4 58. Rb3+ Kc5 59. Rb5+ axb5 60. a6 Rf1#.  Unfortunately, Marc could not find this maneuver and the game wound up as a draw.

A Rook v. Knight Ending in the MSL Tournament

On Saturday, the Mid-Suburban League held its championship tournament.  In the first round, Prospect freshman Kyle Gilligan played Schaumburg's Vince Calabrese on 7th Board.  Early in the season, Kyle struggled to keep accurate notation so it was a pleasure to find that his score sheet accurately recorded all sixty-nine moves for both players.  Not surprisingly in a game that long, a lot of interesting endgame issues arose. 


Pawn Structure:  What is Black's best move in this position?

Material is even but Black would be happy to trade off all the pieces to reach the following king and pawn ending.

Black is effectively a pawn ahead here due to White's tripled c-pawns.  Black will be able to create a passed pawn with his extra pawn on the king side while White won't be able to do so on the queen side. 15...Qxd1+ 16.Kxd1 0-0-0+ would have been very pleasant for Black.

Pieces Before Pawns:  A basic endgame principle is that a player should improve the position of his pieces before he advancing his pawns unless the position involves a pure pawn race to see who queens first. 

Black played 34...c6 here.  It wasn't a bad move, but he should have been looking for a way to exploit the superiority of his rook over the White knight.  34...Re1 intending 35...Ra1 would have shortened White's resistance.

Confining Over Attacking:  You cannot capture an opponent's piece without attacking it, however, attacking a piece that can run away often ends up being a waste of time.  Therefore, covering the squares where your opponent's piece can move is often better than attacking the square on which it sits.  Sometimes restricting a piece's movements is just as effective as capturing it.  In the following position,  Black played 44...Kb7 and the White knight simply skipped away with 45.Nd7.

 Look what happens on 44...Kd6! though.

The White knight is completely confined.  White can play Na6, but the knight cannot escape via b4 due to Black's c-pawn.  White is helpless against 45...Rb1 46.Na6 Rb6 when he loses his knight.

Winning Efficiently:  Having offered several criticisms, it is my pleasure to compliment an excellent move.

With 53...Rxg5!, Black gives up his rook to gain a new queen after 54.Nxg5 a3! when the a-pawn cannot be stopped.  Black would still have been winning after 53...Rh4, but the potential for an unhappy accident involving a knight fork would have been greatly increased.

A Final Question:  Is there any reason for Black to bother capturing the White c-pawn with 68...Kxc4? 

All other things being equal, no.  Black had three minutes on his clock and 68...Kc3 69.Ka1 Qb2# (which Black played) wins the game.  However, what if Black was down to a couple seconds on his clock and he did not see the two-move checkmate?  By grabbing that last pawn, even if Black ran out of time, the game would still be a draw because White would no longer have sufficient material to deliver checkmate.  Of course every player should be able to deliver checkmate with a king and queen (or a king and rook) against a lone king using only the five seconds per move allowed by the delay.  However, if you have any doubts, it doesn't hurt to grab your opponent's last pawn to guarantee yourself at least half the point.

Here's the complete game.

Leone-Moskwa Analysis

29.Rc1 would force 29...c5 after which 30.Rb1 picks up the Black b-pawn.

King, Rook and Rook's Pawn v. King and Rook (Analysis)

Take a crack at the positions before you look at the solutions.

King, Rook and Rook's Pawn vs. King and Rook

Consider the following two positions which were inspired by Robert Moskwa's recent game with the World Under 8 Champion, Awonder Liang. White has just checked the Black king with his rook and Black has the choice of moving away from the White king and pawn with 1...Kd7 or towards them with 1...Kb6. The only difference is that the White rook is on c4 in the first and c3 in the second.  Both positions are theoretical draws if Black makes the correct choice. See if you can figure what the right move is in each case before you look at the analysis in the next post.

Sometimes a Pawn Gets in the Way

It's Black's move.  Which position does he prefer?

Interestingly, Black is much better off with one less pawn.  In the first position, he simply plays 1.Kc4 and 2.Kb5 which forces the knight to give up its protection of the White pawn.  Once White's pawn is gone, the position is drawn.

In the second position, Black is dead lost because his pawn prevents his King from reaching a square from which it can attack both the knight and the pawn.  After 1...Kc6 2.Kh4 Kb6, the White knight moves to safety with 3.Nc5.  Now it will take three moves for the Black king to attack the White pawn, 3...Kc6, 4...Kd5, and 5...Kc4, whereupon the White knight protects the pawn with Na6, when it will take the Black king another three moves to get back to b6.  White can use this time to pick off the Black h-pawn after which it comes over to gang up on the Black b-pawn.

Prospect Falls to Fremd (2): Knowing the Score

The result against Fremd could very easily have gone the other way if the players on 4th Board not agreed to a draw.  At the time, Prospect's Ekrem Genc had good winning chances against Fremd's Chang.  Unfortunately, he was running low on time and he lacked confidence in his ability to play the endgame correctly.

This position is winning for White, but it is going to take some work.  After something like 48.b4 Bd2 49.a6, Black can give up his bishop for the a-pawn and b-pawn with 49...Bxb3 50.Rxb3 Rxa6. White's two extra pawns on the other side of the board should be enough to win, but it's going to take a while.  With his king in front of the pawns and his rook checking from the side and from behind, Black could have held out for awhile.  Nonetheless, given that Prospect needed a win to win the match, Ekrem should have kept playing.  On the other hand, the fault does not lie entirely with the player.

A Coaching Failure.

When a match is down to one or two games, IHSA rules allow the coach to give a Communication Card to a tournament steward to give to a player telling him what the score of the match is and the effect that his result will have on determining the outcome of the match.  Unfortunately, this did not occur to me until Ekrem was low on time and I did not know what the correct procedure was for going about it.  As a result, I had to talk to Mr. Barrett about it and before we could get it figured out, the players had agreed to the draw.

Ideally, a player should always try to apprise himself of how the match stands before he agrees to a draw.  IHSA rules also permit a player to have the steward pass a Communication Card to a coach in order to find out how the match stands.  Moreover, a player can initiate a communication regardless of how many games are still being played in the match.  A player can also get up and look at the match score sheet.  However, a player with less than four minutes on his clock cannot reasonably be criticized if he decides that trying to figure out how the match stands is not a wise use of his remaining time.

Mr Barrett and I should have been prepared to communicate the score if the need arose.

Why Game 60 Sucks 

Game 60 is a convenient time control if you want to hold a match after the school day ends without getting the players home so late that they can't have dinner and do their homework.  G60 is also handy if you want to complete a seven round tournament for the state championship in two days.  However, when it comes to developing endgame technique, G60 sucks.  On those rare occasions where both sides play well enough to reach an endgame where the result is in doubt, it is even rarer for either player to have enough time remaining to do the position justice.  On top of that, players are often so low on time that they quit keeping score in the ending making it very difficult to go over the game and learn from mistakes.

One of the best reasons for joining the United States Chess Federation is to get the opportunity to play in some longer time controls.  The Continental Chess Association runs three area events each year, the Chicago Open, the Chicago Class, and the Midwest Class, that use a time control of forty moves in two hours filed by one hour sudden death (40/2, SD/1).  That means that each side has up to three hours to complete the game which usually leaves enough time to devote some thought to the ending.  The Illinois Open, the Illinois Class, and Tim Just's Winter Open use game in ninety minutes with a thirty second increment (G90 inc 30) which means that thirty seconds get added to each players clock on each move.  In a game that goes sixty moves, each side will have two hours.  This doesn't always leave time for deep thought in the ending but at least the thirty seconds per move allows the player to keep score for later review.  Up in Madison at the University of Wisconsin Chess Club, they occasionally run events with a generous 45/2, 25/1, SD/1.

The downside to the USCF events is that the longer time controls tend to be bigger events with larger entry events.  Nevertheless, the key to improvement in all phases of the game is to play slower games.

The Zwischenzug

Despite Ekrem's professed lack of confidence in his endgame skills, he actually found a couple of moves that demonstrate excellent chess thinking.  "Zwischenzug" is a German word meaning "in between move."  It refers to a quiet move that is played in an otherwise forcing sequence.  They are very easy to overlook when calculating variations.  Ekrem found a very nice one on his 36th move.  

The most obvious move here is 36.Rxb5 when Black will find it very difficult to promote his remaing h-pawn.  Running low on time, no one could blame White for playing this move immediately.  However, Ekrem saw that 36...Rxc2 threatened both White's a-pawn and f-pawn.  He also saw that the Black b-pawn wasn't going anywhere so he played the zwischenzug 36.Re5! driving the bishop away from e1.  After 36...Bd2 37.Rxb5 Rxc2, White could play 38.a4 without worrying about his f-pawn.  This is the kind of thinking that produces good endgame play. 


Basic Endgame Positions


In order to succeed in endings at short time controls, it is necessary to have some of the basic positions down pat such as The Wrong Colored Bishop and Rook Pawn. A lone king can draw against a king, bishop and a-pawn or king, bishop, and h-pawn if the bishop does not control the queening square.

This is the position that White would have had with both rooks and all his pawns gone.  It is a draw because there is no way that Black will ever be able to evict the White king from h1.  The quick reason that Ekrem should have kept playing is that even if he managed to lose all five of his pawns, all White needed to do was trade rooks in order to reach a dead drawn position. 

Endgames: Position Pieces Prior to Pushing Pawns

The most common mistake I see players on the lower boards make in the endgames is pushing pawns  before their pieces are in a position to support the advance.  Sometimes the game does come down to a race between unobstructed pawns, but I think it is much more common that a pawn will need support to advance.  A player should always ask himself whether he needs to improve the position of his pieces before pushing a passed pawn.

This position occurred on 5th Board in the Conant match.  White has an extra passed a-pawn, but all three of Black's pieces are well positioned to oppose its advance.  The only piece supporting the pawn is the White rook, but since it is front of the pawn, it will have to move off the a-file in order for the pawn to reach the queening square at which point the pawn will be completely unprotected.  Since the a-pawn is perfectly secure on its present square, White's first priority should be to get his king and knight involved in the game.  Bringing the knight to c4 via e3 is one obvious plan.

The game eventually reached a king and pawn ending.  The winning technique here is for White to get his king in front of his pawn with 57.Kg5 Kf7 58.Kh6 Kg8 59.Kg6 Kh8 60.g5 Kg8 61.Kh6 Kh8 62.g6 Kg8 63.g7 Kf7 64.Kh7 and the pawn queens.  After 57.g5, which White played, Black should have been able to draw with 57...Kf7 58.Kh5 Kg7 59.g6 as long as he remembered that Straight Back Draws 59...Kg8 60.Kh6 Kh8 61.g7+ Kg8 62.Kg6 stalemate.
 

This endgame occurred on 6th Board against Conant.  It should be a fairly easy win for Black. In an open position with pawns on both sides of the board, the rook is a much stronger piece than the knight. All Black needs to do is to find a square for the rook that maximizes its attacking capabilities.   Any square on the 2nd rank would give the rook many targets. 26...Re1 is a logical way to start.

Unfortunately, Black chose to advance pawns instead. Rooks are much better at attacking than defending. Even after several pawn moves, Black still could have gone on the offensive with 32...Rd2.

In this final position, the Black pawn doesn't need any support, but Black still needs to improve his piece before pushing it.  In the game, Black played 50...b3? and lost after 51.a7 b2 52.a8=Q+ Ke7 53.Qa2.  Black could have won with 50...Kb8! 51.a7+ Ka8 52.c5 b3 53.c6 b2 57.c7 b1=Q+.

Chicago Open

After nearly slipping out of the expert class last November, my rating now stands at 2069 after I picked up 36 points while tying for 4th-5th in the U2100 section of the Chicago Open with 5.5-1.5.

My tournament began inauspiciously with a first round draw when I responded to 1...e4 with 1...e5 for only the second time in a USCF event and the first time in thirteen years.   After watching Bobby Fischer win the World Championship in 1972, I took up the Sicilian Defense and I have stuck with it ever since.  However, having looked at so many Open Games (1.e4 e5) while working with high school players over the last few years, I decided it was time to try it for myself.   In the second round, I over played an attack and wound up with a dead lost position, but my opponent similarly misplayed his attack allowing me to win.

My wake up call came in the third round. I played the opening terribly, but I fought back to reach a rook and pawn ending where I had decent drawing chances. Unfortunately, I didn't have a clue about the right way to play it and my opponent marched his pawns to victory.  After that, I settled down and worked on finding solid moves and I managed to win my last four games.

Here are a couple instructive positions from my games.

In the Endings, Takebacks Are Sometimes Allowed

In the opening and middle game, it is very rare that a player gets to take back a move that didn't achieve the desired result.  However, in the ending it sometimes happens.  I took advantage of that to find the correct plan in the following position.

Black to move would like to trade off the knights to reach an easily won king and pawn ending without letting the White king penetrate on the queen side.  What is the quickest route?

I looked at the position for awhile trying to figure out whether checking the White king accomplished anything useful before it occurred to me that I could always return to my knight to c6 as the White king cannot stray from c4 or d4 without losing the knight.  So I figured I would give a couple checks with my knight and see whether things looked any different.  As soon as I played 39...Ne5+, I saw that that checks got me exactly what I wanted.  After 40. Kd4 Nf3+ 41.Kc4 Nd2+ 42.Kd4 Nb3+ 43.Kc4 b4+!, my opponent resigned.  The White king can no longer protect the knight and the king and pawn ending is lost for White after 44.Kxb3 Kxd5.

If You See a Good Move, Look for a Better One

Here's a position where my opponent said he would have resigned immediately if I had found the right move.  Unfortunately, I simply played the move that I had decided upon before I played 16.Qxb7.

What move would have caused Black to resign? 17.Bc7! deflects the Black queen from protecting the bishop on b4.  Unfortunately, I played 17.Bd6? and after 17...Bxd6 18.Rxd6 Rab8 19.Qxc6 Rb6, my queen is trapped. However, 20.Rxe6 Rxc6 21.Rxc6 gave me adequate compensation and I still wound up winning.

Don't Trade Your Rooks

I become frustrated with players frequently, but I only get angry in rare circumstances. One of those circumstances is when a player voluntarily trades his last piece to reach a lost king and pawn ending. Consider the following position that arose in the MSL Tournament:

Fig. 1

White is dead lost here. There are pawns on both sides of the board and Black has a healthy extra pawn. Since he can obtain a passed pawn any time he wants by ...a6 and ...b5, White has to keep his king on that side of the board to defend. That leaves the Black king free to run over to the other side of the Board and pick off White's g-pawn and h-pawn. If Black's extra pawn was doubled or backward, White might have a chance, but Black's extra pawn is healthy so the position is hopeless for White. If all the pawns were on one side of the board, White might be able to trade down to a drawn king and pawn verses king ending, but with pawns on both sides, that's not going to happen.

With a couple of rooks on the board, White chances are much improved.

Fig. 2

Black should be able to win this ending with his extra pawn and better pawn structure, but it is not a lock. At some point, Black will want to attack the White pawns with his rook, but if he is not careful, he will find his own pawns falling as well. Such endings are often drawn as a result of all the pawns getting traded off. Unfortunately, White played 1.d4 cxd4 2.Rxd4 Rxd4 3.Kxd4 and reached the dead lost position in Figure 1.

Here is another dead drawn position from the MSL Tournament:

Fig. 3

Black has more space and a more mobile king, but the White rook can prevent his king from ever getting close enough to the White pawns. All White has to do is put his rook on the 8th rank and keep the Black king cutoff.

About the best that Black can hope for is to reach a position like the following:

Fig. 4

Unfortunately, Black still can't take the f-pawn because he will lose his rook. 1...Rxf3 2.Ra2+ Ke3 3.Ra3+ Ke2 4.Rxf3.

So the position in Figure 3 should be drawn and the players in fact agreed to a draw after a couple more moves. Those moves were 1. Re1 Kd5 2. Rf1 Kd4 3. Rf2 Rd1+ 4.Rf1 Rxf1+ 5. Kxf1 Ke3 6. Kg2 1/2-1/2. Although the players agreed to a draw and the material is even, White is now dead lost.

Fig. 5

All Black needs to do is play 6...Ke2 and the White king must give way 7.Kh2 Kxf3. 8.Kg1 Kg3 9.Kh1 Kxh3 and all the White pawns fall.

It is never a good idea to trade off your last piece if the resulting king and pawn ending is a loser. You almost always have better chances of making a comeback with pieces on the board, even if those chances are only marginally better. With rooks, however, the chances are often dramatically better with Rooks. If you add a pair of knights to the position in Fig. 5, White's hopes would improve, but Black still would have excellent winning chances. However, if you add a pair of rooks, Black's hopes evaporate and the position is dead drawn.

Here's the lesson to remember: If your only reasonable hope is a draw, unless you can clearly see how you will get it in the king and pawn ending, keep the rooks on the board.

Wrong Colored Bishop and Rook Pawn

The Rule of the Square is absolutely essential endgame knowledge, but there are many other handy tricks that are worth knowing as well. One of them is the problem of the wrong colored bishop and rook pawn.


This position is a dead draw because White cannot force the Black king out of the corner. In endings with a bishop and an a-pawn or h-pawn, if the bishop moves on the same color as the queening square, the game is an easy win. If the queen moves on the opposite color, it is a draw (assuming that the defending king can reach the corner).

This can be an important drawing resource. A player who is down by a piece and a pawn may be able to draw if he can arrange the right exchanges. A player who is down by two pawns may sometimes achieve a draw by sacrificing his last piece for a pawn.

This was the position that Mike Momsen had against Fremd's Meyyappan Ramu on 5th Board. If Black grabs the pawn with 46...Qxb4, his drawing chances increase significantly because White has the wrong colored bishop for the h-pawn. If Black can manage to trade any one of his four remaining pawn for the White g-pawn, a queen trade would lead to a dead draw. Instead, Black played 46...Qe5+ and continued to put up stiff resistance leading White to eventually make a generous draw offer which Black happily accepted.

Defending an Inferior Position

One thing that pleased me greatly was the way that Mike Monsen on 5th Board and Nick Martin on 4th Board hung tough while down material. Too often, players who fall behind look for cheap traps to turn the game around quickly. When the trap doesn't work, their position falls apart quickly. Mike and Nick did it the right way. They maintained solid pawn structures and avoided giving their opponents any easy targets.

Defending an inferior position can be dreary work, but the goal is a simple one, stop your opponent from making progress on his next move. If you can do this for several moves, your opponent may start to wonder whether his advantage is as big as he thought it was or he may start to feel like his advantage is slipping away. He may start playing for a draw instead of a win or he may take unnecessary risks and blunder. For Mike it was the former. For Nick it was the latter.

The Rule of the Square

Prospect moved to 6-2 yesterday without a hard fought win over Fremd which was much closer than the 57-11 score indicated. After an hour an a half of play, each team had one win, Prospect was in trouble on two boards, and the other four boards were tense games that could have gone either way.

A vital question in any king and pawn ending is whether a king can catch a pawn before it queens. Of course it is possible to simply calculate out the moves, but the quickest way to figure it out is to apply the Rule of the Square. Take the distance from the pawn to the end of the board and draw an imaginary square extending towards the defending king. If the king can move into the square on his move, he can catch the pawn. If he cannot move into the square, he cannot catch it.

On 3rd Board, Fremd's Mihir Awati reached this position as Black with seven seconds left on his clock against Caleb Royce. The Rule of the Square would have told him that his king would have reached the White pawn before it queened, but he was unable to calculate out the moves quickly enough and he lost on time. It was a very tough loss as Mihir had played very well in time pressure for many moves to reach this position. On the other hand Caleb had also missed a chance to win using the Rule of the Square a couple moves earlier with twelve minutes left on his clock.

I'm Still an Expert...Barely

Last weekend I played in a three-day, nine-round event at the North Shore Chess Center. After the first two days, I had 1 win, 2 losses, and 3 draws and I was confident that when the tournament was over my rating would dip below 2000 for the first time since 2006. It's only a number, but it is fun to be able to say that I am an "expert" chess player. As fate would have it, having resigned myself to being a Class A player again, I won all three games on the last day of the event to finish with 4 wins, 2 losses, and 3 draws and a rating of 2006.

I really have to work on my endgames. Twice I offered draws in positions where I held a material advantage because I was unable to figure out a plan to win. In the first round, I reached the following position against Aakaash Meduri, a junior at Hinsdale Central with a rating of 2010.


I was fairly low on time at this point and I could not figure out how to convert my material advantage into a win. I cannot win the b-pawn and if I bring my rook over to capture the g-pawn, Black can simply play ...Bxh3. I thought there should be some way to make progress, but I could not figure out how. It appears to me now that my goal is to try to reach a position where after I play Rxg5, I can follow up Black's ...Bxh3 with Rg7 so that rook attacks the b-pawn and prevents Black from protecting it with Bg2. How I go about accomplishing this isn't entirely clear to me. In the game, I played 55.h4 gxh4 56.Kxh4 and offered a draw.

I also accepted a draw in the following position against Paul Seet.


At the board, I couldn't decide whether Black's passed pawns offset his material deficit and exposed king so I accepted the draw when Paul offered it. I'm still not sure about the position.

If I am going to remain an Expert, I am going to have to improve my endgame technique.