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Tag Archives: chess puzzle

Puzzle Worthy Position 5

White to play and checkmate in 5 moves.   

A crafty stalemate

From page 57 of Hendricks Move First, Think Later, Chapter 6 Pattern-like Knowledge. The following position is a good example of how we look for patterns in chess and fail to see solutions that do not fit into those. See if you can find the draw for white here, I know I certainly couldn’t…. Read the fullContinueContinue reading “A crafty stalemate”

It’s Your Move: daily chess puzzle # 153

Finding that nothing ‘clicked’ after 1 Nf6+, my first thoughts were to exploit Black’s near zugzwang, improve the rooks, and then ‘do something’. But I couldn’t see what to do here either, until, back to ever reliable Examine All Biffs, I saw 1 Na5! and its point…. Read the full article via http://ift.tt/1NIg672

Pawn Sacrifice: Bobby Fischer Chess Puzzle 2

In today’s puzzle, we try to find an improvement over Fischer’s Qd6+. The unplayed improvement is actually a forced mate in 3 that Bobby Fischer missed over the board. I imagine that the then 15-year-old Fischer was so caught up in the excitement of slaying the dragon that he failed to search for a betterContinueContinue reading “Pawn Sacrifice: Bobby Fischer Chess Puzzle 2”

Emory Tate’s Magnificent Mate in 4

Below is the conclusion to a chess game from International Master Emory Tate’s simultaneous exhibition at the Fremont Summer Chess Camp played on 7/21/2015. For the previous moves, please refer to “Mate in 4 Challenge from Emory Tate’s Simultaneous Exhibition at MSJE.”                

A Question for Chess Composers?

My question to fellow chess composers is, “What is the preferred method of determining whether a chess composition is unique or if the composer has unintentionally duplicated someone else’s creation?” As an example, I am including a position I recently composed to test my students at the Fremont Summer Chess Camp. As far as IContinueContinue reading “A Question for Chess Composers?”

My Answer to, “What is one of the hardest mate in 2 puzzles?”

Originally answered on Quora here: http://qr.ae/DyvkB One of my favorite composers of chess problems is the late Gyorgy Bakcsi. Gyorgy astounds me with how he was able to take a simple premise, such as a forced mate in two, and turn it into a source of such beautiful complexity. Below is one of my favoriteContinueContinue reading “My Answer to, “What is one of the hardest mate in 2 puzzles?””