Black to move. Is this a win, draw, or loss for Black?
Note: This is a very difficult endgame. It involves a very important R&P endgame pattern.
8/8/1R6/7k/1p6/1P3K2/r7/8 b – – 0 58
Source: Dvoretsky endgame manual
Chess Daily News from Susan Polgar
R & P special endgame
Just a quick guess as I only had 2 minutes. Rh2 so as to meet Rxb4 with Rh3+ forcing the king back to the second rank or Rh2 Kg3 Re2 in both cases cutting whites king off from suporting the pawn as far as is possible.
Thanks to growing up playing over Capablanca, Rubensteing, Lasker and Alekhine endgames this is piece of cake! Rb2 loses Rh2 draws. For example:
1. …….. Rh2
2. Rxb4 Rh3+
And here white can’t get to fourth rank due to Rh4+ and Rook is lost and pawn will be lost too and after
3. Kg2 king is stuck behind wall of Rook and can’t help pawn to queen.
3…… Rc3
4. Kf2 Rh3
5. Ke2 Rg3
6. Kd2 Kg5 King has to stay near box to keep white’s rook and king from overpowering the black’s rook.
7. Kc2 Kf5
8. Rc4 Ke5
9. Kb2 note Rc3 is a drawn pawn endgame just do the math and you’ll see it is true!
9…………..Kd5
10. Ka3 this is what I would try as white to see if Black has knowledge to draw or not!
10………… Rh3
11. Kb4 Rh8 Now that White has achieved getting King near pawn the Rook takes the most annoying stance. Note, this is true only in one pawn rook endgames eith b or g files. Keres and Smyslov also wrote excellent books on these endgames.
In this position you can see how White cannot escape either annoying Rook checks or King harrasing Rook so draw is result!