White to move. Is this a win, draw, or loss for White? How should White proceed?
8/1p5n/p7/P3K1P1/7k/8/6P1/8 w – – 0 1
Chess Daily News from Susan Polgar
Special endgame improvement
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White plays g6 and I don’t see how Black can prevent white from queening that pawn… White wins…
1. g6
suuuuper easy.Is this a joke?
Hummm not solutions ?? Why no one show the resolutios ?
It looks to me like 1. g6 wins.
G7?
-HH
1. g6 Ng5 2. Kd5! Kh5 3. g7 Nh7 4. Ke5! and the white pawn will promote.
1-g6 Nf8
2-g7 Nd7+
3-Kf5 +-
or
1-g6 Ng5
2-Kd5! +-
white win any case.
This seems straightforward to me, but white must be avoid certain temptations:
1. g6 Ng5 (Nf8 is below)
And, here, I think white just need avoid the temptation of pushing to g7 and then trying to support the pawn’s queening by bringing the king to f8 as this might take a tad too long to work:
2. g7 Nf7 (what else?)
3. Ke6 Nh6
4. Ke7 Nf5+
5. Kf7 Ng7
6. Kg7 Kg3! (must pick up g2)
And, by counting, I can already tell exactly how this is going to end- drawn, with the white king stuck on the a-file in front of his pawn, and finally, with the black king controlling a8 with impunity:
7. Kf7 Kg2
8. Ke7 Kf3
9. Kd7 Ke4
10.Kc7 Kd5
11.Kb7 Kd6
12.Ka6 Kc6 (Kc7 draws, too)
13.Ka7 Kc7
14.a6 Kc8
15.Kb6 Kb8
16.a7 Ka8 and white either loses the pawn or stalemates black with 17.Ka6.
Also, if we return back to white’s third move and play 3.Kf5 (in order to attack the knight when it plays to h6), I think this is still drawn:
3. Kf5 Nh6
4. Kg6 Ng8
5. Kf7
Here, 5.Kh7 seems no better. Continuing:
5. …..Nh6
6. Kf8 Kg3
7. g8(Q)Ng8
8. Kg8 Kg2
And, now, I can already tell that I was wrong above- it isn’t drawn- black will win this:
9. Kf7 Kf3
10.Ke7 Ke4
11.Kd7 Kd5
12.Kc7 Kc5
13.Kb7 Kb5
14.Kc7
Only hope is to make to the corner, but it is hopeless:
14. ….Ka5
15.Kc6 Kb4 and black’s a-pawn cannot be stopped. No, at move 3, white needs to prepare to make use of his backwards g-pawn. From the top:
1. g6 Ng5
2. g7 Nf7
3. Kf4! Nh6
4. g4!
And, now, black’s options are very, very limited. He must either play Ng8 or Kh3:
4. …..Ng8
5. Kf5 Ne7 (Kh3 and Kg3 below)
6. Ke6! Ng8 (what else?)
7. Kf7 Nh6
8. Kg6 Ng8
9. g5 taking control of h6 with the threat of Kf7 which cannot be met by any move for black. At move 5 above, black ends up in the same pickle barrel with
5. …..Kg3 (or Kh3)
6. g5 Kh4 (Ne7 7.Ke6 Ng8 8.Kf7)
7. Kg6 and there is no answer to the coming Kf7.
The lesson here is to never just give up on a pawn, even if it looks useless, at least think about how you might use it.
Obviously it cannot be a loss according to me, still looking for a solution.
what am I missing? This one is too easy.
The tricky knight offers Black a slim hope that White will fumble this one away.
1. g6 Ng5 2. Kf5 (not 2. g7 Nf7+ 3. Kf6 Nh6 4. Kg6 Ng8 and the knight cannot be dislodged from control of g8) Kh5 3. g7 (3. g4+ Kh6 4. g7 Kh7 5. g8(Q)+ Kxg8 6. Kxg5 Kg7 and Black’s opposition does no good with White’s king able walk over to the queenside) Nf7 4. g4+ Kh4 5. g5 (guarding against the fork from h6) and the pawn queens.
Without analyzing too deep, seems to me that
1. g6 Ng5 2. Kf5
wins, the trap being
2. g7 Nf7+ 3. K~ Nh6 and black stops the pawn
One last thing, even though I think I showed that the line
1. g6 Ng5
2. g7 wins for white as long as he plays to bring the backward g-pawn into play, I decided to look at the plan of immediately going for the queen side with 2.Kd5, and discovered pretty cool by total accident. I now think this wins more quickly than my original post- from the top:
1. g6 Ng5 (Nf8 loses quickly)
2. Kd5!
And the knight has no squares at all! I missed this completely the first time through. This leaves only king moves- trying Kh5 loses immediately to g7 as the knight still has no access to e6 and no check on the white king:
2. …..Kh5 (or Kg4)
3. g7 Nh7 (what else?)
4. Ke5!
Of course, g8(Q) leads to a knight fork on the king and new queen, but with Ke5, the g-pawn can’t be stopped.
A much more elegant solution than my original.
1 g6 wins because Black has no way to stop the pawn.
1… Kg5
Black’s best chance. 1… Nf8, 2 g7 Ng6+ (2… Ne7+, 3 Kf5) 3 Kf6, denying Black the e7 square.
2 Kf5
Stopping Black’s Nf6.
2 … Ka4
3 g7 Nf2
4 g4+! Ka5
Moving to a3 blocks the Knight from forking after g8=Q
5 g5
Covering h6 and winning.
1 g6 Ng5
Just push the pawn with g6. The knight has nowhere to go but g5
2 Kf5
This is the tricky move. Not 2 g7? Nf7+ followed by Nh6 and Nh8, blocking the queening square, and black can trade knight for pawn, pick off the g2 pawn with the king and then race the king over to gobble the a-pawn.
2 …Kh5 (forced, to protect the N)
3 g3
Not 3 g7 or again Nf7 with a nasty royal fork on h6 if the g-pawn queens. And I like g3 better than g4+ because of the zugzwang potential: if black runs out of moves, then black either has to move the knight to a bad square or push the b-pawn and lose instantly when the a-pawn captures it.
3 …Kh6
4 g4 and now black has to move the knight away to an awkward square, like f3 or h3, and white plays Kf7 and the knight can’t make it back to stop g7 and g8/Q.
Kf5
Move the upper right pawn up one space, so that it is attacking the rook.
1.g6! Ng5
2.Kf5! Zugzwang
2…. Kh5
3.g3! Zugzwang
3…Kh6
4.g7! and the blow is delivered at the moment where the king occupies the h6-square
4….Kxg7
5.Kxg5 and White has a qualitative pawn majority as well as an outside passed pawn and wins the endgame since all the tricks based on b7-b5 fail
1.g3+ kxg5 2.Kd6 and white could promote his a or b pawns