“In order to improve your game, you must study the endgame before everything else, for whereas the endings can be studied and mastered by themselves, the middle game and the opening must be studied in relation to the endgame.” – José Raúl Capablanca
If Black’s rim pawn is blocked on the fourth rank, Black loses when his king is blocked next to his own pawn by cutting off along the c-file! The following position was created in the Bellon – Tatai game ( Rome 1977 ) . White to move wins by driving his opponent into zugzwang! […]
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Black is lost if his king is cut off along the c-file! The following position is the mirror image of the endgame which was played, although with opposite colours, in a famous Rubinstein – Salwe game ( Prag, 1909 ) . Rubinstein, one of the biggest experts in the theory of endgames at the […]
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In the similar positions with the rim pawns, Black has some better drawing chances. But, if the black pawn is fixed on the sixth rank, nothing changes either in the evaluation of the position or in the winning plan. ← Basic EndingsBasic Endings →
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When in Rook and pawn versus Bishop and pawn ending Black has a pawn blocked on the fifth rank, the win is complicated. In order to capture the pawn and convert into a pawn ending, White has to prepare by vertically cutting off the opponent’s king from the pawn so that it could not […]
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When the bishop is deployed in such a way that one of its diagonals intersects both pawns’ routes, we have “absolute blockade”. In absolute blockade pawns cannot make any progress on their own since the sacrifice 1.d6? Bxd6 would be pointless as it does not clear the path to the other pawn. Absolute blockade […]
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Like knight, bishop can also easily immobilize the connected enemy pawns on the fifth rank and even more efficiently. The following example is a case in point. Although the white king is much closer to the pawns and can support the pawns on their path to the promotion square, Black to play draws by […]
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← Basic EndingsBasic Endings →
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Being “short-legged”, the knight has more difficulty fighting isolated pawns. A sole knight can only block pawns not separated by more than three files. ← Basic EndingsBasic Endings →
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One should note that the knight situated on a light square attacks only dark squares and, conversely, from a dark square only light squares. Since after an even number of moves the knight returns to the square of the same colour, the knight in some positions cannot gain a tempo against the enemy king. […]
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An even more complicated case of fighting the breakthrough is shown in a study by N. Grigoriev published in 1930. The white g-pawn has paralyzed both enemy pawns; White would win easily by advancing the distant a- passed pawn if Black did not threaten a breakthrough involving the sacrifice of the f-pawn. Since then […]
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