Test your chess: Reitstein problem 79

White to play and win

Reitstein's book has 'hints' for each problem. I don't normally give them in this blog, but for reasons explained in the solution, I do here:

White has a beautiful forced win in the offing here. If you can find his first two moves, the rest will not be too difficult.

S Lewis v P Kroon 1965

Solution

The first move is obvious, 1 Rc8+! Kc8[] (1…Ke7 2 Rf7 mate), but then what? In the game, white played the move I kept wanting to make work, 2 Qc6+, which only draws. Eventually I saw 2 Qa6+!- there is a strange geometry in chess, or at least in my chess, where I have a tendency to prefer the near check to the further one: here a6 is slightly, and is optically further than c6.

Then depending on black's response, white checks until the king moves to the seventh rank, when Rf7+ follows.

Here, again, is saw the optically closely check, Qc6+, which mates after Ka5 Ra7+ Kb4 Ra4 mate; to the optically further Qa7+! Kb5 Rb7 mate.

The hint

Had there been no hint, and had it been a game, I think I might not have seen Qa6+, or at least appreciated its difference from Qc6+. What would I have done instead? When I was struggled on Qc6+, and before I saw Qa6+, I came up with 1 Qc4! which is also extremely strong.

Black can't survive: he could play 1…Qc1+ and struggle on, but it is hopeless.

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