drunknknite
He was winning,
but he didn't see it
and I escaped - as usual.

-Levon Aronian

White to Move And Win?!

By drunknknite
My most recent chesscapade was in Tonopah, NV:


7 Northern Nevada players and 7 Southern Nevada players met there to decide the State Championship and the State Team Championship. Everyone played 2 games against someone of similar strength, a pretty standard team match. I faced Virgilio Reyes, the state champion from last year on board 2 of the teams. His rating is 2092. I have seen him play before and I'm sure we have played blitz games in the past but I don't think he remembered me. When I lived in Vegas we went to the same club for a while but I wasn't around for that long.

The first game I thought things were going pretty well and then we got to this position:

where White unleashed a pretty tactic that wins a piece. It's the first time I've been hit by something like this in a while. I felt like resigning but played on for about 80 more moves before we reached a drawn position and then some crazy stuff happened. Tune in later this week for the game and the dramatic ending.
 

6 comments so far.

  1. Anonymous October 3, 2008 at 7:53 AM
    Tune in later this week for the game and the dramatic ending.

    Same drunkn time, same drunkn channel?

    Chess is weird. I really want to see what tool on your Drunkn Utility Belt got you got out of this one.
  2. Chessaholic October 3, 2008 at 12:31 PM
    Cool, sounds like a good game. Just glancing at the position, looks like something like 1.Nxc6 Qxc6 2. Qxd5+ could work?
  3. Anonymous October 3, 2008 at 9:27 PM
    Cool tactical puzzle!

    I was thinking along similar lines to Chessaholic:

    1.Nxc6 Qxc6 2.Qxd5+ wins a piece.

    Or if Black recaptures with the b-pawn then:
    1.Nxc6 bxc6
    2. Rxd5 also leaves White up a piece, because Black cannot afford to recapture again with 2...cxd5 or he will fall prey to this nasty double-fork:
    3. Qxd5+ Kf8 (if ...Kh8 gets Black mated after Qxa8+)
    4. Qxa8+ (forking the king and a7 bishop, and when the
    dust clears White will have netted 2 bishops and a
    pawn from all the exchanges!)

    Or at least that's how it seemed to play out in my head, though I wouldn't be surprised if I overlooked something... ;-)

    Best regards,
    Hank
  4. Anonymous October 5, 2008 at 4:01 PM
    All variations are already given. Indeed a nice tactic for white.
  5. Anonymous October 5, 2008 at 9:25 PM
    nc6 bc6 rd5 qa2 still seems complicated ... maybe then qd1 rb8 rd7 rb3 ra7 rb2 ... but since i'm doing it from a glance & memory there might be an easy refutation. but it does seem hard enough to keep black playing.
  6. Anonymous October 7, 2008 at 9:38 AM
    Nxc6,... all the lines are already here. Good strike.

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