Welcome to this active site. Each week I am going to present to you an endgame position for you to solve or to workout the best continuation. Computer analysis will also be considered. Some of these positions will come from actual historical games. Others will be composed endgame studies, but all the solutions will be relevant to the practical game. The new position will occur each SUNDAY and I will always be pleased to receive POSITIVE feedback about the positions and the analysis and I will try to acknowledge these where relevant.

Czechoslovakian Grandmaster, theoretician and endgame composer. A leading player in the 1920s. 1st at the great international tournament at Gothenburg in 1920. In 1924 at the New York tournament he achieved a great win over Capablanca, the first loss the World Champion had suffered in 8 years. In 1928 he obtained 1st's at Vienna and Giessen, and equal 1st at Brno, and 2nd at Dortmund. His last tournament was in January 1929 in Stockholm, Sweden. He came in 1st ahead of Lundin, Stoltz and Stahlberg. Reti is chiefly remembered for his contribution to the HYPERMODERN MOVEMENT and his book Modern Ideas in Chess (1923). It deals with the development and history of chess strategy up to the time of hypermodern play and has since become a classic. Reti regarded chess as an art and it is not surprising that he composed a number of chess endgame studies which are regarded as immortal works of art.

 

In many practical situations the extra piece is usually not enough to bring home the win unless the weaker  side's King can be driven into a mating net or the enemy Queen can be won by a tactical trick such as a fork or skewer. It is interesting to note how White drives the enemy King towards his Queen so that the weaker side will fall prey to a tactical shot. But on the way he has to avoid the many stalemate traps. The g-pawn could become very dangerous so White can waste no time in the attack.