Friday’s 5 second tactic!
SPRAGGETT ON CHESS
Lone Pine 1979. The Lone Pine tournament was once the world’s strongest OPEN tournament. Sponsored by a wealthy inventor (Louis Stathom 1907-1983), the annual tournament ran unbroken from 1971 to 1981.
In the photo above (link) we can see Korchnoi (sitting and smoking) in the second row , left. He is playing with Anatoly Lein, who is standing behind Korchnoi, in the background. Do you recognize anyone else in the photo? There is the unmistable Pal Benko close by to Lein. Directly in front –facing the camera, we can see Gert Ligterink (originally I thought it was Kim Commons, but Nigel Short correctly pointed out my oversight! Thx, Nigel!) Bent Larsen is his opponent.
POSITION AFTER 27 MOVES:
gm LEIN
gm KORCHNOI
A very sharp position! Both sides have a passed pawn, but White’s has already reached the 7th rank. There is something magical about pawns on the 7th rank…often the normal chess valuations we associate with the pieces become changed and combinations can spring out at you!
WHITE TO PLAY AND WIN!
SOLUTION:
28.Re1! does the trick! White plans to simply play Re8 and promote his pawn. AFter 28…RxQ 29.PxQ Kg7 (what is he hoping for?) 30.Re8! and the game soon ended.