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.

 

International Grandmaster. World Championship Candidate. Many times champion of Iceland. 1st equal with Korchnoi at Hastings 1955/56. In the Portoroz interzonal tournament of 1958 he came 5th= with Bobby Fischer, thus qualifying for the Candidates Tournament of 1959. Former FIDE President. In 1982 appointed secretary to the Icelandic Parliament.

This ending played in the final round of the tournament was very tense. Tal had secured his place in the 1959 candidates by beating Panno brilliantly in the previous round. He only wanted a draw to come 1st in the tournament but Olafsson found himself in a good position in this Rook and pawn ending so he wasn't interested in sharing the point. During the adjournament Tal and his second Koblents worked out a plan to create a situation in which Olafsson might make a mistake and thus increase Tal's chances of saving the ending. Their plan worked and so Tal came 1st, but Olafsson was not too disappointed with the result as he only needed a draw to secure his place in the Candidates. We start with the moves played in this difficult ending but from move.5.d7!! we follow the proposed winning line.