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.

 

World Champion 1921-1927. Cuban Grandmaster and chess writer. In the Moscow tournament of 1936 Capablanca regained his great strength. He remained undefeated in this great event and came 1st ahead of a field which included such world class players as Botvinnik, Lasker, Levenfish and Flohr. Again we see his great gifts to the fore: his strength , energy, ease and accuracy in the endgame.

It is worth playing through the complete game to see how Capablanca carefully nursed his small positional gains to achieve this winning position in the ending. He has gradually weakened his opponent on both flanks and is now ready for the pawn advance in the centre. Notice how the active Black Rook cuts off the enemy King from the critical squares and takes care of White's counter-attack. We follow the moves as played in the game:

Capablanca made a special study of Rook and pawn endings and when he had a slight positional advantage he was devastating. Many of his endings have become classical and will repay careful study. They are an important part of the beautiful inheritance of chess.