The finish of the 6th game of the World Championship match between Ding Liren and Ian Nepomniachtchi was impressive. In a tense and complicated position, Ding surprisingly advanced his d-pawn, and this small pawn advance was crucial to a spectacular mate that could have occurred in the game. The audience was impressed, the study composers were inspired. In his last "Study of the Month" column Siegfried Hornecker had a look at "Ding's Theme" in studies, in his current column he returns to this theme with further insights. | Photo: Ding Liren | Photo: Amruta Mokal
The term "malyutka" - "baby" - is used for endgame studies with up to five pieces. The art of such studies is very old, but some modern composers extensively researched such positions. Obviously, endgame tablebases made composing such endgame studies easier in the late 20th century, and it seems that there can't be much variety with only three pieces apart from the kings. Yet, even with so few pieces, some interesting ideas can be found.| Photos: Pixabay
A special kind of magic trick is to turn one thing into another a.k.a. a switcheroo. In endgame studies, one such transformation is turning a stalemate into a checkmate. Columnist Siegfried Hornecker shows phenomenal examples which made use of this fantastic ‘magic trick’. | Pictured: Ernest Pogosyants
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As seen in Douglas Adams’ masterpiece
A Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy or in Isaac Asimov’s
The Last Question, computers, given enough time, might be able to solve every question. Not always will two words “Fiat Lux” be the outcome of their research, nor the answer to life, the universe and everything, however, arguments are made that computers might technically be able to give the solution to chess problems, yet lack what a human would be able to understand: the knowledge about similar ideas shown before. No twomover ever was really solved by a computer in that way (sadly I forgot who wrote such idea many years ago, I apologize for not being able to attribute it).
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