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Today, I played poorly in a game, but still managed to capture a win! I was a bit sleep deprived and played after work, and I’d already lost a couple of games and thought that I was losing this one too – by the middle game, I was definitely in a losing position and entered a rook and pawn endgame in a rather unfavourable position. However, one of the things about rook and pawn endgames is that they can be tricky and innocent looking moves can transform a win to a draw, and a draw to a loss!

One of the slightly frustrating aspects of this game on analysis is that I had seriously considered several moves during the match which turned out to be good according to Stockfish, but had second guessed myself out of the move and chose a bad one instead! I got spooked by my opponent’s aggressive stance, and there is an insight here. Creating new aggressive threats, even if suboptimal, can lead to your opponent making blunders! And I had a lot of blunders in this game – 7 compared to my opponent’s 4.

So how did I win? I think that I simply may have had more experience with rook and pawn endgames than my opponent. There are some general approaches that can be helpful. Firstly, one rook by itself cannot support a passed pawn to promotion, against another rook. At some point, your rook must get off the file and an opponent’s rook will always be able to capture that pawn without being captured back. Thus, it is vital to support the pawn and rook with your king. And from that perspective, being able to isolate the opponent’s king from the pawn can be a very powerful tactic. So the second insight – at the beginner-intermediate level – if you’re better at rook and pawn endgames than your opponent and you get to one, you might be able to overcome substantial disadvantage. At the same time, if the opponent is better, you could lose despite having a big advantage up to that point. It’s something well worth learning more about strategically.

I hope you enjoyed this video, and thanks for watching!

Game on chess.com: https://www.chess.com/game/live/39935403911

[Event "Live Chess"]
[Site "Chess.com"]
[Date "2022.03.01"]
[Round "?"]
[White "vitualis"]
[Black "boavista4959"]
[Result "1-0"]
[ECO "C28"]
[WhiteElo "1301"]
[BlackElo "1177"]
[TimeControl "1800"]
[EndTime "21:40:57 PST"]
[Termination "vitualis won by resignation"]

1. e4 e5 2. Nc3 Nc6 3. Bc4 Nf6 4. d3 Bb4 5. Bd2 d6 6. Nge2 Bd7 7. a3 Ba5 8. O-O a6 9. b4 Bb6 10. Be3 Ba7 11. Bxa7 Rxa7 12. b5 Ne7 13. h3 Qc8 14. Nd5 Nfxd5 15. exd5 Ng6 16. a4 O-O 17. f4 Nh4 18. fxe5 Bxh3 19. e6 Nxg2 20. Rxf7 Rxf7 21. exf7+ Kf8 22. Qf1 Ne3 23. Qf4 Qg4+ 24. Qxg4 Bxg4 25. Nd4 Kxf7 26. Re1 Nf5 27. Nxf5 Bxf5 28. Rf1 Kg6 29. Rf2 h5 30. d4 Bg4 31. Rg2 Kh6 32. Be2 Bxe2 33. Rxe2 axb5 34. Re6+ g6 35. axb5 h4 36. Kh2 Ra3 37. Re7 Rc3 38. b6 cxb6 39. Rxb7 Rxc2+ 40. Kh3 Rb2 41. Kxh4 g5+ 42. Kg4 b5 43. Rb6 b4 44. Rxd6+ Kg7 45. Kxg5 b3 46. Rb6 Rb1 47. Kf5 Kf7 48. Ke5 Ke7 49. d6+ Kd7 50. Rb7+ Kd8 51. d7 b2 52. Kd6 1-0