Chess Training

Salvio, 1634 - White to move and win General Setup: Defender's King is pushed out of the pawn's way and cannot access the Queening square. Attacker's king is in front of his pawn, on the queening square. The basic winning technique here is to "Build a Bridge" - interpose the attacking Rook between the checking Rook and attacker's King. Once that is achieved, the position is lost as the exchange of Rooks results in a won K+P vs. K endgame. The general technique is as follows: 1) Superior side advances pawn to the 7th rank. 2) Superior side uses Rook to push defender's King out of the way. 3) Advance Attacker's Rook to the 4th Rank in preparation for 'Building a Bridge'. 4) Move attacker's King out of the way of his pawn. 5) Advance attacker's King toward defender's checking Rook. 6) Interpose attacker's Rook on the 4th rank to block checks - 'Building a Bridge'. 1.Rd1+ Kc7 "Superior side uses Rook to push defende...

Philidor - 1777, Black to move and draw Philidor's Drawing Method in the R+P vs. R endgame can be summarized as follows, given the defender's King is in front of the pawn on the queening square: 1) Defender prevents his opponent's King from advancing to the 6th Rank. The superior side is forced to push his pawn to use it as a shelter for the King to cross the sixth rank. 2) When the pawn moves to the sixth, defender shifts his Rook to behind the superior side's King to give checks. 3) With pawn on the sixth, Superior side cannot escape checks from Behind - Draw! Let's examine this move by move: 1...Rb6! "Defender prevents his opponent's King from advancing to the 6th Rank." It is clear that White, in order to make progress, will need to advance the pawn to screen the King from the Rook. Exchanging Rooks leads to a drawn endgame. In fact, any Rook move on the b-file draws except the obvious 1...Rb7?? (2. Rxb7 +-), and 1...Rb5? which allows 2. Kg6! and...