Mate in 3: rook to e1
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The tactical motive
Mate in 3: a forced sequence that ends in checkmate.
Difficulty 939 ShuffleRating — for beginners taking their first steps in Chess960 tactics.
Black to move — find the best continuation
How to recognize this tactic
In a mate in three every move must be forcing; the defender should never get a free tempo. Find the check or threat that herds the king, calculate the single defence to each, and confirm the net closes on the third move.
General method: before you move, list the forcing candidates — every check, every capture, every direct threat — and calculate those first. The solution to a tactic is almost always among them.
Position on the board
White: king g1, queen f4, rook d1 d8, pawn b2 h2 a3 f3 g3 c5.
Black: king g7, queen h3, rook e6 e7, pawn a5 g6 b7 c7 h7.
10 white and 9 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 32.
The position in numbers
White are ahead by 1 points of material (25 against 24; pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9) — the tactic has to convert or outweigh that.
The white king stands on g1, the black king on g7.
It is Black to move on move 32, with 29 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 6 pawns, Black 5. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): d, e — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for Black: f.
The Black king has 0 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
32... Re1+ 33. Rxe1 Rxe1+ 34. Kf2 Qf1#
Why it works
- Great move! rook to e1 keeps the pressure (#2).
- Well found: rook to e1 (#1).
- Strong! queen to f1 is the sharp choice (#).
- The line ends in a forced mate in 3.
- If instead Rxe1, then Rxe1+ and you stay on top.
Move by move
- 32… Re1+ — rook to e1 with check
- 33. Rxe1 — rook to e1 (capture)
- Rxe1+ — rook to e1 (capture) with check
- 34. Kf2 — king to f2
- Qf1# — queen to f1 and it is checkmate
Types in this puzzle
Ladder mate
Two heavy pieces climb line by line, cutting off every retreat.
The ladder mate uses two heavy pieces climbing rung by rung: one cuts the king off along a line, the other checks on the next line, driving him toward the edge. It is the classic two-rook technique — check, the king retreats one rank, the other rook checks, until mate on the last rank. The only danger is the king creeping close enough to attack one of your rooks. If it does, simply slide that rook to the far side of the same line.
Only move
Everything else loses — find the only move that holds.
An only move is a position where everything loses except one single continuation. You cannot play "by hand" here: run through fundamentally different defenses — run away, block, trade, counterattack — and discard the ones that fail. The hallmark of these puzzles is that the obvious moves lose quickly while the solution often looks strange. First understand exactly what the threat is — then the one saving move reveals itself.
Mate in 3
A forced checkmate in three moves.
Mate in three is a forced staircase: each of your moves narrows the opponent's choices, and the third one ends the game. Look for the start among checks and sacrifices — quiet first moves are rare in mating problems, but deliciously sneaky. Keep the tree in your head: every defense gets its own branch. Do not stop calculating after move two — see the final mating picture with your own eyes.
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Verified by Stockfish at depth 20+.
Solution forcedness confirmed (verified).
Pack 005
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