Mate in 3: rook to h7 (h1)
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The tactical motive
Mate in 3: a forced sequence that ends in checkmate.
Difficulty 1712 ShuffleRating — for advanced tacticians.
White 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 c1, rook d1 h1, bishop f2 c4, knight b1 f5, pawn b2 e4.
Black: king h8, queen c7, rook a8, bishop e7, knight c5 e8, pawn c2 d6 g6 h7.
9 white and 10 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 30.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 3 points of material (24 against 27; pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9) — the tactic has to convert or outweigh that.
The white king stands on c1, the black king on h8.
It is White to move on move 30, with 51 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 2 pawns, Black 4. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): a, f — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for White: c, d, g, h.
White hold the bishop pair, an edge in open lines. The White king has 2 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
30. Rxh7+ Kxh7 31. Rh1+ Bh4 32. Rxh4#
Why it works
- Great move! rook to h7 keeps the pressure (#2).
- Well found: rook to h1 (#1).
- Strong! rook to h4 is the sharp choice (#).
- The line ends in a forced mate in 3.
- If instead Kxh7, then Rh1+ and you stay on top.
Move by move
- 30. Rxh7+ — rook to h7 (capture) with check
- Kxh7 — king to h7 (capture)
- 31. Rh1+ — rook to h1 with check
- Bh4 — bishop to h4
- 32. Rxh4# — rook to h4 (capture) and it is checkmate
Types in this puzzle
Hook mate
Rook, knight and pawn form a hook the king cannot escape.
The hook mate is a three-piece construction: the rook mates, the knight guards the rook, and a pawn guards the knight. The rook strikes the king at close range along a line, the knight stands diagonally nearby stealing the escape squares, and the pawn anchors the chain. The pattern usually appears near the edge after a rook invasion. Build it link by link — first plant the knight under pawn protection, then crash in with the rook.
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 013
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