Mate in 3: rook to a1
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The tactical motive
Mate in 3: a forced sequence that ends in checkmate.
Difficulty 1339 ShuffleRating — club-player level.
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 d2, rook b1 c3, bishop c7, pawn g2 h2 f3 d4.
Black: king a4, rook a8, bishop c4, knight g5 d7, pawn b4 d5 c6 a7 f7 h7.
8 white and 11 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 32.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 3 points of material (17 against 20; pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9) — the tactic has to convert or outweigh that.
The white king stands on d2, the black king on a4.
It is White to move on move 32, with 35 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 4 pawns, Black 6. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): e — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for White: a, b, c.
The White king has 5 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
32. Ra1+ Ba2 33. Rxa2+ Kb5 34. Ra5#
Why it works
- Great move! rook to a1 keeps the pressure (#2).
- Well found: rook to a2 (#1).
- Strong! rook to a5 is the sharp choice (#).
- The line ends in a forced mate in 3.
- If instead Ba2, then Rxa2+ and you win the bishop.
Move by move
- 32. Ra1+ — rook to a1 with check
- Ba2 — bishop to a2
- 33. Rxa2+ — rook to a2 (capture) with check
- Kb5 — king to b5
- 34. Ra5# — rook to a5 and it is checkmate
Types in this puzzle
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.
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.
Win the pinned piece
The pinned piece cannot run — attack it again and win it.
A pinned piece cannot flee, which means you can win it outright by attacking it one more time. Count attackers against defenders: if you outnumber them, the piece is yours. The best extra attacker is a pawn, since it costs less than anything it might capture. Do not rush the capture — build up the pressure first, then harvest.
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Verified by Stockfish at depth 20+.
Solution forcedness confirmed (verified).
Pack 010
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