Mate in 2: rook to a7
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The tactical motive
Mate in 2: the first move creates an unstoppable threat, the second delivers mate.
Difficulty 1176 ShuffleRating — club-player level.
White to move — find the best continuation
How to recognize this tactic
Mate in two usually opens with a forcing move — a check, a capture or an unstoppable threat — that strips the king of squares or defenders, so the follow-up mate becomes unavoidable. Look for the first move that leaves the opponent only losing replies.
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, queen f7, rook g1 d7, pawn f2 h2 d3.
Black: king a8, queen e5, rook d8 f8, pawn b4 a6 e6 g7 h7.
7 white and 9 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 30.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 2 points of material (22 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 d2, the black king on a8.
It is White to move on move 30, with 41 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 3 pawns, Black 5. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): c — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for White: a, b, e, g.
The White king has 3 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
30. Ra7+ Kb8 31. Qb7#
Why it works
- Great move! rook to a7 keeps the pressure (#1).
- Well found: queen to b7 (#).
- The line ends in a forced mate in 2.
- If instead Kb8, then Qb7# and it is mate.
Move by move
- 30. Ra7+ — rook to a7 with check
- Kb8 — king to b8
- 31. Qb7# — queen to b7 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 2
A forced checkmate in two moves.
Mate in two: your move, any reply, then the mating blow. Start with the most forcing first moves — checks and sacrifices that shrink the opponent's options to almost nothing. Against every single reply you must have a mate ready, so check them all without exception. The common failure is analyzing the pretty defense and forgetting the boring one.
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Verified by Stockfish at depth 20+.
Solution forcedness confirmed (verified).
Pack 007
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