Rescue the king to a6
li-05BPROpens in the app if installed, otherwise downloads the APK.
The tactical motive
Save the piece: one of your pieces is attacked — find the best way to rescue it.
Difficulty 1397 ShuffleRating — club-player level.
White to move — find the best continuation
How to recognize this tactic
Here the task is defensive: one of your pieces is under attack and must be rescued without losing more. Look for a move that saves it with tempo — a counter-check, an equal counter-attack or an interposition — rather than a passive retreat.
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 a5, rook g7, pawn b7.
Black: king b8, rook e4, bishop f4, knight c4, pawn e5.
3 white and 5 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 72.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 6 points of material (6 against 12; pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9) — the tactic has to convert or outweigh that.
The white king stands on a5, the black king on b8.
It is White to move on move 72, with 4 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle. White are in check right now, so every reply must answer the check.
White keeps 1 pawns, Black 1. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): a, c, d, f, g, h — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for White: e.
The White king has 4 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
72. Ka6 Nd6 73. Rg8+ Kc7 74. b8=Q+
Why it works
- Great move! king to a6 keeps the pressure (+4.4).
- Well found: rook to g8 (+4.3).
- Strong! pawn to b8 is the sharp choice (+4.7).
- You win decisive material (+4.7).
- If instead Nd6, then Rg8+ and you stay on top.
Move by move
- 72. Ka6 — king to a6
- Nd6 — knight to d6
- 73. Rg8+ — rook to g8 with check
- Kc7 — king to c7
- 74. b8=Q+ — pawn to b8 with check
Types in this puzzle
Promotion
The pawn reaches the last rank and becomes a queen — decisively.
Promotion turns a pawn on the last rank into a queen and rewrites the evaluation on the spot. In tactics the passer rarely walks in for free — usually a sacrifice clears its path. Count the tempi: how many moves does the pawn need, and can the defender stop it in time? And watch the promotion square itself — it must be out of enemy reach or won by force in your combination.
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.
Promotion race
Both sides push passers — win the race by a tempo.
A promotion race is a sprint between two passed pawns: both sides push toward the last rank, and victory goes to whoever queens first or queens with check. You will recognize it when both players have far-advanced passers that neither king can catch. Count the tempi literally, move by move, all the way to promotion. The classic mistake is spending a tempo on a "useful" move — in a race, almost any non-pawn move loses.
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Verified by Stockfish at depth 20+.
Solution forcedness confirmed (verified).
Pack 010
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