Rescue the pawn to b6 (b5)
li-0SAdInaming tag (square·N)Opens 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 2372 ShuffleRating — expert level — few solve it at first try.
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 g1, rook b4, knight c5, pawn h2 b5 e5.
Black: king g8, rook f4, knight c4, pawn d5 e6 g6 f7.
6 white and 7 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 40.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 1 points of material (11 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 g1, the black king on g8.
It is White to move on move 40, with 18 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 3 pawns, Black 4. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): a, c — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for White: d, f, g.
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
40. b6 Rg4+ 41. Kh1 Nxb6 42. Rxg4
Why it works
- Great move! pawn to b6 keeps the pressure (+4.3).
- Well found: king to h1 (+4.2).
- Strong! rook to g4 is the sharp choice (+4.2).
- You win a piece — the rook.
- If instead Rg4+, then Kh1 and you stay on top.
Move by move
- 40. b6 — pawn to b6
- Rg4+ — rook to g4 with check
- 41. Kh1 — king to h1
- Nxb6 — knight to b6 (capture)
- 42. Rxg4 — rook to g4 (capture)
Types in this puzzle
Quiet move
No check, no capture — yet this modest move decides the game.
A quiet move gives no check and takes nothing — yet it decides the game by creating an unstoppable threat or stealing the king's last square. This is the hardest class of moves: the eye hunts for loud blows while a modest shift does the winning. The clue: every forcing try runs into a defense, so seek the move that strengthens the threat or takes squares away. Train yourself to ask: what if I neither capture nor check, but quietly improve?
Passed pawn
Nothing can stop the passer — escort it to the last rank.
A passed pawn has no enemy pawns in front of it or on the neighboring files: only pieces can stop it. Check who can blockade the pawn or catch it with the king — if nobody can, the pawn is worth a whole piece. Push the passer with your pieces supporting it, and put your rook behind it. The beginner's mistake is shoving the pawn forward unprotected, straight into a capture.
Save the piece
The attacked piece can be saved — with profit.
Saving the piece: one of your pieces is attacked, and the job is not to lose it for nothing. There are several tools: retreat with tempo, defend it, block the attack, or create a bigger counter-threat. Before retreating automatically, look for a retreat that attacks something — you save the piece and gain time in one move. The typical mistake is panicking onto the first available square, where the piece gets trapped again.
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Pack 015
Similar puzzles
In your browser or in the Android app. Nothing to install · Free, no ads