“American Chess Magazine has been launched in November 2016 to help readers keep in touch with all the most significant happenings in the exciting world of present-day chess, both at home and abroad.”
The month of February contained an increased number of nice puzzles. This is going to be the subject of another blog entry later on. In the same time I also managed to identify a couple that I labeled as wackos. Here they are below. Please give them a try before moving on and reading the solutions:
Have I picked your interest yet? Did you purchase the calendar? I am just curious and have nothing to do with it beside doing my best to solve the puzzles presented. This is an interesting personal experiment of getting my daily dose of chess. Maybe it could help you too. Now you can read below the 2 solutions.
If you got the first one, good for you. I looked at a number of options, hoping the cramped position would lead to an easy answer. That was not the case. The white pieces did not seem to be properly coordinated to reach checkmate. I remember looking at the only wacko/ correct first move, but could not follow up on it. Normally once you find the first move, the next one(s) comes naturally. What I have noticed is that for these puzzles, there are several possible replies that lead to different checkmates. As I have already mentioned in my January blogs, if you want to practice your tactical eye, try all available checkmates after white’s key first move!
This puzzle is at the opposite end when it comes to the space distribution of pieces. The pieces are dropped everywhere, like a careless farmer who dropped his tools and machines all over the yard because he has plenty of space. Now the natural reaction is to figure out a way to use one of the heavy pieces available, right? Not even close. I bet Percy laughs at us through a portal in time. I did not see the first move coming for the same reason as above!
Eugen Demian
Please follow and like us: