White to Play
Published in Chess Puzzles
Solution:
The composer’s task was to create a problem where one of the variations would include White underpromoting to a knight four times in order to win! Considering the dire threat of mate that White faces, every move had better be a check. Black doesn’t have to play into the four knights variation, but he gets mated all the same. The four knights variation is in bold and the other variations are there to show that, although the queens take over, the knights still play a role. 1.e8=N+ Kd7 [1...Kc6 2.a8=Q+ Kb5 3.f8=Q g2+ 4.Qxg2 hxg2+ 5.Kxg2 e4 6.g8=Q f1=Q+ 7.Qxf1+ Kc5 8.Qgf8+ Kb6 9.Qb4+ Ka7 10.Qa1#; 1...Kd5 2.a8=Q+] 2.f8=N+ Ke7 3.g8=N+ Kxf8 [3...Kxe8 4.a8Q#; 3...Kd8 4.a8=Q#] 4.g7+ Kf7 [4...Kxe8 5.a8Q+ Kd7 6.Nf6+ Kc7 7.Qa7+ Kc6 8.Qa6+ Kc5 9.Ne4+ Kd5 10.Nxg3 Kc5 11.h8=Q f1=Q+ 12.Nxf1 Kd4 13.Qd8+ Kc3 14.Qa3+ Kc4 15.Qdd3#] 5.h8=N+ Kxg8 6.Nf6+ Kxg7 7.Nh5+ Kxh8 8.a8=Q+ Kh7 9.Nxg3 and White mates as in the variations given above. Quite ingenious! Anybody for five knight promotions?
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