{"id":12048,"date":"2026-03-20T09:47:49","date_gmt":"2026-03-20T15:47:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/free-but-costly\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T03:31:22","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T03:31:22","slug":"free-but-costly","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/free-but-costly\/","title":{"rendered":"Free but costly"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

When negotiating, it is usually advantageous to avoid making the first offer. Similarly, in chess, sometimes it is best not to have the move and instead give your opponent an extra move. The phrase for this is called \u201chaving the opposition.\u201d It often occurs in endgame positions.<\/p>\n

In this week\u2019s position, white seeks to promote its pawn and win. Black escapes with a draw by having the opposition. Timing is key. With this hint in mind, please try to find black\u2019s drawing move.<\/p>\n

If the black king moves to c8, white\u2019s king charges onto c6. To resist, the black king moves to d8. White advances its pawn to d7. It is black\u2019s turn to move, and its king must move to e7 (see next diagram).<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/p>

White next escorts its pawn to d8 with the king to c7, and black is lost.<\/p>\n

Instead of king to c8, black\u2019s drawing move is king to d8. If white simply moves its king to d5 behind the pawn, black\u2019s king moves to d7 and the position repeats itself, resulting in a draw after three repetitions.<\/p>\n

To make progress, white\u2019s king again advances to c6 in response to king to d8. Black now moves its king to c8. Now it is white to move, and pawn to d7 is the only option to avoid a draw by repetition. Black\u2019s king moves back to d8.<\/p>\n

This time it is white to move in diagram two. The only move for white that saves the pawn is king to d6. Here, black has no legal moves and is not in check. This is stalemate, and the game is drawn.<\/p>\n

The lesson is that sometimes free moves are costly.<\/p>\n

Reach Eric Morrow at ericmorrowlaw@gmail.com<\/a> or (505) 327-7121.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

move and draw<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10593,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[1091,29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-12048","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-columns","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12048","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12048"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12048\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18575,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12048\/revisions\/18575"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10593"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12048"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12048"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12048"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=12048"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}