{"id":13598,"date":"2026-02-09T14:20:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-09T21:20:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/to-err-is-human\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T03:38:45","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T03:38:45","slug":"to-err-is-human","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/to-err-is-human\/","title":{"rendered":"To err is human"},"content":{"rendered":"

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

The prestigious Tata Steel Chess tournament in the Netherlands is a multiweek event that concluded on Feb. 1. Nordirbek Abdusattorov won the event, and fellow Uzbek Javokhir Sindarov placed second.<\/p>\n

This week\u2019s position is from Abdusattorov\u2019s game against reigning World Chess Champion D. Gukesh in the sixth round. Abdusattorov is white; Gukesh is black. Gukesh has just moved his rook from g6 to g5, threatening white\u2019s queen. This is a terrible blunder by the world champion. Like a normal person with feet of clay, Gukesh overlooked a simple tactic. With this in mind, what move by Abdusattorov caused Gukesh to resign?<\/p>\n

Gukesh anticipated white\u2019s e5 pawn taking black\u2019s f6 pawn with check. If so, black\u2019s queen takes the white pawn on f6, triggering a queen trade and a good position for black (see next diagram).<\/p>\n

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

Instead, Abdusattorov played Qxf6, check. Here Gukesh resigned. That was because after the black king retreats to g8, white\u2019s queen picks off black\u2019s rook on g5 (see next diagram).<\/p>\n

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

Computers can give a percentage of how well one has played by comparing moves against the engine\u2019s analysis. A good player may have a 70%\u2011ish score in classical time controls. The top players, however, often score around 99%.<\/p>\n

Gukesh\u2019s error was atypical of high\u2011level chess. Even so, to err is human. To blame someone else, even more human. To Gukesh\u2019s credit, he only blamed himself and his wife. He has not been heard from since.<\/p>\n

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

move and win<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13599,"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-13598","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\/13598","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=13598"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13598\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19060,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13598\/revisions\/19060"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13599"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13598"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13598"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13598"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=13598"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}