Welcome to 2010.   We should all be back at school or work now after the Xmas holidays so to ease into the new year I offer a cute little puzzle that’s not too difficult.

Have a look at the position below (with White to move).   Clearly Black is well up on material and in normal circumstances would win comfortably.   White doesn’t seem to have a checkmate in the offing and he’s not threatening to win material back so it doesn’t look good.

There is however a neat way that White can save the game …. and even win!

Can you find it?

8/qp6/p7/pk6/2R5/P2K4/8/8 w - 0 1 White to play.

ANSWER:

1.a4+ Kb6 2.Rc8! and Black is in zugzwang.

For those of you who may not be familiar with this term it is a German word for “A player whose turn it is to move who has no move that does not worsen his position is said to be in zugzwang.”

After 2.Rc8! Blacks only legal moves are 2…Qa8 or 2…Qb8 both of which lose the queen and the game.