Trapping A Vulnerable King With A Passed Pawn
I love having a passed pawn in the middle game and looking for a strategy to protect and advance it to the last rank. When the pawn can trap the enemy king and make it vulnerable, it is even more valuable -- and maybe promotion is not necessary.
In a recent 10-minute blitz game I played, no one has a significant advantage after 25 moves. However, my opponent blundered by leaving a knight hanging which I, playing Black, grabbed on my 26th move. The diagram below shows the board position after 26 moves.
With the knight advantage, I sought to simplify and drive the position to a favorable endgame. After several more moves, I was able to pick off his d-pawn. Then to simplify further, I forced a knight trade as we each picked off an unprotected pawn; however, I still retained a pawn advantage (plus the extra knight). The board position after 36 moves is shown in the following diagram.
Now the fun of the endgame begins: How successfully and quickly can I advance the passed pawn to the final rank? After he retreated his rook (to avoid a trade), I began a series of moves to keep my pieces protected and advance my king to the center of the board to assist. With my king on the fourth rank, I began to advance to pawn. The board position after 42 moves is shown in the following position.
With the extra knight, I am in a very comfortable position to force the pawn promotion. After he made an inconsequential rook move, I moved d3+. He moved his king to d1 to block the pawn (d2 was not available because that square is controlled by the knight). Next I moved d2, and he made another insignificant rook move. Even though the pawn is protected by the knight, I moved my king to d3 to add extra protection to the pawn. His king is now blocked as the diagram below shows after 45 moves.
My opponent now moved his rook to c8 to attack the knight – but too late. Checkmate is delivered by Nb2#. Rather than becoming a queen, the passed pawn is the linchpin in blocking the enemy king and keeping him from moving. The knight teams with the pawn to end the game. The following diagram shows the board position after 46 moves when the game ended.
Ray Linville’s high point as a chess player occurred when he swiped the queen of GM Hikaru Nakamura in a 60-second bullet game in 2021. This game was reported in a “My Best Move” column of the Chess Life magazine, published by the U.S. Chess Federation.
At Chess.com, he has been an editor (part-time) since 2019 and has edited news articles and tournament reports—including those of the Candidates and World Championship Tournaments and other major events—by titled players and noted chess writers as well as Game of the Day annotations by leading grandmasters. He has also been a contributing writer of chess terms, e-books, and general interest articles for ChessKid.com.
He enjoys “top blogger” status at Chess.com. His blog has won the award for Best Chess Blog from the Chess Journalists of America for several years. In addition, he has also been the recipient of first-place CJA awards for feature article, humorous contribution, online review, and educational lesson as well as honorable mention in the categories of personal narrative and historical article.