Play Chess Better with a Capybara

 2025 Daily Chess Championship - Round 2 

Good morning chess players!

Another round completed — and that means another batch of chess puzzles to solve!

I’m happy to share that I finished first in my group in Round 2 of the Daily Chess Championship 2025! There were 12 players in total, and the fight for the top spot was much harder this time. Moreover I wasn't the only one in first place, though. I shared it with another player who also scored 20 out of 22 possible points.

I didn’t win all my games like in Round 1. I lost one game and drew two. But in the end, it was enough to take first place. Sometimes you need a little luck too — in one of my games I managed to win even though I was down a piece! It doesn’t happen often, but in chess everything is possible. You just have to focus properly on the chessboard 😄. 

Even in a lost game, you might still get a nice little gift from your opponent.

As always, I picked some of the most interesting moments from my games and turned them into puzzles for you to solve.

This time there’s a special puzzle that I really want to show you. It’s a very funny position where I wanted to checkmate my opponent... but my own knight was in the way! Instead of helping, it was blocking the winning move.

These puzzles are a mix of different ideas — sometimes you have to calculate a lot, sometimes it’s just about seeing the pattern. I hope you’ll enjoy solving them!

Can you find the best moves?

Try to put yourself in my shoes. Think like you’re playing the game — what would you play? Some puzzles are tricky, others are easier. But all of them are taken straight from real games.

Good luck and have fun! And if you manage to solve the puzzle with the “annoying knight” — let me know! I’ll be curious to hear if you found the solution faster than I did during the game .

Puzzle #1 Annoying Knight

It’s a very funny position where I wanted to checkmate my opponent ... but my own knight was in the way! Instead of helping, it was blocking the winning move."

That’s exactly what I wrote in the introduction to this blog post.
I wrote it because that’s what I was thinking during the game, and what I still believed when my opponent resigned.

Nh7!! – a clever knight sacrifice. Simply put, it gets the knight out of the way so I can deliver a quick mate.
It looked cool enough to make the game worth submitting in the "Best Games" category.

And then… during analysis, surprise!    That brilliant Nh7 turns out to be a mistake. Or at least a big oversight.

Instead of Nh7, there’s probably a whole list of much stronger moves. All the queen moves to the f-file (like Qf4 or Qf3) are way more solid.

Well… chess creativity won over common sense this time. A move worthy of admiration — in the 18th century.

But hey, this is the 21st century. It's all about pragmatism now .

And since Nh7 turns out to be a mistake, the whole thing doesn’t even work as a proper puzzle.
So instead, I’ll present it as a very instructive example — a case where what looked like a winning combination was really just a failed attempt at a flashy sacrifice.

Puzzle #2 Pinned pawn?

The tournament situation wasn’t very promising for me. My opponent in the game described here has :bullet: rating over 2400, not much lower than mine. Additionally, I played quite poorly in our second game, and ultimately lost with white pieces. In another game I incorrectly sacrificed a piece. So, this game was a must-win for me.

Already one move earlier, I had doubts about whether instead of 30. e4, a clever Knight sacrifice with 30. Nf7 Kf7 31. Rg7! Kf8 32. Ra7 Kg8 33. Rb7 might actually lead to a draw. I couldn’t find a clear path to victory here for a long time, but eventually it turned out that Kh8 with the plan of transferring Rook via the g-file should secure a win.

And of course, I’m adding an animation of the Knight sacrifice line — that was the one I was most unsure about:

Alright, let’s go back to the game. 30. e4 also looks solid. It starts threatening h7+ and after the only move Kh8, I lose f7 and then forcibly  e6 pawn, resulting in a draw. At first, I didn’t even consider capturing pawn on h6. After all, the black king is on the same file as the white rook. But since I couldn’t see any other reasonable move, I eventually calculated the variations and played.

So then, can you find the best — and probably the only — winning move in the position below?

Puzzle #3 The King in Danger

And now, the game I lost. The same opponent as in the previous puzzle, but this time I was playing white. It should have been easier, but it turned out to be quite the opposite. I walked straight into a full-blown attack on my king.

I had castled, and I had a few pieces nearby. But it somehow felt cramped. In the end, I ran out of time to properly regroup and defend against my opponent’s attack. The final combination is truly impressive. Try to find the winning tactic my opponent used.

Puzzle #4 Weak central squares

In the previous move, White played the pawn advance d4-d5. The idea of exchanging the isolated d-pawn is commendable. However, the execution was flawed. Such an exchange needs to be well-prepared, especially ensuring the protection of weak points around the center. Until that moment, the d4 pawn had been preventing Black's pieces from infiltrating White's camp. But after the move d4-d5, that protection is gone. How will Black take advantage of this?

Puzzle #5 A shaky pawn structure

If the pawn structure around the opponent’s king is full of weaknesses, it’s time to act — without delay. Once the king has castled, there’s no reason to wait. It’s time to attack.

Puzzle #6 The Art of Losing Quickly

Yes, this is the game I mentioned earlier. I was playing White. We had just finished the opening phase, and I was already down a piece. The white king had some issues, sure, but it wasn’t exactly clear how to punish it. If my opponent had found the right plan, I wouldn’t have had the slightest chance — not even for a draw. Fair warning: this puzzle isn’t easy. During the game, I realized how quickly I could lose. Luckily for me, my opponent chose a different — and much worse — plan. In the end, I managed to win a queen.

Puzzle #7 Piece exchanges

Sometimes it's worth trading a few pieces — especially when you come out slightly ahead after all the exchanges.

Now I am waiting for round 3. 

Final Standings:

That’s all the puzzles I’ve prepared for you based on my best games from round 2.  
If you solved them all — congratulations! You’ve earned a spot on the podium and a virtual medal.
If not, no worries — it’s all part of the training. Every mistake is a step forward.
Go back, review the positions, and try again.
Even strong players blunder sometimes  — what matters is learning from it.