I think people are overstating whites position. I think Black's best move will be f5And Black will have plenty of time among many lines of swapping off or not to get those rooks doubled on c-file and exploit white own pawn blocking the invasion.

Yea f5 looks like the right defensive plan but 22.g4 fxg4 23.Rg3 f5 24.exf Nxf6 25.Be5 is trouble right? 24.-Rxf6 looks like it might hold though. "Plenty of time" seems like an exaggeration

Still going with what I talked about earlier.

This is like the fifth time I thought my next move was obvious and was online when Tex played his move, but I wanted to give people time to comment so I didn't post it right away, then went a week thinking I'd played my move already.

Still going with what I talked about earlier.
This is like the fifth time I thought my next move was obvious...

Surely the "obvious" move was Bg5. Square f6 is such a good target, especially with a N heading to e4.

I haven't analysed all the tactics but with a B on g5 all the lines with g4 and then h5 guarantee to open the h file which is going to be lethal if black doesnt have f6 under control.

Not saying Bh6 is a mistake, but the first move I would want to have analysed was 22.Bg5.

I think it's pretty obvious I have to move the rook, so the only question is to which square. For a while I considered moving the rook to d8 in case the d-pawn comes under fire, but then Bg5 will gain a tempo at some point. Best to put the rook on the open file and just try to get on with something over there. We'll see what white does next.

Woohoo, we're focusing on the kingside, where the chess is played!

I think I fell into one of those noob "I'm gaining a tempo!" but not really failures. I definitely did not gain a tempo (or fail to lose one or whatever) out of Bh6.

Anyway, I'll calcu-ma-late more later. It's the weekend, ladies!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ey-VNes5YQs

Capturing on g4 has to be forced here. Letting white open the g-file is obviously bad, so I think this is the best way to go. I'm expecting something like 23...hxg4 24.Rg3 f5 25.exf6 Nxf6 26.Bg5 Rf8 and things look ugly but unless I'm missing something I think black is holding alright. We'll see how he proceeds after the g4 capture and go from there.

I'm in over my head again. This feels good because I'm sort of pushing the action, but I can't tell who this is good for at all.

I'm looking at a couple of different ideas so I'm just going to decide as I type and play around on an analysis board.

The main two ideas I want to look at are Rg3 and Rh2. If I play Rh2, my goal is to push h5 and crack open the h-file (or get a passed h-pawn) and use that to do bad things to him. The problem is that the bad things are kind of vague and I'm not sure if they are actually there.

After Rh2, he has a couple of ideas he can pursue. He can play Kh7 anytime he wants and annoy my bishop.

He can also abandon the d4 pawn with Bc5-b6-c7 to attack e5, because if I take on d4 then he's got a nice fork of the knight and rook with Bxe5. I would have walked right into that one in a non-correspondence game, because I just saw it as I played around.

But let's say I get everything I want in: h5, hxg6 and Rh1, then I'm still down a pawn and I'm not sure how much I'm getting.

The best line I can come up with is:

Rh2 Bb6/h5 Bc5/hxg6 Bxe5/gxf7+ Kxf7/Rh5. I think I get a really nice overall position out of this sort of line, but it doesn't seem like nearly enough to make up for the loss of an entire pawn. I kind of like it though.

The other option is Rg2. This is the sort of move that I fits into something I'm trying to learn to do in chess: play good moves and trust the position. I don't think I get to open up a file as quickly or bludgeoningly as with Rh2, but I'll get my pawn back and have some interesting pressure on his king down the g-file.

I think Rg2 f5/exf6 e.p. Nxf6 all seems pretty natural, if not forced. I can follow up with Bg5, and now I'm kind of happy. The bishop is on a nice square, he's going to have to use a tempo either moving the knight or protecting it (and Rf8 would be a nice waste of time after that rook just vacated that square recently and take pressure off the queenside). If he moves the knight, I'm getting my pawn back and the pressure on the kingside black pawns is enormous. I don't see how he can hold them all.

If he lets me trade the knight off, I have to enter a bishop vs. knight ending that I'm not entirely comfortable with, but it's not a good bishop at all and I think objectively I'm better off.

So...unsound but comfortable plan or sound but uncomfortable plan...

Everybody's watching me, so I'll do the right thing. If this were my own, private game, I'm not so sure I would.

I'm going to continue with my plan outlined in the prior post, I think it still looks alright. 24...f5 25.exf6 Nxf6 26.Bg5 Rf8 27.Bxf6 Rxf6.

that all looks pleasant for White, the knight will go to e4 where it must be better than the bishop. not that I see anything better, I just didn't expect Tex to be so optimistic

Nothing to do now but wait and see what happens.

Don't want the spoiler to look too short or he might figure out ... things ... about what I'm thinking. So, umm ...

Here's a picture of my current celebrity crush, Eden Sher, who is a dead ringer for what would happen if you made my wife Hollywood-level hot and 15 years younger. Thanks for not reading chess forums, darling!

Continuing my plan outlined in previous notes. After Bg5, Rf8 looks ok. We will see...

I wish I had more to say, but black doesn't have a lot of options to discuss at this point. Just hoping to make it to a rook endgame with some play at this point.

Instamove to project confidence

Continuing as planned...

Hmm, I didn't really think he'd play Rf8. It just didn't seem right to me. Normally, when someone does something that I'd kind of mentally half-rejected, that's my subconscious instincts telling me it's bad.

I've told this story on here before, but there was the time I was in the last round of a 4-round local swiss and had won my first three games with some major upsets. In the fourth game, there was a move where my opponent only had two legal moves. All my analysis had focused one one of them, and he made the other. I was completely wrongfooted. I almost offered a draw after like five minutes in the tank. Then I noticed the reason I hadn't considered it was because it left mate-in-one on the board. I was *this* close to offering a draw with a tournament-winning mate-in-one on the board.

Anyway, this one's going to require a bit of thinking time.

would be super awesome if you had indeed offered a draw and he replied with the standard line "make your move first".

Okay. This is a really critical move.

The obvious line involves trading knight for bishop, and I've got to decide if I like the resulting position.

First, what viable alternatives do I have to making the trade? I can't really see any. I could delay it for a bit, maybe Rdg1? That gets crazy complicated. The line I'm looking at as I type is:

Rdg1 Nd5/Rxg4 Rxf2/Nxd4 and I don't know what the what is going on. I've got so many pieces in danger, especially from his bishop, but it kind of looks like I'm better as long as I'm not tactically lost.

If he doesn't play Nd5, what else could he play?
Rdg1 Kg7 looks kind of similar to if I just play Bxg6 right away. Rdg1 Kg7/Bxg6+ Rxf6/Rxg4 and we're back to the same complications that are coming later in this analysis.

Rdg1 could also be met by Rac1 or Rad1, with him making a similarly calm move before we enter the forcing lines.

Umm, okay. I'm getting sucked way down the rabbit hole here. This is going to be one of those positions where I'm in way over my head and if it works out in my favor it looks like I'm brilliant but it was just luck.

Let's check the most forcing line before I get myself too confused.

Bxg6 Rxg6/Rxg4

I'm threatening the d4 pawn, but I'm not even sure I want it. Activating his bishop would be brutal in this endgame. I was thinking earlier that Rxg4 Rxf2/Rxg6+ Kf7/Rdg1 worked for me because I could win his corner rook if he took my knight, but his king gets away via f6-e5-d6.

Ummm, that means I'd have to play Bxf6 Rxf6/Rxg4 Rxf2/Nxd4 if I want to go that route. I really hate that line because after he protects his pawns, I'm not going to be able to stop his bishop from controlling g1 and that's going to make the rook battle impossible.

I could be more patient, I guess. Bxf6 Rxf6/Rg2 looks promising. I can try to get my knight to g3 and then the super dominating e4 spot.

Bxf6 Rxf7/Rg2 Raf8 and I guess maybe I have to sac another pawn in this line.
Bxf6 Rxf7/Rg2 Raf8/Ng3 Rxf2/Rxf2 Rxf2/Ne4 doesn't look good to me. He can play Rf5 and hold everything together and I'll have to fight to get both my pawns back, or I wonder if he can just ignore that, let me take the bishop, and roll down with g3-g2-g1-touchdown!. Testing that out (I won't type out the line), he ends up a tempo short and I just keep it all together. So I guess I just have to worry about Ne4 Rf5, but I still don't know if I like that.

This looked a lot better to me before I started analyzing lines.

What about Bxf6 Rxf6/Rxg4 Rxf2/Ng3 immediately? That looks a lot better. He doesn't have time to get his a8 rook into the game easily because I'm threatening a lot of things at once. His next move is critical. He has to worry about Rxg6 and how he intends to respond to Ne4.

Rf6 to protect g6 just loses immediately to Ne4. If he wants to protect that pawn, it has to be a king move, which gives me time to play Ne4 and force Rf5, which then gives me time to play Rg1 and I'm sitting awfully pretty. I think I'm finally on to something here.

So if he doesn't want to play a king move, his other options would be to counterattack or ignore the threat of Rxg6.

His best "ignore it and develop" move would be Raf8. That's met with Ne4/Rf5 and white just looks so much better.

He could counterattack. With what? If I were him, I'd be looking hard at Rg2, threatening Bc6.

Rg2/Rxg6+ Kf7/Rg5 Bc6/Ne4 Rxg5/Nxg5+ and I think I'm not only going out good but winning a pawn as well.

I've been at this for about an hour now, and I'm so far down the rabbit hole I can barely remember what the original position looks like. I hope this all made sense, and I pity any poor soul who has tried to follow my mental ramblings to this point. Everything seems to point to the Bxf6 Rxf6/Rxg4 Rxf2/Ng3 variation. There's something not good about trying to figure all this out through pure brute force variation-checking, but it's all I got

I was about to post a conditional reply to Rxf6 because it seems forced, but I just noticed he has Bc6 as an interesting option as well. I'm too variationed-out to examine that now.

Obviously forced. I'll figure out a plan next move.

Well, we're now in an endgame and I don't really like my position all that much. Lots of weak pawns and a bad bishop. If I could somehow trade bishop for knight I'd be in heaven, but I don't think Kyle will let that happen. However, white's f2 pawn is currently hanging so that's interesting.

My first order of business is to see if white has any immediate threats and see what is most dangerous. White is currently threatening to win the d4 pawn. However, if I can let him take it and trade minors and somehow win a pawn back, I like my chances to draw.

Right now it seems like all of white's pieces are clicking. The knight can easily come to the kingside to attack black's weaknesses and the other rook can come to the kingside also to gang up on the g-pawn.

I'd really like to get out of the pin on the g-pawn, that has to be order of business numero uno, but how to do that? If Kf7, then I'm wondering if white can take on d4. Something like 28...Kf7 29.Nxd4 Rd8 I think is ok. The knight has to retreat and then f2 hangs, so that looks alright. What about 28...Kf7 29.Ng3? It looks like 29...Rxf2 30.Ne4 Rf5 saves the day there as well. I think I might just be hanging by a thread, unless I missed something.

I tried to calculate taking on f2 immediately with the rook, but that scares me. After 29.Nf4 I don't like how many hanging pawns I have at all. That has to be losing.

Alright, 28...Kf7 it is and getting out of that pin. I think if I played anything else white would build some really dangerous threats on the kingside, if he doesn't have some already. Time to just keep hanging in there and hoping he makes a mistake somewhere along the line. He's playing really well so far, I wish he'd take it easy on me

Okay, to be honest, that was a bit more passive than I expected.

Nxd4 forces a trade down and eventually the win of a pawn for black, but that leaves a rook endgame, which is always drawn. Let's stick that in the ol' back pocket for now.

Now with an immediate Ng3 I don't have to worry about Rg2. That looks hella strong.

Ng3 Rxf2 (seems very logical)/Ne4 Rf5 (forced)/ Rdg1 Rg8 (seems forced) ... ?

I don't know if I'm getting anything but empty prettiness out of that pawn sac. The line just runs out of steam right there.

I can't really find anything better, either. Okay, back to the pawn-up rook endgame.

Nxd4 and what if he doesn't take it? Rd8 attacks the knight, and now what? I'm going to have to move it, and when I do, he'll get his pawn back with Bxf2 and now all I've accomplished is making my knight awful and his bishop awesome.

Man, I would have lost this game a dozen times OTB by now. I can see the appeal of correspondence.

I give up, I'll go with the Ng3 plan and see what comes out of it.

maybe an interesting line if black plays Rxf2 that Kyle has not looked at yet: 29. Ng3 Rxf2 30. Ne4 Rf5 31. Rc1!? and now I think black has a ton of problems, the fork on d6 is actually really hard to deal with. 31.. Rc8 fails to 32. Nd6+, 31.. Be7 32. Rc7 and white has a ******ed amount of play, 31.. b6 is probably best, but then maybe 32. b4!? to force our way to the seventh rank, something like 32.. Bxb4 33. Rc7+ K somewhere 34. Rxg6 looks like it should be very tough for black to hold even though black is still a pawn up.