Chess School Quiz Challenge #3

Challenge

The super-talented Leonardo Costa has let his passed pawn on the a-file rush forward to a7. One more step and the pawn turns into a queen. What should Black do to prevent this impending promotion?

Solution

The black king is too far away, it can't help. So the rook must stop the white passed pawn. There are two possibilities: 47...Rg3-g8 to control the eighth rank, or 47...Rg3-a3 to control the a-file. 

If we think one move ahead, we see: 47...Rg3-g8 would be a mistake that immediately loses the game. Black can't control the eighth rank. White would go 48.Rb6-b8, and on the next move the passed pawn reaches its target. 

So it has to be 47...Rg3-a3. After that it's hard to see how White will make progress. In fact, Christopher Noe held this critical endgame from the first round of the German Masters 2023 against Leonardo Costa after stopping the passed pawn with 47...Rg3-a3. 

In this situation, Leonardo Costa and Christopher Noe must have thought of one of the most important and best-known guiding principles in chess: "Rooks belong behind passed pawns, your own and your opponent's", once said Dr. Siegbert Tarrasch (1862-1934), one of the best players in the world at the turn of the century and author of the most successful chess teaching books of the time. 

What Tarrasch said back then about rooks and passed pawns still applies today and is part of the chess basics that every chess student will encounter sooner rather than later. 

Rooks belong behind passed pawns! They belong behind the opponent's passed pawns, as in this example, to stop them, and behind your own passed pawns to push them on their march to the other side of the board.