Endgame studies

I have always had a real fascination for these, and still believe that the efforts spent in solving them can really pay off in terms of practical chess skills - in particular, they raise awareness of tactical possibilities during a game, they help to improve chess visualisation, and they help with 'imagination' in chess.
Here is an old favourite of mine:

White to play and win - the process involves gradually forcing the Black king down the board, followed by a pin driving the rook off the file. A full solution might appear here later!

Qxd4 in the Sicilian

I Have played this line quite a few times over the years, and I find it truly astonishing how many players as black make the error of playing e7-e5 a few moves later. I have won most of the games I have played as white when black has made that error, and have it off as a bit of a "party-piece". Here is an example from over 20 years ago:

County match

Yesterday I played my second county match for Greater Manchester. Last month I managed a very long and hard-fought draw that I ought to have been able to win, but failed to find a couple of crucial moves in the endgame. It really annoyed me, as the endgame is normally the strongest aspect of my game.

In yesterday's game, I got to play one of my favourite lines against the Sicilian, and was pleased to see that my opponent didn't know the best way to handle it. He mis-calculated early on, and gave me a rather easy win - I just had to be careful and keep up the pressure, but the result was never in doubt.

Chess Progression

I wanted a quicker way to post chess stuff on the web (quicker than the process I have used over at Padgate Chess) so here goes.