Daily Rome Shot 1526

7 Comments

1. A.S. Haley says:

   14 January 2026 at 5:56 PM

   A nice chess problem — thank you, Fr. Z!
   Note that as the board stands, Black has only two choices to move: his King can move to e7, or his pawn can move g6 or g5. White can force Black to choose by playing
   1. Kf4!
   This places the Kings in opposition, which (if White can maintain it) will result in a win for White.
   Now if Black responds with Ke7?, White keeps the opposition by playing
   2. Ke5! Black loses his pawn on d5, plus he cannot prevent White’s pawn on d4 from advancing to promotion.
   If Black instead chooses to move his pawn, the end comes just as surely:
   1. Kf4! g5+
   2. h4xg5+ Ke7 (or Kg7)
   3. g4xh5 and White has four pawns (one passed) to Black’s two, which are both blocked. Black’s King cannot both defend his pawn at d4 and prevent White’s advance of his h-pawn for promotion and a win.
   If Black tries g6 instead of g5+, then White proceeds:
   2. g4g5+ Kg7
   3. f5f6+ Black’s King is blocked behind White’s chain of pawns, and is too far away to prevent White’s capture of d5 and the promotion of his d-pawn.
   If Black responds to 2. g4g5+ instead with 2. . . . Ke7, then:
   3. f5xg6 f7xg6
   4. Ke5 and again Black cannot prevent the capture of d5 and the promotion of White’s pawn.
   Finally (!), if Black tries to prevent White’s King from attaining the dominant square of e5, by playing
   3. f5xg6 f7f6, then
   4. Kf5 and Black has to choose whether to defend his d-pawn or his f-pawn. Whichever he chooses, White’s King captures the other, and leads his pawn to promotion.
   So from the above analysis, one sees that the key move is White’s first, since it leaves Black with no good choices to move. And that is the essence of the German term Zugzwang.
2. Fr. John Zuhlsdorf says:

   15 January 2026 at 10:42 AM

   1. Kf4 is the key. These pawns endgames are tough.
3. maternalView says:

   15 January 2026 at 5:25 PM

   Interesting video.
   I think I learned to read fast because I loved reading and just naturally picked up the described techniques.
   People will hand me something to read, I read it & hand it back. And they’re like “no, you need to read it”.
   As the video says the trick is not to “read” each word but let your mind recognize it.
   Years ago I read when I was beginning to homeschool, an article that suggested better readers don’t look up every word they don’t know. Rather they pick up the meaning from the context the word is used.
4. EAW says:

   16 January 2026 at 10:06 AM

   I was able to follow the video, even though English is not my first language. Great news about Fulton Sheen, I think many people didn’t expected this to happen, after the procedure stalled during the previous pontificate.
5. Imrahil says:

   16 January 2026 at 12:43 PM

   Reverend Father, with all due respect,

   the word “Zugzwang” is at the very most medium-size among German words. After all, a word like “Schachkomposition” is entirely normal and people have to work with the “Datenschutzgrundverordnung” every day.
6. Fr. John Zuhlsdorf says:

   16 January 2026 at 1:25 PM

   Imrahil: I agree that “Zugzwang” isn’t all that along. However, the tactic in the puzzle that wins for white is an “in between move” or “Zwischenzug”… yeah, just a little longer. It’s not exactly like Höchsgeschwindigkeitsbegrenzung. I don’t know of any really long German chess terms.
7. IaninEngland says:

   16 January 2026 at 1:44 PM

   @ Fr Z:
   You could always make one up, like Donaudampfschiffahrtsgesellschaftsstellvertretersgemahlinszugzwang.

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