Underpromotion themes: #1: Amazing composition from 1933

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  • Underpromotion themes: #1: Amazing composition from 1933

    We had an original situation at the Canadian Championship 2017, with a forced underpromotion. Perhaps never seen before in serious chess, in its 500+ year history. Hopefully never to be seen again. It wasn't forced by circumstances ON THE BOARD, but rather OFF IT, in the blitz playoff game Sambuev -- Noritsyn. Numerous posts have described the situation, so I won't repeat that here.

    I am going to be writing on this site about underpromotion themes for the next few days.

    I will start by presenting an amazing composition from 1933. FIDE awards international titles for chess composition, as well as for judging chess composition. Here, a triple underpromotion is the only way to win!

    Mark Libiurkin, First Prize, Vechernya Moskva, 1933:
    (Sources: Irving Chernev: 'Chessboard Magic', and Arnold Denker and Larry Parr: 'The Bobby Fischer I Knew And Other Stories')
    W: Ka1, Bg1, Nf6, a2, a3, b6, e6, e7, f2
    B: Kc3, Bb8, c2
    White to play and win.
    Solution:
    1.Ne4+
    [Black threatened 1...c1=Q#, as well as 1...Be5 and 2...Kd2#]
    1...Kd3 2.Nc5+ Kc3 3.Nb3 Be5 4.f4 Bg7
    [Black wishes to keep the bishop on the long diagonal to threaten mate. If 4...Bxf4, 5.Bd4+ wins.]
    5.e8=N! Bh8 6.f5 Be5
    [Otherwise 7.f6 blocks the bishop.]
    7.Bh2 Bxh2 8.b7 Be5 9.b8=B!
    [Otherwise 9.b8=Q Kc4+ 10.Bxe5 c1=Q+ 11.Nxc1 is stalemate.]
    9...Bxb8 10.Nc7 Bxc7 11.e7 Be5 12.e8=R!
    [The third underpromotion is necessary because 12.e8=Q Kc4+ 13.Qxe5 c1=Q+ 14.Nxc1 is stalemate.]
    12...Bf6 13.Re6 Bg7 14.f6
    [The bishop is finally driven away, so White wins.]
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