Tactics Puzzle #3: Two-in-One

August 22, 2022

is chess in the Olympics

There is currently no chess in the Olympiad. The Chess Olympiad is a chess competition officially organized by FIDE since 1927 and takes place in even-numbered years. Before World War II the event was occasionally held every year. There was also an unofficial Chess Olympiad series that ended in 1976. Although chess is covered in the sports sections of many newspapers around the world, it is not one of the recognized sports in the Olympic Games. However, FIDE is now a member of the International Olympic Committee and follows its rules. This means that chess could one day become an Olympic event, although most knowledgeable observers say this is unlikely. The World Chess Championship is a competition held annually by the international chess organization FIDE to determine the World Champion of chess. Both men and women are eligible to participate in this championship. The World Champion does not have to be the player with the highest Elo rating: the 2006-2007 World Champion, Vladimir Kr

For the next tactics puzzle, I have a two-for-one, I found two tactics in one of my games and these are very simple tactics that I missed because I wasn't aware of them at that time and I did not have much foresight when playing the game.

This is the first position:
White to move and find the best continuation.

This is the second position:
White to move and find the best continuation.

Answers:
For the first, g4! is a good move because the knight on h5 is trapped since the only square that would allow it to escape was taken by Black's dark-squared bishop while the rest of the squares that the knight could move to are controlled by White's pieces. This is the reason for the maxim "knights on the rim are dim" because they can easily be trapped. However, the move that White played in the game was Nf4 which was a relief to me because it only exchanged the knights.

A bit later in the game, we came to the second position and my opponent found the right move which is Bc5! because it attacks both my dark-squared bishop and my rook. The best continuation for White then would be Bf6 moving out of the attack and giving up the exchange, however, even then White would still have a great advantage because my pawns on the queenside are weak and he can easily activate his rooks toward the center.

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is chess in the Olympics