Christmas Puzzle Contest January 2003
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A selection of the messages we received

The folloing excerpts from the messages we received were generated semi-automatically. The choice of submissions was often not by merit but by random selection. So please do not feel offended if your submission is not quoted. Only a small percentages of the total number of messages is quoted here.

Mark McCarthy, Durham, NC, United States
Thanks for the puzzles, they were a lot of fun (even the Dawson one, to some extent). Look forward to the puzzles for next year!

Dipl.-Math. Peter Held, Berlin
Puzzle 6: "An der schönen blauen Donau" (Strauss). Nice Question! It took me some time to find this out. The tune did sound somewhat familiar to me but I was not sure about the title nor the composer. Of some help was a tag like <bgsound = "strauss.mid"> in the source code!

Thomas J. McElmurry, Champaign, Illinois
Puzzle 6 proved surprisingly difficult, as the background music apparently did not comply with the standards of the World Wide Web. In order to hear the music, I was forced to yield temporarily to the Dark Side and open the puzzle page in Microsoft Internet Explorer. As unpleasant as this experience was, it did enable me to hear an impressive jazz rendition of Johann Strauss's Blue Danube Waltz.

Hans Kranendonk, Haarlem, The Netherlands
I realy loved these puzzles. I had fun with all the puzzles, but in a very different way. My favorite was puzzle number 5. Unbelievable that a human mind is able to invent such a beautiful puzzle! I think that puzzles like these show us the beauty of chess. I would realy love to see more of these on your website!

Massimiliano Benotti, Rome, Italy
Puzzles are amusing and instructive, they show us particular situations of the game that, perhaps, we will never face; they show us the complexity and the beauty of chess and that the solution can have the strength of a mathematical theorem. The web site is always up-to-date and it's a "point of reference" for chess lovers; please, continue this way!

Legendary GM Ulf Andersson trying to bust the Moravec study in Wijk aan Zee

Uberto Delprato, Rome, Italy
I visited Chessbase.com for the first time while looking for some news about the match Kasparov-Deep Junior. I enjoy chess (even if i am not an active player) and, wandering in Chessbase.com, I found the puzzle section: really challenging! After fighting with them, I took the challenge of your Christmas 1999 Puzzle. [correct solution given] For me the real surprise of puzzle is not the solution in itself, but the uniqueness of the solution: I still hardly believe that there is one and unique way to solve the puzzle (even if, honestly, I was not able to find it for a long time - let's say 4 days, one hour per day)!

Cornel Pacurar, Ontario, Canada
I found the ChessBase Puzzles section last evening, doing a search on Google (keyword: Adabashev), and I have since spent a few very enjoyable hours analyzing the chess compositions presented! I have especially enjoyed the "Christmas Puzzle Contest" problems. I found the problems not very difficult, but I think that the selection is just perfect for this type of solving contest, which does not target problemists directly, but chess players and chess enthusiasts in general and I hope that this contest will be a very successful one! Therefore, I would like to congratulate you for a job very well done! Thank you!

Metz Roger, Bischheim, France
Your puzzles are always entertaining and I like such mind boggling exercises which distract us from all that opening theory. I like very much solving studies and sometimes problems, so I found this puzzles not so difficult. But they are very nice. I also like your news page on your website, especially the photo reports: they are always entertaining.

Bolívar Ribeiro Gonzalez, Curitiba PR, Brazil
For me some puzzles are very difficult, mainly the ones that leave the conventional chess, as the number 1. The others vary of intensity and they are very instructive and interesting. I adore puzzles and I find the initiative of doing these interactive contests with the readers and fans the team ChessBase is very good. Between parentheses it is the time that I was long to solve each puzzle. I want to congratulate for the excellent work carried out in the web and products, that contribute to the world growth of the modality in common that so much liked to practice!

Adam Pittman, Rochester, NY
I enjoyed your Christmas prize puzzles very much; they were both fun and challenging. Your website is very informative and well-arranged. It is one of the few chess websites (which is available in English) that I've found that is thought-provoking. I'm no great chess player, but I do have a passing interest in the game. Regarding puzzle 6, I would have loved to have tried this puzzle, but as a penniless college student, I am forced to use the laboratory computers which don't have sound in order to go on the Internet. Thanks for the puzzles. I hope to see many more.

Matt Rose, Oxford, England
The puzzles were excellent, just hard enough to be interesting but not like a John Nunn endgame study where you could spend your life finding the solution (There is a place for these too but not on a computer screen but rather in books). Personally I prefer a sparsely populated board and a long solution line when it comes to puzzles rather than the crowded 'mate in two' variety - those these can be beautiful too. I also enjoy fairy chess and 'reconstruct the game' type puzzles. The web-site in general is outstanding. Usually my first port of call. Can I suggest more games in a 'gameviewer' format (ie. A format which doesn't require any software download)?

Robert Vollertsen, Odense, Denmark
I liked the puzzles, especially number two. (Greedy as I am, I started out trying Kxg7, just to cry out "Doh!" some four moves later! That's fun -realizing how the problem works.) Were the problems too hard? I think they were all right. (Personally, I would even have prefered one really hard problem.) But I think it was a good mix with traditional problems and some... well, unorthodox ones. I don't know, if the unorthodox problems are supposed to make it harder for Shreddicts and Junior-junkies. I wouldn't deem it neccesary, though. The real prize is solving a problem and experiencing the moment, when everything falls into place. If someone chooses to "burn the christmas candles in the oven" instead (Skakbladet), so be it. I like your site the way it is: excellent.

Christian Söderberg
Thanks for another great Christmas-puzzle (although it would have been even greater without the background music ;-) My first assumption with regard to puzzle one was that it would be possible to show that the position is illegal in some way, but I think I can obtain it with only legal moves. I therefore glanced through FIDE's rules of Chess, and found some possible (although quite strained) ways for White to loose:

• Article 7.1 says: "If during a game it is found that the initial position of the pieces was incorrect, the game shall be cancelled and a new game played." So, White notifies Black that he had begun the game with his kings rook at a1, and queens rook at h1 (or maybe his king and queen had switched places). The new game is easily won by Black.
• Article 7.4 says: "If during a game it is found that an illegal move has been made, the position immediately before the irregularity shall be reinstated." Black therefore retracts his last move, Qf3-e5+, which is obviously illegal, and the game continues 1... Qxh5 2. g7+ Kf7 3. h7?? Qxh7#
• White chooses to ignore the check and plays 1. h7. Since there is nothing in FIDE's rules which says the players must find irregular moves, Black makes no protests, and hastens to play 1... Qg7#. Article 5.1 says: "The game is won by the player who has checkmated his opponent's king. This immediately ends the game, provided that the move producing the checkmate position was a legal move." Since the final move, Qe5-g7, is legal, and the game is ended immediatley after it (ie article 7.4 is not applicable), Black has won, and it is to late for anyone to complain that the king was in check already before the last move.
• The players switch sides (there is nothing in FIDE's rules of chess which explicitly prohibits the changing of sides). The player called White is then the player who started the game with the white pieces, but eventually lose it with the black pieces. This solution has one downside, and one upside: The downside is that according to the rules, it is the players which must make their moves alternatly (not White or Black), so it would be Black's move again - but I assume he might claim a win, since his opponent is checkmated anyway. The upside is that it is the only way to give both players an incentive to play for a win (since they both argued their original side would lose).
• They use a cylindrical board, in which case White's king could move to a7 och a8 (I know Dawson used cylindrical boards in some of his problems).
• The piece on h5 is a badly dressed white knight, so White plays 2. Ng7 and subsequently loses in big style.

I think I've embarrassed myself enough with these suggestions, so I'll hold here.

Michael Jones
Problem 1: it's a quickplay game in which players do not have to announce checks and may capture the king if their opponent fails to see it. So White pretends not to have noticed the check, plays e.g. 1. h7 then Black plays 1... Qxh8 and game over.

Justin Tan, St Ives, NSW, Australia
Puzzle 6 really got me. I have a slight interest in classical music and have heard this piece before on the odd occasion, yet sadly I haven’t paid too much attention to its name. I needed my parents’ help to solve this puzzle. How this puzzle relates to chess I'm not quite sure, but I’ll oblige you with an answer all the same to broaden my chances of winning the grand prize!!

Jaywant Keshav Pai, Mumbai, India
Problem 6 is simply beyond me. It can be hymn; a joyous song; a carol; a Mozart or even a Beethoven. Positively divine. No two opinions about that. The notes appear to come a streaming seemingly from some place deep out in the centre of the Milky-Way galaxy.But as I said earlier I am foxed by this one. All in all a superb collection of problems deftly cooked up for the festive season. Fredric, my boy, keep it up. The Helpmate Problems were indeed a novelty for me and I throughly enjoyed them. If the luck of the draw does not favour me, do have the courtesy of praising my 'incredible powers of concentration' and 'excellent positional sense'; also speak highly of my 'tactical prowess' and my 'uncanny knack of coming up with dazzling pins and breathtaking combinations', and all that sort of thing, you know. I want to show it to my wife. She thinks I am an ass.

Justin Foord, Adelaide, South Australia
Thanks Chessbase for a fun and challenging set of puzzles over Christmas which kept me busy during my two month long break before the start of year 12.

Lex Tarista, Fairfield CA, USA
Thank you so much for offering these puzzles :) I did enjoy them very much. I'm just a little concerned that when there's competition (some prize or reward involved) there's nothing to stop people from utilizing various software. It's good that the kind of puzzles offered here doesn't look like they can be easily solved by software (except may be number 2 and 3). But I'm afraid that in the future, there'll be chess software that can solve these too. Other than that, I think this is great, your website is very informative and you should keep up your good work. Thank you and God Bless!

Joshua Green, Phoenix, AZ
Some notes on the Christmas Puzzles: In the problem by Madeley, the bPh6 appears to be superfluous. Similarly, in the problem by Fabel, the Black Knights are unnecessary. It is a convention that you don't include such pieces in problems, so it seems that each of these pieces should be removed. Pollmacher et. al.'s position appears to allow a record number of immediate mates, At least, I was unable to top it. In my opinion, it would be better to begin the Kubbel study after the first two ply. It doesn't seem worth it to add a whole White Knight just to add two (relatively simple) ply to the solution.

The study by Gunst is based on a theme which has been used by several composers over the years. The original (and, in my opinion, best) version is by Alexei Troitsky: wKd5, Bc1, Pg6, bKf8, Pe7, h7; White to play and win. The study by A.V. and K.V. Sarychev begins with one of the most stunning moves I have ever seen in a study. I still find it remarkable that such a move can be possible in such a simple-looking position.

The problem by Bridgewater was, as expected, easy to solve and fun to play over. And unlike Shinkman's problem, this one is sound. The study by Fabel was harder than I thought, since I didn't realize that it would be necessary to waste moves with the Bishop via Bf1-g2-h3-f1. However, the basic idea (stalemate the bK to force the c-pawn to move) was apparent.

Fabel's problem is cute, though it was perhaps a bit unfair to require solvers to use retrograde analysis without warning them. Plus, they would also have to know the convention that castling is legal in problems unless it can be proven otherwise. This reminds me of another problem that I've seen before: Place a wK, 2 wRs, and a bK on an (otherwise empty) board so that White has four different ways to checkmate Black in one move.

In Loyd's helpmate, the long move by the wR is quite pleasant. With this in mind, I'd prefer to begin with the wK on d2 and the wB on h2, giving the wB as long a move as possible. Forsberg's helpmate is justifiably famous. It's nice that every mate is model, and it's somewhat surprising that such a task could be achieved without needing any other pieces (for soundness).

Korhonen's helpmates each have play analogous to series-movers (in which one side remains stationary). It seems that Black (for the most part) just does his/her thing without caring what White is up to. Friedel's problem has a similar effect, but of course in that problem, Black's first two moves are forced so that the wP can move.

Nunn's H# from Hollenstedt is cute, though the 1. Kd5 solution in part b doesn't seem to be thematically related to the other two solutions. In fact, it seems quite possible that this solution was unintended. While Nunn's 2002 H#s were pleasant enough, it must be admitted that the solutions aren't terribly interesting. Moreover, it seems that some of the pieces used were unnecessary for the problem content. (For example, in the first "2" problem, the bNd4 can be safely removed, both improving the problem economy and making the mate ideal.) This is always a question in "shape" problems--is it worth it to add material to create the shape even if it doesn't improve the problem content?

Hoeg's retro is nice, but I still prefer Smullyan's problem from last year's competition (in which the location of the wK had to be determined.) In both problems, the last three ply can be determined, but in Smullyan's problem you don't even need to be told where the wK is! I wonder if Hoeg's problem is more economical since it contains only four pieces whereas Smullyan's contains five after the wK is put back on the board.

Miscellaneous comments: I enjoyed working on these problems. Admittedly, I had seen many of them before (and the remaining ones were usually quite simple), but this at least served to boost my ego! Of course, it's hard to find truly difficult problems without resorting to fairy stipulations now that powerful computer programs are readily available. (In fact, the retros are probably the only problems that cannot be solved by computers yet.) Perhaps, in the future, you could choose less well-known studies.

Yours is one of the websites that I visit on a daily basis. The news you print on the frontpage is usually interesting. The Online Database has proven very useful to me. However, I would suggest that you merge the Download and Support sections. If someone is looking for, say, a program patch, it isn't always obvious which section it would be in. Overall, keep up the good work!

Abraham Fotiadis, Athens, Greece
Bringing out a puzzles page is a very good idea. I like most of them very much. Specially the abstract ones, like helpmate, selfmate, retro, or like finding the players names when only the knight's moves are given (last year). They are not boring but interesting to problem solvers as well as to ordinary chess players. On the other hand, only combinations or mate in 3 problems would not distinguish you from a tactics/problems book. The other advantage is that computers are not so much helpful. I have seen puzzles of other chess portals, asking for historical details like "...how many times did Kasparov castle long with black against Karpov..." and stuff like this. I don't like searching for something like this. Difficulty is OK too, in general continue this way. My suggestion: more often! Why not three or four times a year, (for the start, later every month). I visit your page daily. What I admire is the fact that your page is renewed so often, which means that you are working on it. I also enjoy playing online, the Playchess portal is well designed. I managed to climb to 1915 points with username "abe" (by the way, a nice nickname found by Mr. Friedel after my attempt to solve last year's puzzle, when he wrote: "Sorry abe, the courier steals keys"). OK, although full of compliments, that all has been my true point of view.

Hrayr Sayadian, Alexandria, VA, USA
Itremendously enjoy your website and am grateful for the effort ChessBase puts in maintaining it. I suggest that you include a folder (icon) that directs visitors to chess info sites, including but not limited to a site giving Calendar of chess tournaments/events.

Gábor Gyuricza, Budapest, Hungary
Originally I was born in Brazil, but I moved to Hungary six years ago with my wife and four kids. In problem one White must have said: "Let's change sides!" Therefore, what has changed is the direction the pawns move, the white defendant cannot go "backwards" (to cover the check) and therefore white is checkmated, he loses the game! A few weeks ago I was playing a friendly email game against a strong Brazilian friend and, at a certain moment, I had the option of sacrificing my bishop on h7 with a dangerously looking check, or attacking him with a different plan in mind. I chose the second and got an email from him, saying: "You missed a win, why didn't you take my pawn on h7?" I replied that I was sure it led to nothing on the long run. He said: "...let's start a new game with this same position, but now I am white and take your pawn, check! I will prove you that I am right!" Well... we did what he suggested, but he lost this "second" game! So this is the source of my inspiration. I hope my reply is correct. :-)

Michael S. McKee, Muncie IN, USA
Congratulation for your puzzle contest. I think it's a good idea or I would not have spent many hours thinking about the solutions. I almost didn't participate when I saw the first question. After spending about half an hour on the first question and having no idea what the answer was I was going to spend my time doing something else. But I checked the contest rules, which said you didn't have to solve them all, and then I decided to look at the other questions and to participate.

Jean-Luc Duriez, Voisins-le-Bretonneux, France
I enjoy the puzzles, and even if most of them are not useful to improve one's play due to their special nature, they show the beauty of chess and are quite fun to solve. I am a regular consumer of them. They are like a breeze of fresh air in these computer times.

The ChessBase site is a must for the international chess community. Over the years it has become more and more informative and fun. With the daily update of the main page you attract many readers, and this is well deserved as you offer real added value material. I appreciate also Mig's articles. On the support and documentation side, I am a true supporter of the T-Notes. But beside this, I find the support pages of low value. Your software is last word in chess, but quite difficult to master if you enter in details. It deserves more explanations, FAQ, and most of all practical examples.

Sergei Vasilevsky, Urbana, IL, USA
I'm a senior at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and a hobby chess player. I think you guys are doing a great job with the site. I love the player and game database available online. And Mig's column is humorous and informative. I think you should make your playing zone free to the public with GM lessons available for "premium" members.

Jan H. Lubbers, Kortgene, Netherlands
Interesting puzzles, a right mix of easy and difficult, funny and serious. I am a retired Dutch ambassador, now 83 years old. I started playing chess in 1935 on the occasion of the first World Championship match Euwe-Aljechin. My main interest today is correspondence chess, both postal and by e-mail. Your ChessBase website is one of my favorites.

Henk Mannen, Utrecht, Netherlands
I really liked the compositions, I haven't done a lot of solving compositions in my chess carreer, but these puzzles made me sleep bad for some nights, I was getting really addicted! Some problems were harder than others, but they were a good mix of different composition styles! Thanks for the interesting problems and good luck with the competition!

George Mavridis, Thessaloniki, Greece
The Christmas puzzle content is something that I wait for every year. This year's puzzles were excellent and I hope that you'll keep up the good work. I also think that you must keep as you did in the past give us some puzzles from Grandmaster's games, to make us try to think and plan as the best do.

Guido Bojack, Wiesbaden, Germany
Many thanks for these amazing and delightful puzzles and for having a lot of cosy hours with my chessmen. One idea: could you offer "self-mate" and "reflex-mate" problems in later puzzles to complete this wonderful world of chess problems for chess-problem-newbies like me?

Verlinden Dirk, Merksem, Belgium
This contest took me hours analysing positions, pondering around why move x was or wasn't good and moving pieces over my chessboard. After all it was worth the job, because finding the solution to these beautiful problems after hours of work, gives a lot of pleasure. If this idea is repeated next Christmas, I know for sure that I'll be present again. Thank you ChessBase, and best wishes to you all. Keep on going!

Peter Rail, Texas, USA
I like your Christmas chess puzzles and found them very enjoyable and challenging. Just the right level of difficulty so that I'm not sure of my solutions. I also admire your web site and check it daily for chess news. I like Mig's columns best and read his ninja web site too. I hope you keep him around even though he is a smart ass. I often read the German pages too. There are some news items that are very interesting there but you don't always translate and repeat them on the English page. I wish you would because my German is only about Elo 1200 so I don't always get the jokes!

Gang Chen, McLean, Virginia
First I would like to thank you for the fantastic chess site. This is the best place for me to get my daily chess dosage. Please keep up the good work!

Brian Stewart, San Jose, CA, USA
Other than the helpmates, I liked all the puzzles. I've never tried to solve a helpmate before, and after trying the examples you gave, I don't have the urge to try again. If you're trying to make the case that these are good puzzles for amateurs to try, then you failed miserably. On the good side, though, I really liked the rest of the puzzles, especially Puzzle 5. Puzzle 6 was... interesting. You have to say who came up with that rearrangement of the song! Puzzle 2 was especially challenging, and I would wager that a lot of the entries won't have that one right. All in all, a good mix of easy and challenging puzzles. Just lose the helpmates!

Brian Stewart, San Jose, CA, USA (later)
Well, you'll be glad to know that all the nights I lie awake thinking about Frederic Friedel's helpmate problem (puzzle 4) haven't been for naught. I at least was able to figure out one aspect of the problem. With Black's king on b4, the helpmate goes as follows: 1.Rb5 h5 2.Rhb6 h6 3.Ka3 h7 4.Rb3 h8Q 5.R6b4 Qa1#. As for why that's not an acceptable problem, I'd assume that there's an alternate solution, but I can't fathom what it would be.

Derek Grimmell, Ph.D., Lincoln, NE, USA
I am a neuropsychologist by training, currently working for the Nebraska Department of Corrections, also known as the state prison. In general, I enjoy the puzzles on your page immensely. These were perhaps somewhat easier than last year's, of which I think I got only one right. But wait -- perhaps I'm getting better! And let's not even talk about John Nunn's Christmas 1999 puzzle -- you recall, the one that ends with NxR mate. I spent about 5 hours on that one to no avail. Also, I appreciate when you pull out combinations from an ongoing tournament as a brief puzzle page. Your ranking of the puzzles' ease is generally very accurate and helps me track my progress in tactics.

You may want to know that I have your site as one of only two that I can reach by hot keys. The other is Chess Cafe. Yours is hot key #1, because it changes on a daily basis. Perhaps that is the best compliment I can give --your site is usually the first place I go when I log on.

Thomas Lemoine, Fontenay-sous-Bois, France
I found this year's problems rather easy; at any rate, much easier than last year. Apart from the study from Moravec, which is hard to spot if you don't know it (but I'd bet I won't be the only contestant who knew it before), I solved every other problem in less than 10 minutes. Either I made huge progress in problem solving since last year (I couldn't made heads or tails of most problems in last year's contest), or there was really a big difference.

Prof Chad Johnson, Plano, TX, USA
Some of the puzzles were fairly easy while others (like #2) took me a few hours to get through, so for me they presented a good balance of difficulty. It's true that I'm not a very strong player, so perhaps these puzzles are too easy for some chess enthusiasts; it may also be that the puzzles are a little easier because many of them use the same tricks (eg, promoting a pawn to a knight). However, I enjoyed them very much. I think putting up challenges like this is a good way to get more of the average-strength players to visit your site and have some fun with the game. Encore!

Fadi George Qassis, The holy lands of Palestina
I’d like to express my admiration of your website which I couldn’t found any other place on net. It was by chance that I went to your website while searching and it wasn’t long time ago, but since that day I can say that I enter your site on daily basis to check for news. I also copy many games that you offer as .pgn, thank you for this. I’m satisfied of the contents of your website and have no ideas to suggest at this time.

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