Mistakes in draughts literature – 3 (Article from the website “Draughts for everyone”)

26.11.2024

We are starting a series of publications devoted to errors in the assessment and analysis of positions found in the draughts literature.Currently, a lot of draughts literature has already been published, in which in total you can find literally everything about the game of draughts. However, it is no secret that in some draughts books there are errors in the assessment and analysis of specific positions that arise when playing draughts.

This is not surprising, it is almost impossible to play draughts accurately, therefore, both players and authors of draughts publications are mistaken. It is important for beginners and inexperienced draughts players to understand that when studying draughts literature, everything does not need to be considered the absolute truth, it is necessary to critically evaluate all the information encountered. This will not only help not to repeat the published errors in the evaluation and analysis of draughts positions, but will also serve as an excellent training for those who independently check and make sure that the printed versions are correct (or erroneous).

We offer interesting information on this topic, received from Dmitry Anurin, who has extensive experience playing Russian checkers and is well acquainted with draughts literature. The errors discovered by Dmitry in draughts publications are of great importance for the correct assessment of the positions under consideration. Below we publish some of them.

Chart 1

Source Books:

Malamed V. “Course of draughts endings” 1989, p.17, No. 8

Fedorov M. “Encyclopedia of the endgame” 2010, part 1, p. 53, d. 125

In these books, 1.cd2 ad8 is proposed (with other moves, the black queen dies faster) 2.eh4 da5 3.de1 ad8 4.ea5 and White wins.

However, in the starting position, White’s winning path may be one move shorter: 1.cg5 ad8 2.gh4 da5 3.hd8 x.

Chart 2

Source book: Litvinovich V., Perchenok I. “School of positional play” 1984, p. 152, 499

According to the authors of the book, this position is one of the tasks for an independent decision. However, the answer given for verification (on page 180) is incorrect. The authors of the book propose to win in this position by creating a destructive bundle for the opponent: 1.fe3 ac3 2.ed4 ce5 3.gh2. However, this only leads to a draw: 3…ed4 4.fg5 hf4 5.gc7 de3 6.cb8

after 6.hg3 ed6 7.ce5 fd4 8.gf4 eg5 9.hh8 de3 with equality
does not win and 6.cd8 because of 6…ef2 7.hg5 fh4 8.dh8 fg1 and a draw
6…ef2 7.ba7 fe1 8.ae3

(in the case of 8.ac5, white also cannot win: 8…gh6 9.cf8 ec3 with a draw)

8…ec3 9.eh6 ca1 10.ha3 fg5 and possession of the main road guarantees black a draw.

White can win in the starting position in a fairly simple way: 1.gh2! ac3 2.fg5 hf4 3.gc7 x

Chart 3
Malamed V. “The course of draughts endings” 1989, p. 226, d. 856

Fedorov M. “Encyclopedia of the endgame” 2010, volume 1, p. 252, 799, part 2, p.271, 1567

This position was analyzed by Z.Cyrik.

The assessment of this position remains the same — white has a very difficult draw here. But when considering the exact version of the game leading to a draw, an inaccuracy was found. After 1.ba5 de5 2.ab4 ca3 3.ab6 ab2 4.bc7 ef4 5.cb8 fe3 6.bc7 ba1 7.cd8 fe5 8.dc7? (only move 8.hg5 leads to a draw, etc.) 8…ed4 9.cb6 the following position is obtained

In this position, Z.Cyric recommends playing 9…ac3, but Black thereby misses the win: 10.hg5 ca5 11.bd8 ed2 12.gf6 dc1 13.fe7 fd6 14.hg7 dc3 15.gf8 de5 16.dh4 c3b2 17.hg3 ed4 18.gf2 dc3 19.fh6

(Cyrik considers only 19.fd6 in this version of the game?)

19…ba1 (19…c3d2 20.hf4 de1 21.fd4 and white reaches a draw)

20.fg1 ca3

In other variants of black’s game, it is also a draw:

20…c3d2 21.hf4 =
20…ab4 21.hf8 =
20…c1b2 21.hf4 =
21.hc1 and black cannot win, for example 21…af8 22.ch6 ac7 23.hc1 cb8 (if you play 23…ch2, then 24.cb2 cd2 25 will immediately follow.bh8 =) 24.ga7 fh6 25. cb2 cd2 26.bh8 difficult draw!

In the position obtained after White’s 9th move, black can win as follows: 9…ab2 10.ba7 (10.hg5 will be followed by dc3 11.bf2 cd2, etc. black wins) 10…ba3 11.ab8 ed2 12.hg5 de1 13.gf6 ec3 with a win.

Telegram_logo Icons8