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Subject: Re: K+P ending in practical play - try this position!

Author: Robert Hyatt

Date: 12:19:57 10/28/98

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On October 28, 1998 at 14:44:52, Roberto Waldteufel wrote:

>
>Hi Bruce,
>
>Yes, I am familiar with Reti's famous study. In fact, this reminds me of one of
>my own studies from way back - I believe it was published at the time in the
>Problemist. White is to play and win (that's not a typo - White really has a
>forced win here!)
>
>The position: White king: g3
>                      Black king: h5
>                      White pawns: g2,h2,f3,f4
>                      Black pawns: b5,b6,f6,g6,h6
>
>I would be interested to know what programs make of this position (a) with a
>full search, and especially (b) with a static evaluation only. I have shown this
>position to many strong human players (including IMs) and they have always been
>amazed that White is not lost, let alone winning. In fact, IM Paul Littlewood
>once let his curry get cold while he analyzed this position instead of eating!
>
>This study, as well as Reti's, are excellent examples of the dangers of
>accepting the obvious superficial assessment of passed pawns.
>
>Best wishes,
>Roberto


My static eval has no hope here...  But a quick search discovers that Kh3 is
best...  with a score of near zero until depth=17, 10 seconds (ALR 4 proc
machine) where Kh3 fails high to +.5, then at 18 it fails high to +1, and will
presumably fail high again...  I stopped it after 19 plies, 1 minute...

static pawn race eval says 0.00 for that part of the evaluation because the
white king is on move and can prevent a pawn from queening at b1...

Bob



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