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Subject: Re: Pandolfini's Endgame Course

Author: José de Jesús García Ruvalcaba

Date: 10:12:07 10/08/04

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On October 08, 2004 at 08:49:58, Rick Bischoff wrote:

>Does anybody have a list of errors in this book?
>
>I am trying to test my engine on these simple end games.. but on this position:
>
>[D]8/8/8/8/4N3/1k6/1p6/7K w - - 0 1
>
>It says white to move and draw with Nd2+ Kc2 Nc4 b1/Q Na3+ Kc1 Nxb1 Kxb1, but
>crafty with EGTB shows a forced win for black:
>
>1. Kh2 Kc2! 2. Kg3! b1=Q 3. Kf4! Qa1 4. Kf5! Qd4! 5. Nf6 Kd3! 6.
>Ke6! Qe3+ 7. Kf7 Qe5 8. Ng8 Qd5+ 9. Kg7! Kd4! 10. Nf6! Qf5 11. Ne8!
>Qd7+ 12. Kf8! Ke5! 13. Ng7! Kf4 14. Ne6+ Qxe6! 15. Kg7 Qe7+ 16. Kh8
>Ke5 17. Kg8 Kf6! 18. Kh8 Qg7#
>
>This is endgame 149.

Hi,
I do not have the book, but Pandolfini is one of the worst chess authors around.
There are plenty of mistakes in his endgame "course" and most of them are taken
from other books, he did not even care to check. If I were you I would look for
this position in "Basic chess endings" by Reuben Fine, my intuition tells me
there is a good chance Pandolfini took it from there.
I do not know how strong your engine is, but I recommend "Test your endgame
ability" by Speelman and Livshits (it is difficult for weak humans and most
likely it is also difficult for weak engines), anyway test positions are not the
best way to test an engine (they say something only if your engine misses very
easy ones).
José.



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