Jesus de La Villa - 100 Endgames You Must Know: Vital Lessons for Every Chess Player Improved and Expanded

100 Endgames You Must Know

Shortlisted for The Guardian Chess Book of the Year Award

[Former Womens World Chess Champion Alexandra Kosteniuk] said she had really enjoyed De la Villas 100 Endgames You Must Know and had made flashcards out of the 100 positions. One side of the card had the position, the solution was written out on the reverse, and she quizzed herself until she knew all 100.

Elisabeth Vicary, USCF Online

If you really have no patience for endgames, at least read Jesus de la Villas 100 Endgames You Must Know.

Gary Walters Chess

The greatest strength of the book: breaking things down into well-worded chunks of easily digestible information.

Marsh Towers Chess Reviews

De la Villa does the job quite well. He emphasizes the practical and prefers understanding to memorization.

IM John Donaldson, jeremysilman.com

(comparing 100 Endgames with John Nunns Understanding Endgames) Though Nunns comments are clear and to the point, I found De la Villas discussions easier to digest.

Ted Greiner, British Correspondence Chess Association

Admirable

Justin Horton, Kingpin Magazine

A clear exposition of the most imortant endgames, with exercises to test your knowledge.

British Chess Magazine

The instructional explanations, the many diagrams and the pleasant presentation make this endgame book an interesting publication for club players with a rating from 1600.

Max Euwe Centre, Amsterdam

An excellent book to enhance your endgame skills.

Johan Hut, Gooi- en Eemlander

Every club player should study this splendid book.

B.H.Wilders, Nederlands Dagblad

We all admired 100 Endgames for its clarity and practical value.

Danny King & Ronan Bennett, The Guardian

I like it a lot. It may be the first chess book since more than 25 years I will study thoroughly.

WIM Rike Wohlers-Armas

Jess de la Villa

100 Endgames You Must Know

Vital Lessons for Every Chess Player

Fourth, Improved Edition

New In Chess 2015

New In Chess

First Edition May 2008

Second Edition August 2009

Third, Improved and Extended Edition November 2012

Fourth, Improved Edition September 2015

Published by New In Chess, Alkmaar, The Netherlands

www.newinchess.com

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission from the publisher.

Cover design: Ron van Roon

Translation: Patricia Llaneza Vega

Correction: Steve Giddins

Supervisor: Peter Boel

Proofreading: Ren Olthof

Production: Anton Schermer

ISBN: 978-90-5691-617-6

Introduction

The relative importance of the endgame

In my first years in the world of chess, I used to read a lot about the importance of a good knowledge of endgames and the futility of studying openings. I used to find this kind of statement not only in Capablancas works, but also in many articles from magazines of that time: sentences like Grandmasters greater understanding is most clearly noticeable in the endgame and similar things. Strategy used to receive the same, or similar, treatment when compared to tactics. You could read sentences like Grandmasters spend much more time in developing plans rather than in calculating variations and so forth. That could be the reason why I, who spent almost my whole time during the games in calculating variations accurately, and devoted much more time to the study of openings rather than the endgame, could not even imagine that I would one day become a grandmaster.

It took me a long time to discover that all those recommendations were fairly exaggerated, but perhaps I should be grateful to them, as I do not know whether, otherwise, I would have paid to the endgame the attention this stage of the game truly deserves. My concern about those statements by famous players led me to devote some time to the study of the endgame, which eventually I enjoyed.

It is true, however, that it was not easy. One of my first decisions, a rather drastic one, actually, was to buy Rook Endings, by Levenfish & Smyslov, a book as excellent as it is boring. I had to start reading it several times, as I found it extremely difficult to get beyond the first one or two chapters. Nevertheless, in the end I managed to absorb some of the material.

Recently, the openings have taken over as overwhelmingly the main area of chess study. All great players spend most of their time researching new variations, in order to surprise their opponents and obtain as large an advantage (or as small a disadvantage) as possible, before the game itself really begins. But do not be fooled: it is not that these players have discovered that there is no value in studying the endgame, merely that they have already done their homework and at least have a good command of the most important endings. Of course, there are some distinguished exceptions, as you can see now and then in a few of the games and examples in this book, in which top players seriously misplay basic endgames, but, generally speaking, top players have good endgame technique. The fact is that the number of important theoretical endgames, and especially those which are of practical relevance, is much smaller than the field of openings. Those top players have already paid their dues, as it were, that is, they have studied the necessary endgame material in the past, and now they can devote greater efforts to other aspects of the game, without fear of losing unnecessary half-points in the endgame, during tournaments.

Therefore, if you intend to reach a certain rating, I will not say that a good command of the endgame is essential, but it is certainly very useful. On the other hand, if you neglect this part of the game, many half points, or even full points, will now and then elude you. And you will rarely get wins in the opening to make up for those lost (half-)points, as nowadays everyone comes to their games armed to the teeth with opening preparation. To put it simply: a player who reaches a certain level as regards theory, strategy and tactics, will lose many points if his mastery of the endgame does not correspond with that same level. Thus, the study of the endgame will be the most straightforward way to improve his rating. If his mastery of the endgame is at the same level as his other skills, this effort would not be so profitable, but my experience suggests that this is not the case with most players.

Why is this? Well, any player with some years of experience, even if his rating is below 2000, knows the story: Studying the endgame is boring; Half (if not 90%) of the endings I look at are quickly forgotten; I cant find a book with good explanations; and, perhaps the smartest excuse of all, My games never reach the endgame! This is especially true of the games of players who avoid the endgame deliberately, sometimes by means of excessively risky play in the middlegame; such players often lose in the middlegame, as a direct result, although they generally explain away their defeats by blaming them on tactical blunders, or time-trouble, or some similar excuse.

This tendency to neglect the endgame has grown as the rates of play have become faster and adjournments have been eliminated. Previously, adjournments allowed deep analysis of positions (often endings) and helped players to develop their endgame technique and their appreciation of the endgame. Moreover, accurate play in endgames was possible with enough time on the clock, and those games were worth analysing, as they were fine works of art, with the study of which we could improve our overall chess understanding. Now it is rare that an ending is played with reasonable time on the clock, which leads to real comedies of errors. Consequently, the analysis of contemporary endgames is often more useful as Laughter Therapy than as a chess lesson. But precisely due to that lack of time on the clock, a good command of basic endgames is even more necessary than ever. If you are running out of time and do not have a clue about how to handle the position, the game is much more likely to end in disaster.