chess online

A very good puzzle. Congratulations.

took me a few minutes trying to visualise the solution, I thought maybe a Rook sac at first. Interesting that it's only mate in 3 because Black has a delaying move rather than a defence.

Good puzzle. Nice to see one with no queen, because I usually just sacrifice them first without thinging about the puzzle and 9 out of 10 times it's the right move.

This was a position I would have solved almost instantly in a game, but which took some time as a puzzle. That's the reverse of the usual comment, but sometimes puzzles are difficult because they're puzzles.

When looking at the position, the first thing that came to mind was the Arabian Mate. You know, the one that goes like this:

Any time I see a position when a White knight can reach f6 and the rook is on the h-file, this is the first idea I investigate.

So I saw the key move quidkly, and that the Black pieces couldn't help out and that Black had no realistic counterattack. In a game, I would have made the move at this point and started to make plans for lunch.

But in a puzzle, the goal is not just to checkmate Black, but to do it in a specified number of moves. Often in puzzles, a quiet first move by White will not be correct because Black has some ridiculous checks that string out the game just enough to spoil the solution.

So when I saw that Black had a check, I assumed White had to check all the way. That's what usually happens in easy puzzles, anyway. So I started down the wrong paths instead of trusting my instincts, as I would have done in a game.

What puzzles can teach well is a disciplined approach to thinking instead of a scattergun one that makes assumptions instead of analyzing carefully. That's always been my weakness, and a reason I'm much lower-rated here than I was in over-the-board play. The systematic approach really pays off in correspondence games, even if it's not as enjoyable as Insta-Solving.

My thoughts exactly! See puzzle #92166.