Two part puzzle

This is from a finished game (not one of mine!)

Part 1. Can you find Black's winning move in this position?

Well done, that is indeed the winning move.

It was a 1700 player who played it, and I was very surprised, but perhaps it's easier to find than I thought.

Originally posted by Sicilian Smaug
Rxf4! is the winning move

...Rxf4!
exf4, e3
f3, e2!
Re1, Bxf3 with forced mate.

I saw that immediately but I have been doing a huge amount of tactics puzzles recently😉. Maybe a 1600 player would see it and have the confidence to play it, perhaps less, I'm not too sure.

Actually after 4.Re1 I think 4....Qg3+ is more accurate than 4...Bxf3, otherwise the king can escape via f2.

...hmm, by just looking at it, I cant see how Rxf4 fails....

If it were an RHP game however, I'd whip out the analysis board and check every variation.....

On closer Inspection I found another continuation, which seems less risky:-


Qg4+ Kh2 Qxh4+ Kg2 Qg4+ Kh2 Rf5 Qxf5 Qxf5


^ while objectivly weaker, it should still win the game and its a lot easier to calculate.

Ill play it against fritz to see what happens

Rxf4!. took about 2 seconds to see the move and about 5 seconds to conclude that the move would be most probably winning and about 2 minutes to calculate main lines (Rxf4 exf4 e3 f3 (or Qd8+ Kh7) e2 winning)

This puzzle is generally pretty easy, since if you look at this position, you logically start to think about how to get that pawn on e4 out of the way.