Rook Endgames: the Lucena position and the Philidor defense

Rook endgames are the endings you will actually reach, and most are settled by two named positions: the Lucena position, for winning a pawn up, and the Philidor defense, for drawing a pawn down. Learn both and you convert wins that used to slip away and rescue half points from games your opponent counted as finished.

The Lucena position: building the bridge

In the Lucena, the white pawn is already on the seventh rank and the white king stands on b8, on top of its own queening square. That is the whole problem: for the pawn to promote, the king has to step aside, and the moment it does, the black rook starts checking and never stops. White's rook on c1 is already doing real work: it cuts the black king off along the c-file.

The first move is the one most people skip: 1.Rd1+. The black king cannot go to c7, which is next to the white king, and it cannot go to c8, which the b7 pawn covers, and blocking with 1...Rd2 loses the rook to 2.Rxd2. Only the e-file is left: 1...Ke7 puts the king one file further from the pawn. This check is not decoration, it is what wins the race at the end of the line.

Now the bridge: 2.Rd4. The rook steps up to the fourth rank and waits. After 2...Ra1 3.Kc7 Rc1+ 4.Kb6 Rb1+ 5.Kc6 Rc1+ 6.Kb5 Rb1+ the white king has reached b5, and the check on the b-file is met by 7.Rb4: the rook blocks and the king defends it.

There is nothing left. If Black trades with 7...Rxb4+ 8.Kxb4, the black king on e7 needs two moves (Kd7 and Kc7) to get near b8, and White queens first with 9.b8=Q. If Black declines, the checks are over and the pawn promotes anyway. Notice what that first check bought: with the black king still on d8, it would reach c7 in one move and the race would be a draw.

1. Give one check to push the enemy king one more file away from the pawn.
2. Bring the rook to the fourth rank, keeping the enemy king cut off.
3. Walk your king out towards the checking rook, down to the fifth rank.
4. On the last check, block on the fourth rank with the rook, protected by your king. Traded or not, the pawn queens.

The Philidor defense: hold the third rank

Now swap sides. You are a pawn down and the enemy pawn has not reached the sixth rank yet. This is Philidor territory, and the draw comes from two ideas: king in front of the pawn and rook on your own third rank. In the diagram Black defends: the king on e8 sits on the queening square and the rook on a6 owns the sixth rank, which is the third rank counted from Black's side.

The rook on a6 is not there to check, it is there to forbid the sixth rank to the white king. And without the king on d6 or f6, the e5 pawn cannot advance with support. White maneuvers, Black waits with the rook on the sixth rank, staying off d6 and f6, where the pawn would take it: 1.Rb7 Rc6 2.Ra7 Rb6, and nothing has changed.

The second half of the defense starts when the pawn advances: 3.e6. The sixth rank stops mattering, because now the pawn itself occupies the square the white king wanted to support it from. The rook drops to the far end of the board with 3...Rb1 and starts checking from behind. The white king has nowhere to hide: 4.Kf6 Rf1+ 5.Ke5 Re1+ 6.Kf5 Rf1+ and so on. The most testing try is 4.Ra8+, but 4...Ke7 5.Ra7+ Ke8 changes nothing: the e6 pawn takes d7 and f7 away from the black king and keeps it exactly where it needs to be.

The rook belongs behind the passed pawn

Outside those two positions, the rule that saves the most thinking is this one: rook behind the passed pawn, yours or your opponent's. Behind your own pawn, the rook gains range with every square the pawn advances. Behind the enemy pawn, it forces one of his pieces into babysitting duty. In front of a pawn the rook goes passive: in front of your own it has to move before the pawn can advance, and in front of the enemy pawn it only blockades.

Activity is worth more than a pawn

In rook endings an active rook beats material. A rook on the seventh rank, eating pawns from behind and confining the king to the back rank, is normally worth the pawn it cost to get there. The common error is the opposite: gluing the rook to the defense of every pawn and losing anyway with an extra pawn on the board.

Cut the king off and count the moves

Almost every rook ending turns into a race, and whoever cuts the enemy king off wins the moves he needs. Each file of distance between the enemy king and the pawn can be the difference between queening and drawing, exactly as 1.Rd1+ was in the Lucena. Defending, the priority never changes: get your king in front of the pawn before it is cut off.

• Before you trade the last pieces, see where your king ends up: in front of the pawn, or cut off.
• A pawn up with your king stuck on the queening square, look for the Lucena bridge.
• A pawn down with the enemy pawn still short of the sixth rank, set up the Philidor.
• When in doubt between defending a pawn and activating the rook, activate the rook.