Today's problem was sent by regular contributors Lloyd and Josh Gordon of Toronto, Ontario. We were going to feature it as a speed problem, and indeed there are some speed problem aspects here. But the problem goes deeper than the first few moves, as you'll soon see.

So this month, we'll spare you the Javascript clock and let you take as much time as you need. We don't doubt that you'll see the "speed" part pretty quickly. After that, you'll likely need to think it through.

Here's the position.

BLACK

WHITE
White to Play and Win

W:W32,30,27,24,21,15,K2:BK31,22,20,14,12,3,1.

It's an interesting study. Take all the time you need, then click on Read More to see the solution.

Solution

24-19 31x24 15-10 24x6 2x25

and now White will win, although it takes some time. One way is

12-16 21-17 1-6 25-22 6-10 22-18 3-8 32-28 16-19 30-26 8-12 17-13 12-16 13-9 10-14 18-22 20-24 26-23 19x26 22x31 16-20 28x19 White Wins.

Finding the 3 for 3 shot isn't really the hard part, which lies instead in convincing yourself that White has a win on the board after the exchanges.

Proposers Lloyd and Josh suggested to us that the 21-17 and 25-22 winning sequence for White (after the exchange) looks quite logical and should be easy enough to identify. While we agree in principle, in practice we think it would require solid over-the-board playing skills to find all of this solution with the clock ticking away.

Many thanks to our cool and collected checker friends in snowy Ontario for providing us with this study.