With this issue, The Checker Maven celebrates two full years of uninterrupted, on-time weekly publication, something that we believe no other internet checker webzine has ever accomplished. Over the past 24 months, we've seen our weekly readership grow from a handful to several thousand, as The Checker Maven has become a Saturday morning staple for many a checker enthusiast. By any measure, it's the world's most widely read checkers and draughts publication.

For our part, we're grateful to all of you for making us a success far beyond anything we would have ever believed possible, and we hope to be able to continue to publish for a long time to come.

To celebrate the day, we'd like to go back to our favorite "coffee and cake" theme. This is an idea created by none other than Willie Ryan, about a problem that you'd set up for your checker pals and bet them coffee and cake that they can't win it. Well, today's coffee and cake problem gives them a fighting chance. It isn't really that difficult if you can see the winning method, so you might actually have to pay up on this one.

BLACK

WHITE
White to Play and Win

W:WK22,19,18:B21,11,10.

Our thanks to Brian Hinkle, to whom we owe coffee and cake many times over, for sending us this problem. Solve it, check your solution by clicking on Read More, and then treat yourself--- to coffee and cake, of course.

Solution

If you saw it, it's easy enough. White makes an exchange to get "the move" and Black is either trapped or goes into a two for one shot.

22-17 21-25 17-21---A 25-30---B 18-14 10-17 21-14 30-26---C 19-15 White Wins.

A---10-14 is a clever try for a draw. There follows 18-9 25-30 and now it would seem Black can win the man on 19 and obtain a draw, but White has the surprising move 21-25! 30-21 and now the Black King is out of position, and the man on 11 falls instead: 9-6 21-17 6-2 17-14 (or 17-22) 2-7 White Wins.

B---29-25 18-14 10-17 21-14 29-25 14-18 and White Wins on the move.

C---30-25 14-18 and White Wins on the move.

A nice problem with a theme seen often in practice, and some fascinating twists and turns. And now, off to the coffee shop!