A rare endgame.

I actually got that ending in my 13th USCF game!--against an expert (couldn't hold it though). 

Amazing defense. I would have crumbled under that time control. :(

no powerlevel, svidler resigned.  He is getting mated.  Rh1 is mate, so rf7 + is forced (kh7 rh1+ kg8 rh8+ kf7 rh7+ wins the rook).  So after rf7+ bf6 rh1 is still mating.  Rxf6 is forced to stop mate, and that is losing.

Yeah it seemed to come out of nowhere.

If carlsen was playing black, maybe he can do the impossible and defend the position under that pressure?

idk....  The position is exceptionally difficult to defend.  Even If I had lots of time as black and white was under time pressure, I'm not sure If I could have held it.

Difficult to defend? I guess. But It's damn hard to get the mate too -- try it against an engine giving yourself all the time in the world! 

Until this video if I'd gotten that ending with my R+B against R and my opponent extended his hand like, "everyone knows this is a draw" -- I'd have accepted the offer! 

Can anybody help me to get back to my online games via the app. I can now only access my account via google!

Actually, Rook And Bishop v Rook, assuming they are not prone to being captured in the next 5 moves or so, and that the last move was a capture, is a forced win. The annoying thing is that it takes something like 75 moves to do, which of course would lead to a draw by 50 move rule.

Uh...yeah sure (whatever you say).

I would be happy to see Capablanca play that position , I bet he's gonna win whatever color he is in like 8 moves(I'm obviously exaggerating but you get my point)

if it takes 75 moves it's not a forced win it's a draw with perfect play. but perfect play in these kinds of endgames is rather tricky

It's a forced win on the board, but the 50 move rule will make it a draw before then. If I remember correctly FIDE at some point relinquished or increased the 50 move rule for such endings.

According to wikipedia:

Computer endgame tablebases show that 40.1% of the legal positions with this material are wins, but that includes many unnatural positions that are unlikely to occur in games. Edmar Mednis estimated that less than 4% of starting positions that occur in games are theoretical wins.

how interesting, but this assumes perfect attack and defense

I guess. With wrong defence and attack, everything should be drawn.

Nice thread.  An absolute pleasure to watch the masters at work...

This shoudln't be difficult to draw (at least for professional players) once they reach that defensive setup.  I suspect the only reason he lost was time pressure.  In fact I think losses like this should be a bit embarrassing... akin to a top player failing to preform the bishop+knight mate.

Yes the win can be difficult if you haven't ever practiced it, but the pattern contains very few sidelines, so again once a professional reaches the wining position I would expect it to be easy... I mean compared to other technical endgames these aren't on the difficult end of the spectrum.