Prokes Manoeuvre
Endgame - 2 connected pawns V Rook
Pawns become more powerful as they approach the promotion squares!!! When you have 2 connected pawns well advanced even a powerful Rook will struggle to stop them. Here we look at Prokes manoeuvre, which is useful to know, that enables the side defending with the Rook to get a draw.
Lets look at our starting position: 
It is important to get the King close to help out our troubled Rook. So first move shown is obvious but then opponent has 2 possible pawn moves. If The attacker advances a pawn without attacking our Rook we can move our King closer still. But what happens when the pawn advances and does attack Rook?
lets see: 
The attacked Rook has 2 possible checks but the main move is to keep the Rook at the back to protect any promotion squares. The other check has the problem of the King and Rook treading on each others toes - a bit like me on the dance floor!!! Yes you have been seeing disco balls so you are not going mad!!!!
Anyway the Black King stays in touch with his pawns by moving to d4 but White King then gets to advance further cutting off more squares from opposing King. Things are hotting up as pawns advance but then the Rook has a key drawing manoeuvre!!!
Prokes manoeuvre:
The key move is to sacrifice the Rook in order to move the attackers King away from his pawns. This gives our King time to capture 1 pawn and then slip into the stalemate position. The variation shows that if the Black King avoids taking the Rook then another Prokes manoeuvre is possible to lure the King away.
A final try at avoiding the Rook capture also fails for Black.
lets see:
The King avoids capturing after first Prokes manoeuvre but then a second Prokes is played. If the Black King tries to avoid again our King is able to capture a pawn!!! The other pawn is then lost so the Rook must be captured.
Hope you enjoyed the manoeuvring today unlike my manoeuvring on the dance floor.
