In the previous examples we saw that the key motif to winning this endgame is to force the defending king in front of the pawn with a check, gaining time to bring the strong king closer to the pawn.

In this level, the pawn is a rook pawn (a pawn on the a-file or h-file), which makes things easier for the defender, as stalemate becomes a resource:

After the queen check, the black king goes in front of the pawn - however, there it has no legal moves. If White brings the king closer now, the game ends immediately with a draw by stalemate.

If the strong king is not close enough to the pawn, the endgame is drawn. When defending, you can always threaten to promote the pawn on the next move, and only move the king in front of the pawn if that stalemates the king. If the strong king moves closer, either the game is going to end with stalemate, or you can promote your pawn. Here is an example:

Click the diagram to play this endgame. Don't let the White king come closer!

An exception

There is an exception you have to watch out for:

Here, if you place the king in front of the pawn with 1.Ka8?, Black can actually win with 1...Kb4!, breaking the stalemate and bringing the king closer to the pawn. Also note that 1.Ka6? and 1.Kc6? lose as well, since Black can move the queen to the long diagonal and then in front of the pawn on the next move. Click the diagram to play this endgame.

Later in the course we are going to look at examples where the strong king is close enough to the rook pawn and a win is possible.