Another Nugget from GM-Ram

I am in the K+B+P vs K+N endgame positions in the GM-Ram book and I came across this position (63)





With Black to move, he can draw by perpetual check ( sorry Chessloser). With Nd6+ and whether the king stays near the pawn and gets checked again or he moves away form the pawn and drops it.

With white to move, he can win. First the king has to move to e7 where he won’t be checked. Then, the plan is to get the bishop on the a8-h1 diagonal and then once the knight goes to d8 place the bishop on d5 and black is in Zugzwang. The Bishop on the long diagonal prevents the knight from pesky perpetual checks.

Now here is what I like about wrestling with GM-RAM. Rashid moves the entire position over one file (Position 64).





Now it becomes a draw either way because Black has a stale mate opportunity after white reaches the above goal ( Bishop on the a7-g1 diagonal on c5, 2 squares in front of Black’s Knight) Now, the zugzwang that once was has an opportunity for stalemate. Black moves the king to a8 and white can’t take the knight or else stalemate.

So for me the concepts I have to grab from this is that the if the Bishop is the wrong color of the queening square, then it needs to get 2 squares in front of the Knight that is defending that square in order to put Black in zugwang. Also, the bishop pawn can draw because of stalemate. If the Bishop were on the same color as the queening square, then he can push the knight off the square easily.