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No one ever won a game by resigning.

I came across this chess puzzle
lichess.org/training/37902
and immediately recognized it.

The game is Von Popiel - Marco, Monte Carlo 1902 and it is a classic. Why? Black actually resigned in this position! ^^

Here is a list of 35 examples of people resigning in won positions
http://timkr.home.xs4all.nl/chess2/resigntxt.htm

I can relate as I tend to resign too early and be sort of emotional about it. When I realize I missed something I sometimes just shake hands and walk away cursing to myself.
Nice puzzle, a little counter-intuitive at first. It took me a bit of time as I was looking at long variations and stuff... It's one thing to be told "find the winning move" and quite another to face the same situation in an actual game; if I had faith in my opponent I could well see myself resigning there, too.

Recently the opposite happened to me. It was a correspondence (!) game and the position was neither winning nor losing (dixit Stockfish)... we had just started! Granted, the opening is slightly off-beat, but not completely crazy I would think.
Here it is:
http://fr.lichess.org/bqAtJYs4

To give some context, I know he is by far the better player (nevermind our ratings in correspondence, mine is widely inflated and he is 2000+ in blitz, top 50 in every variant). Is it possible that he played so quickly he thought I had just blundered a bishop? Of course I can't be sure but to me it looked like the kind of reaction you describe in your last sentence, while the position is still fine.
That's why I always have a look at the last few moves in my correspondence games.

I don't know if I ever resigned in a won position, but I'll always remember this game:

I offered a draw thinking he had a perpetual check on h3 and e6 - and was shocked when I saw the engine evaluation. Took me a while to see the winning move.
#1 i came across the same puzzle too recently! i also new the answer when i did it cause id seen it before too.
For some reason, I'm quite a bit better player when I play people who are stronger players than myself. When I play low rated players, I'm too focused on and nervous about the potential to lose rating, and resign easily, but when I play skilled players I see more, and capitalize on mistakes by my opponent even when I'm losing -- I'm one of those jackasses who clings on till the better end and ends up drawing, or even winning.
I have managed to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat and also have blundered winning positions... so it can work both ways and obviously if resignation had taken place then neither side would have the opertunity to blunder or rescue the game.

There is a time and a place for resignation though... when you are overwhelmingly beaten (like you have 2 pawns vs a queen and a rook) it seems unsporting to put your opposition through the motions.

It seems much more likely in casual games where there is no rating on the line, quite a few quick resigners recently have given up even though they held advantage. Maybe if they just don't fancy the line the game has taken they cannot be bothered to finish it.

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