This position is taken from Jeff Ward’s 1982 book ‘Winning is More Fun’. Red was Nack Ballard and White was Kent Goulding and this was the final of the Las Vegas Open.
Bray's Learning Curve
Each week, author Chris Bray lends his sharp insight and easy-to-understand analysis to help you improve your game.
Chris is the author of multiple backgammon books, including Backgammon for Dummies, and is the backgammon columnist for The Times of London.
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Is the fact that Red has his 5-pt made enough to change his play from the standard 24/18, 13/11?
This is a tricky position. I think if you play on automatic you will choose 24/22, 16/11.
White has a reasonably well-timed 2-3 back game, but her home board could collapse with a sequence of high numbers.
We can quickly reject 8/2, 6/2 which creates an ugly structure and one that is difficult to put back together again.
Small numbers often cause a problem in backgammon because they give you so much choice.
One of the fundamental backgammon tactics is this: “attack a lone rear checker, prime an anchor”.