White’s queen is loose and is about to get taken by Black’s queen. White naturally would like to play QxQ himself, but at this point it would just trade queens. Better to distract the Black queen’s guard first with 1. Rc8+. Black has to play 1. …RxR and so leave his queen loose. Time for White to play 2. QxQ? Not quite yet; for then Black has 2. …RxR+ and ends up with two rooks in return for his queen. No, before White plays QxQ he should exploit the priority of check and finish the job on the back rank. He plays 2. RxR+, RxR. Now comes QxQ, and White has won a queen and a rook for his two rooks. He enters the endgame with a queen against Black’s rook and should have no trouble winning.

The general lesson is not to be hasty in playing a payoff move like QxQ. Make sure you have exhausted the damage you can do with checks that hold the initiative; and make sure you have not left your opponent any damage to do (look at his checks) after you play your concluding capture.