Rushing Silver.

Static rook, in the Bishop Exchange · none (the king stays on 5i) · 早繰り銀 hayakuri-gin

The idea

Rushing Silver sends the right silver forward by the shortest road. In the Bishop Exchange, after the 3f pawn, it goes 3h, 3g, 4f, and the pawn to 3e opens the third file.

If White takes, the silver recaptures on 3e, and with the pawn to 2d it joins the rook against 2d, where it can be traded for White’s defending silver. en.wikipedia calls it particularly popular in the Bishop Exchange; ja.wikipedia says that there it does well against the Climbing Silver and less well against the Reclining Silver.

It needs one more move of preparation than the Climbing Silver. Black also has to deal with a bishop drop on 1e first, because once the silver has left 3g and the rook pawn has gone, such a drop can check the king and hit the rook. shogi-rule.com notes that it is chosen less often today than the Climbing Silver and the Reclining Silver.

In the line here White rushes its own silver too; the same plan in the Double Wing Attack is Nakahara’s Rushing Silver.

How it goes together

Both sides’ moves are shown, because this opening is an agreement rather than a system: one player cannot reach it alone, so a one-sided list of moves would be a fiction.

The plan once you are set up

• Play the Bishop Exchange, then push the rook pawn to 2e. When White guards with the silver on 3c, push 3f.
• Bring the silver to 3g and then 4f.
• Before attacking, stop the bishop drop on 1e: the edge pawn to 1f, or a king move such as 6h.
• Push 3e. After White takes, the silver takes back and White drops a pawn on 3d, do not retreat: push 2d, and when everything has been taken and White drops a pawn on 2c, take the rook home with a silver in hand.
• Use the silver in hand. With the edge pawn already on 1f, the edge is a natural target.

What to watch for

• The bishop drop on 1e. With the king on 5i and the first-file pawn at home, a White bishop dropped there after the silver trade checks the king and wins the rook.
• The second pawn on the eighth file. As soon as your silver reaches 3e, White can push 8f, and after you take, drop a pawn on 8e. Taking that one too lets White’s rook recapture and attack both the silver on 3e and the knight on 8i.
• White’s pawn against the silver. Against a Reclining Silver with the pawn on 4d, White can drive the silver back with 4e, and ja.wikipedia counts this among the reasons the Rushing Silver struggles there.
• In the Double Wing version, the pawn to 3e comes before the silver to 4f: see Nakahara’s Rushing Silver.

What it is played against

In the Bishop Exchange, White usually answers with a Reclining Silver (the pawn to 6d, the silver to 6c and 5d), often adding the 4d pawn to push the silver back with 4e; shogilounge says almost every defence against the Rushing Silver is the Reclining Silver.

White can also rush its own silver, as here. Then White’s sharpest reply to the 3e break is the second pawn on the eighth file. Against the Tempo Loss Bishop Exchange, the Rushing Silver is one of Black’s two main answers.