How the backgammon game can become a straight race

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The objective of the backgammon board game is to be the first player in a position to remove all their checkers from the board. This is called "bearing off" in backgammon terminology. To achieve this objective players adopt a number of strategies, the better known of which include hitting the opponent’s blots (single checkers) and building blocks of checkers to blockage the opponent’s checkers in their current positions.

The contest between the backgammon players takes this form in the early and intermediate stages of the game, but as the game progresses and the players manage to get past their opponent’s checkers, the game is transformed into a backgammon straight race, or pure race as the backgammon straight race is sometimes termed. As the expression backgammon straight race clearly indicates, this is the stage of the game when the players devote all their efforts to bringing their checkers into their home areas of the backgammon board from where they can bear them off the board.

The player to win the backgammon straight race is almost invariably the one who has given some thought to the best strategy to apply to bringing all their checkers to the home board as quickly as possible. Dice rolls of double fives and sixes are particularly prized achievements since they help the players speedily bring their checkers home. Good organization is also required when bearing off checkers. It is recommended to bear off the checkers evenly if this does not adversely impact on the speed with which you can bear off. Additionally, the increased tension as the game draws to a close should not lead a player to abandon the caution required bearing off checkers while primes are still in place.