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To draw, White needs to exchange his front f-pawn for Black’s e-pawn. If he can pull that off, it will be a standoff: Black’s king will be stuck defending against three connected White pawns on the kingside and White’s king will have to do the same against Black’s queenside pawns. But to accomplish this, White has to be able to retake on f4 with the king, so he has to play Ke3 first and then f4.
Therein lies the key to Black’s winning strategy. Alekhine mistakenly played 32…c5, following the principle that passed pawns should be pushed, and a draw was agreed after 33.Ke3 since White can now play f4 and execute the above strategy.
In fact Black’s a-pawn is much more dangerous than the passed c-pawn, because it is farther from White’s king. The winning idea is 32…a5 33.Ke3 a4, and White’s plan is up in smoke because the king can’t go to f4 and still stop Black’s queenside pawns. If 34.f4 exf4 35.Kxf4, then a3 followed by b4 and b3 queens a pawn. Equally hopeless is 35.Kd4 fxg3 36.fxg3 b4 37.Kc4 c5, and Black’s king can proceed to snack on White’s two remaining kingside pawns.
Black’s advantage has to be on the queen side. if he can get an advantage quick then he probably has to push a queen side pawn. Moving the king to the queen side looks a little slow. also the king can help defend the king side.
3 pawns across are powerful. but you really need to push past the a pawn which is an attempt to develop an outside passer. as far away from the white king as possible.
if the white kings has to move back and forth a file to h file it wastes too much time.
I would push a5 and c5 and see what white does and work from there to try to keep pushing the pawns.
jeff posted while I was working on the problem. Nice work Jeff. I felt both a5 and c5 were equal and did not think about the f4 kxf4 at all. nice piece of analysis. I think you have the correct answer.
Ok I hope you will se the line I found it is a bit barried among other less sucesfull lines:
1… a5 (1… g6 {I know a dumb move ….}2. Ke3 Ke7 3. f4 Ke6 4. fxe5 Kxe5 5. g4 c5 6. h5 gxh5 7. f4+ Kf6 8. gxh5 c4 9. Kd4 Kf5 10. Kc3 Kf6 (10… a6 11. Kd4 a5 12. a4) 11. Kd4 Kg7 12. f5 a6 13. Kc3)(1… c5 2. Ke3 a5 (2… Ke7 {The king shuld be activated in situations like
this only later I fund out that he is actualy postet preety good} 3. f4 exf4+ 4. Kxf4 Ke6 5. Ke4 a5 (5… c4) 6. f4 c4 7. g4 b4 8. Kd4 c3 9. Kd3 a4 10. a3 c2 11. Kxc2 b3+ 12. Kb2 Kd5 13. h5 Ke4 14. g5 Kf5 15. Kc3) (2… c4 {I had a hunch black shuld try to attack on the queen side as fast as posible!}
3. f4 {This move frees black in all situations}) 3. f4 exf4+ 4. Kxf4 a4 5. Ke4 a3 6. Kd5 c4 7. Kd4 g5 {Another dumb move …} (7… Kf7 8. g4) 8. hxg5 Kf7 9. f4 Kg6 10. g4) (1… Kf7 2. Ke3 Kf6 3. g4 c5 4. f4 {f4 must be prevented! (it is only a draw if f4 is played)} a5 5. fxe5+ Kxe5 6. h5 b4 7. f4+ Kf6 8. Ke4 c4 9. g5+ Kf7 10. f5 b3 11. axb3 cxb3 12. Kd3 a4 13. Kc3 Kg8 14. Kb2 Kf7 15. Kc3) (1… Ke7 2. Ke3 Kd6 (2… a5 3. f4 exf4+ 4. Kxf4 a4 5. Ke4 Kd6 (5… c5 6. f4 b4 7. Kd3 a3 8. Kc4 Ke6 9. g4) 6. f4 c5 7. g4 b4 8. Kd3 Kd5 9. h5 c4+ 10. Kc2 Kd4 11. g5 b3+ 12. axb3 axb3+ 13. Kb1 Kd3 14. h6
gxh6 15. gxh6 Kd2 16. Kb2 c3+ 17. Kxb3 c2 18. h7 c1=Q 19. h8=Q Qd1+ 20. Kb4 Qb1+ 21. Kc5 Qc2+ 22. Kd5 Qb3+ {This line is actualy close … only th move order is incorrect, but a4, a5 started to look like a nice idea!}) 3. h5 c5 (3… Kd5 4. g4 {well f4 is going to be played, the idea was to run with the king to the queen side – yep not a very good idea …}) 4. g4 Kd5 (4… a5 5. f4 exf4+ 6. Kxf4 Kd5 7. Kf5 c4 8. g5 c3 9. h6 gxh6 10. g6) 5. f4 exf4+ 6. Kxf4 c4 7. g5 Kd4 (7… c3 8. Ke3 Kc4 9. h6) 8. h6 c3 (8… g6) 9. hxg7 c2 10. g8=Q c1=Q+ 11. Kf5 Qc2+ 12. Kf6 Qxf2+ {Ok now i definetly now that f4 equalises and therefore I must find a line where it can not be played}) 2. Ke3 a4 3. Kd2 (3. f4 exf4+ 4. Kxf4 (4. gxf4 c5 5. Kd3 {Thw white king is stuck on the queen side and the white pawns are just easy pickings! :D}) 4… a3 5. Ke4 b4 6. Kd4 (6. Kd3 b3 {and black wins})) 3… b4 4. Kd3 c5 5. Kc4 Ke7 6. Kd3 Kd6 7. Kc4 Ke6 8. g4 Kd6 9. Kd3 Kd5 10. Kd2 c4 11. h5 c3+ 12. Kd3 a3 (12… Kd6 13. a3 {Here we simply have to prevent a3 and it is easy we play it ourselves … :D})
(12… Kc5 13. g5 {I’m not shure but I think that I have enough tempi to win in this line to, but a3 is much simpler!}) 13. g5 Ke6 {White king can’t move from the queen-side so all we have to do is eat he king side pawns and queen, easy …} 14. Kc2 Kf5 15. h6 gxh6 16. gxh6 Kg6 17. h7 Kxh7 0-1
Ok if you can’t find the main line I found while analysing I’m not surprised 😀 so here it is in all of her glory 😀
1… a5 2. Ke3 a4 3. Kd2 b4 4. Kd3 c5 5. Kc4 Ke7 6. Kd3 Kd6 7. Kc4 Ke6 8. g4 Kd6 9. Kd3 Kd5 10. Kd2 c4 11. h5 c3+ 12. Kd3 a3 13. g5 Ke6 {White king can’t move from the queen-side so all we have to do is eat he king side pawns and queen, easy …} 14. Kc2 Kf5 15. h6 gxh6 16. gxh6 Kg6 17. h7 Kxh7 0-1
But it goes against the principles – as I found out all king moves draw (so im not surprised if Alekhine did not find it it took me more then 1/2h … on the other hand it shuld have taken Alekhine a lot less 😀 …
D.K.
I think Ke8 wins…it’s a feeling I get. Looks allright.
Rexman
This ending is covered in Reuben Fine’s Basic Chess Endings on p. 67 (the old edition — I don’t have Benko’s revision) starting from a few moves before the diagram given here. Jeff Melton added some insightful commentary that is not in Fine’s book, however.