Pawn endgames: Complex pawn endings

It is just after move 30, and we have the current position. What is going on in this position? Black appears to have the much more active King, but he has doubled pawns on the f file. White is also up a pawn, but it is doubled too. After counting the material, it is clear white is playing for the win, but how exactly do they do this?

Well the key was to activate the King, as below:

As you can see, there were so many twists and turns in this possible variation as white was forced to lose all their Queen side pawns to win! In the game, Capablanca chose to lock the position first in order to restrict counterplay, and eventually won 13 moves later after the current position:

As you can see, it was a far from simple endgame, although it was completely winning for white. What can we learn from this game?:

1. When you are passive in a pawn endgame but have an extra pawn, denying King entry can allow you to improve your position and get an active King yourself
2. If progress does not seem possible, consider pawn possible pawn breaks and sacrifices too
3. It can get very difficult for the King to catch 2 passed pawns at once if they are very far apart

All this in just 13 moves! Of course, Capablanca is considered to be one of the best endgame players of all time, but it doesn't mean you still cannot learn  something from this. The next game doesn't look as complex, but it is actually still quite unusual in how white won it:

Mikhail Botvinnik - Salomon Flohr (USSR Championship 1944)

Mikhail Botvinnik is considered the father of Soviet chess, as he influenced and helped it become a chess super power which dominated the world. Here, it almost looks like his only hope is a draw:

It is just after move 44. White has doubled b pawns, and a Kingside minority, but has a central passed pawn as well as a King which is much easier to activate than Black's. With possibly just the 2 latter points mentioned, it is +8 according to stockfish, and it wants to play out the endgame like this:

Well, there were some wierd moves in that endgame played by Stockfish, so let's see how Mikhail Botvinnik actually won this "completely winning" endgame

Botvinnik won that pawn endgame without too much difficulty, but what can we learn?

1. Breaking up majorities with a minority attack can be quite useful when restricting counterplay
2. Doubled pawns in endgames which are not connected to other pawns can be bad if the pawn in front is isolated as they do not stop anything, while doubled pawns stopped by a pawn couple at least mean that pushing these pawns will lead to undoubling the doubled pawns. (They however can be useful as a reserve tempo to seize the opposition)
3. Kings tend to become very inactive if they are tied down to a passed pawn and must sacrifice valuable time to protect other pawns

Even when you get such wierd pawn endgames, it is important to take factors in carefully and not give up in your evaluation of the position. Now we will go into the final game of this lesson (the simplest pawn endgame win of these games, but the hardest to find how to win immediately due to natural ideas):

Erich Cohn - Akiba Rubinstein (St Petersburg 1909)

For this one I will not show what engine suggested as I want you to fully appreciate how it was won.

The position above looks quite simple. King activity looks around the same, there is the same number of pawns on both sides of the board. At most white has a doubled f-pawn, but it seems difficult to take advantage of it and the position looks roughly equal... except black is completely winning (-6.4). But how? White hardly has any disadvantages. So how can black be completely winning? Well, once you see the incredible idea Rubinstein found, you can truly appreciate how tricky pawn endgames can be and how this is completely winning for black (engine always considered it winning on each move played which were mostly engine's top lines, but it wavered from -7 to -5 as the position is too hard to believe it is completely winning):

This win was a much more simple win, but finding the idea was very difficult which fortunately Rubinstein was able to find. So, what can we learn from this game?

1. Dominating the King gives you much more flexibility with your opponent and allows you to improve your position as much as you want
2. Always look for key ideas that could help or decide the game before converting into a (complex) pawn endgame
   • You can do this by trying to look deeper into your opponent's weaknesses

I hope these endgames helped you understand pawn endgames much more, and if you want to see more complex pawn endgames, here is the link to many pawn endgames: https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chesscollection?cid=1031009 

Another thing you can see is using previous knowledge on these endgames and combining it can help you in finding great ideas like these, and also, again, do not get into a pawn endgame unless you are very confident about the result.

Thanks! Helpful lesson! It was the first lesson which was actually difficult for me.

I mean this is probably the hardest it will get for pawn endgames, so for the next endgame lessons in the series will focus on minor piece endgames (first N endings as these are by far the simplest and very easily resemble pawn endgames)

For N endings I would be happy if you could insert our daily game.

sure!

Thanks for the lesson!