Grigoriev, 1938

The following diagram is a nice exercise about a chess position that looks rather easy at first sight. It’s White turn to move. Is this a draw?

It’s White’s turn to move, but Black will gain a tempo because of the check by f4+. So at first sight it may look like a draw, but as we will see White will be able to win this game.

Pawn_run

First of all White forces Black’s king to move away from the promotion field f1. This is the key move. Black won’t promote with a check and White’s king is still in reach of the black pawn. In order to keep the pawn Black’s king was forced to do so, but this enables White to promote with check.
 

Tags: Endgame