HiveChess Lecture: Endgame Tip 3

Passed Pawns Must Be Pushed

Hello everyone,

It is a new lecture from Hivechess lecture, and we are moving to the 3rd episode of the endgame series. A couple of days back, I started with the first episode, and I am hoping to get to at least 5 endgame tips or more, depending on how it goes. Here are the links to the previous two endgame tips so you can read up on them if you missed them.

Endgame Tip 2:
HiveChess Lecture: Endgame Tip 1

Endgame Tip 2:
HiveChess Lecture: Endgame Tip 2

In today's endgame tip, we will be looking at the endgame tip:
Passed Pawns must be Pushed

A chess game could have an equal number of chess pieces, but a deciding advantage could be the presence of a passed pawn. As mentioned in the endgame tip 2, the presence of an extra piece or pawn could be what wins the game for the player with the extra, but this time, I am telling you in this endgame tip, a passed pawn could be the deciding factor.

Firstly, what is a passed pawn?

A passed pawn is a pawn that is on its way to the promoting square without the presence of another piece obstructing its way. A popular way chess players used to call it at the local chess club is express, meaning a free way to match on to the future. Sometimes this pawn may be backed by another piece of yours, and other times it might not. But when it is backed by another piece, it gives more strength to the passed pawn.

We are going to use a game played in the recently concluded Saturday HiveChess Tournament between @tangibleay and @iamchessguy. Tangible_ay is a back-to-back winner of the Saturday HiveChess Tournament, although he finished in 4th place at this recently concluded round, while iamchessguy0 is a decent player with impressive finishes in the top five in previous rounds; he is not one to be underestimated, and you could suffer the repercussions like Tangible_ay did in this game.

1. e4 c6 2. Nc3 d5 3. d4 dxe4 4. Nxe4 h6 5. Nf3 Bf5 6. Bd3 Bxe4 7. Bxe4 Nf6

The opening played is a Caro-Kann Defense: Finnish Variation. An opening I have also looked at in one of my Hive lectures. You can see the post on the opening here:

HiveChess Lecture: The Caro-Kann

It is a simple opening to understand the ideas embedded in it, and from this game, there was an exchange on the e4 square as well. Not to dwell so much on the opening, let us move to the endgame point, where the endgame tip 3: Passed Pawns must be Pushed was used.

55. g5

Black is not only up a pawn but has a passed pawn as well. So what does he do next? He begins to push his pawn. Not only is it a passed pawn, but it is a pawn that is backed by the king as well. At this point, the game would not take too long to be over for white. Even if white tries to stop the pawn, it will be at the expense of other pawns on the board. That is another added advantage for a passed pawn; it can serve as a decoy to capture more of your opponent's pieces. When they try to stop the passed pawn, they end up giving up more materials.

The game ended like this, as it is already too late for white. He can no longer go back in time to stop the passed pawn, even if he tries with Kf3, black has Kh3 coming close to protect his passed pawn. Do not forget, a protected passed pawn is stronger than a lone passed pawn.

Here is a link to view the entire game used in the lecture:
Game Link

And here is the PGN game:

[Event "Saturday HiveChess S1R12 Arena"]
[Site "https://lichess.org/pcrS9yRD"]
[Date "2025.09.20"]
[White "Tangible_ay"]
[Black "iamchessguy01"]
[Result "0-1"]
[GameId "pcrS9yRD"]
[UTCDate "2025.09.20"]
[UTCTime "15:08:54"]
[WhiteElo "2273"]
[BlackElo "1983"]
[WhiteRatingDiff "-10"]
[BlackRatingDiff "+10"]
[Variant "Standard"]
[TimeControl "180+0"]
[ECO "B16"]
[Opening "Caro-Kann Defense: Finnish Variation"]
[Termination "Time forfeit"]

1. e4 c6 2. Nc3 d5 3. d4 dxe4 4. Nxe4 h6 5. Nf3 Bf5 6. Bd3 Bxe4 7. Bxe4 Nf6 8. Bd3 Nbd7 9. Ne5 e6 10. Qe2 Bd6 11. O-O Qc7 12. Re1 O-O 13. a3 a5 14. h3 c5 15. c3 Rfd8 16. Bf4 Nd5 17. Bd2 Nxe5 18. dxe5 Bf8 19. Qe4 g6 20. Rad1 Ne7 21. Qe2 Nf5 22. Bxf5 exf5 23. e6 fxe6 24. Qxe6+ Qf7 25. Qb6 Ra6 26. Qb5 Qc7 27. Be3 Rc6 28. Qc4+ Kg7 29. Qb5 Bd6 30. Kf1 b6 31. Rd5 Be7 32. Red1 Rxd5 33. Rxd5 Rd6 34. Qd3 Rxd5 35. Qxd5 Qd6 36. Qxd6 Bxd6 37. Ke2 Kf6 38. g3 Ke6 39. Bxh6 Be5 40. Kd3 b5 41. Be3 c4+ 42. Kc2 a4 43. Bd2 Kd5 44. Be3 Ke4 45. h4 Kf3 46. Kd2 Bf6 47. Ke1 Be5 48. Kf1 Bf6 49. Bb6 Bg7 50. Be3 Bf8 51. Ba7 Bh6 52. Be3 Bxe3 53. fxe3 Kxg3 54. Ke2 Kxh4 55. Kf3 g5 56. e4 fxe4+ 57. Kxe4 g4 58. Ke3 g3 0-1