We're going to finish our endgame studies with a composition by Grigoriev that looks about as real as you can get. One move wins here, while other just draw. This is why king and pawn endings are so important. Imagine how bad you would feel if you reached this position, drew the game and then found out you could have won! There are quite a few places, as you will see, where White can go wrong. If you're Black you should be alert to those opportunities.

The whole idea of this endgame is not to randomly push pawns, but to squeeze the black king by using the white king. Eventually, the squeeze results in the loss of the h-pawn and the game: 1.Kh5! [1.g4? Kg6 2.Kg3 h5=; 1.Kg4? Kg6 2.Kf4 Kf6 3.Ke4 Ke6 4.Kd4 Kd6 5.g4 Ke6 6.h4 Kd6 7.Ke3 Ke7 8.Kf4 Kf6=] 1...Kg7 2.h4! [2.g4? Kh7 3.h4 Kg7= The idea behind h4 first is to make the square g4 available to the white king.] 2...Kh7 3.Kg4 Kg6 4.Kf3 [4.Kf4? Kh5 5.Kf3 Kg6 6.Ke4 Kf6 (6...Kf7 7.Kf5) 7.g4 Ke6=] 4...Kf5 [4...Kh5 5.Kf4 Kg6 6.Ke5 Kh5 7.Kf6 Kg4 8.Kg6 and White wins.; 4...h5 5.Ke4 Kf6 6.Kf4 Kg6 7.Ke5 Kh6 8.Kf6 wins.; 4...Kf6 5.Ke4 Ke6 6.g4 Kf6 7.Kd5 Ke7 8.Ke5 Kf7 9.Kf5 Kg7 10.Ke6 Kg6 11.h5+ wins as above.; 4...Kf7 5.g4 Kg7 6.Ke4 Kf6 7.Kd5] 5.g4+ Ke5 6.Ke3 Kd5 7.Kf4 Ke6 8.Ke4 Kf6 9.Kd5 Ke7 [9...Kf7 10.Ke5 Ke7 11.h5 Kf7 12.Kf5 Kg7 13.Ke6 wins the h-pawn.] 10.Ke5 Kf7 11.Kf5 h5 [11...Kg7 12.Ke6 Kg6 13.h5+ as above.] 12.g5 Kg7 13.Ke6 Kg6 14.Kd6 Kf7 [14...Kf5 15.Ke7 Kg6 16.Kf8 Kh7 17.Kf7 and there goes the h-pawn again.; 14...Kh7 15.Ke5 with the same squeezing idea.] 15.Ke5 Kg6 16.Ke6 Kg7 17.Kf5 Kf7 18.g6+ and it's over.

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