LaviChess

Réti vs. Alekhine, Baden-Baden 1925

Richard Réti turns down a draw, and Alexander Alekhine answers with a combination that Max Euwe later called the deepest of its kind. A black rook goes to e3, where it can be taken, and stays there for several moves.

  • WhiteRichard Réti
  • BlackAlexander Alekhine
  • WhereBaden-Baden
  • WhenApril 25, 1925
  • EventBaden-Baden tournament 1925
  • Result0–1, Black won
  • OpeningHungarian Opening (A00)
  • Length42 moves

In the spring of 1925 a big international tournament was played in the spa town of Baden-Baden in Germany. Alexander Alekhine won it without losing a single game: twelve wins and eight draws.

Against Richard Réti, Alekhine had Black. Réti was one of the leaders of the hypermodern school, and he opened with 1.g3 to put his bishop on the long diagonal. The game came to turn on that bishop.

Two days after the game, which was played on April 25, Réti wrote about it in the Argentine newspaper La Prensa. Alekhine annotated it in several magazines and books. Their versions of the moves differ; see the box further down.

The players

Richard Réti (1889–1929) was born in Austria-Hungary, in what is now Slovakia. He was one of the leading figures of hypermodernism, both at the board and as a writer. That same year, 1925, he set a world record in blindfold chess with 29 games at once. He also composed one of the most famous endgame studies, which you can find on our page about the rule of the square. He died in Prague in 1929, only 40 years old.

Alexander Alekhine (1892–1946) was 32. Two years later he beat Capablanca in Buenos Aires and became world champion.

Read more about Alexander Alekhine among the great chess players.

The game move by move

Step through with the arrows or tap a move. Moves with a dot have a comment.

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Richard Réti has the white pieces, Alexander Alekhine the black.

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Play like Alekhine

Guess the moves Alekhine played, one at a time. The move from the game earns two points, and a move Lavi thinks is about as good earns one. The other side's moves and the game's notes come as you go.

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The moments that decided it

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After 22.Bh1: Réti refuses the draw and pulls the bishop back to h1.
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After 28…Re3: the f-pawn can take the rook, but it stays.

The end

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The final position after 42…Nd4. White resigned after 42…Nd4.

The game exists in three printed versions, which differ in how many times the bishops went back and forth on moves 17–21, and so in every move number after that. We follow Siegbert Tarrasch's tournament book of 1925. There the bishops go back and forth three times, and the game ends with 42…Nd4. Réti himself has the same move numbers in his notes in the Argentine newspaper La Prensa, written two days after the game. Alekhine's own notes of May 1925 and most other printings of that year have one repetition fewer and end with 40…Nd4, and that is the version most books give. Two German-language magazines of 1925 have no repetition at all and end with 38…Nd4. Which version is right, nobody knows for sure. From 22.Bh1 the moves are the same in all three.

Why the game is famous

Alekhine himself chose this game as his best. The American master Frank Marshall asked him after the New York tournament of 1927 which game he considered his best, and wrote that he was pleased when Alekhine chose the one against Réti at Baden-Baden: Marshall had been there and seen it played. In 1939 Alekhine wrote that this game and the one against Bogoljubov at Hastings in 1922 were the most brilliant tournament games of his career.

Max Euwe called it “the deepest strategical combination with rooks and light pieces ever played.” The Dutch grandmaster Jan Timman has told how the game, which he read in one of Euwe's books, never ceased to amaze him: “the black rook appearing on e3 and remaining en prise there for several moves.”

The whole game with notes, as text

1. g3 The bishop is going to g2, where it aims along the long diagonal at Black's queenside. Today the move is also called the Benko Opening, after Pal Benko, who was born three years after this game and won with it against both Fischer and Tal in 1962. 1… e5 2. Nf3 e4 3. Nd4 d5 4. d3 exd3 5. Qxd3 Nf6 6. Bg2 Bb4+ 7. Bd2 Bxd2+ 8. Nxd2 O-O 9. c4 Na6 10. cxd5 Nb4 11. Qc4 Nbxd5 12. N2b3 c6 13. O-O Re8 14. Rfd1 Bg4 15. Rd2 Qc8 16. Nc5 Bh3 Black offers to trade off White's bishop on g2. 17. Bf3 Bg4 Alekhine wrote that White now had to choose between exchanging his beloved fianchetto bishop, accepting a draw by repetition, “which in such an early stage always means a moral defeat for the first player,” or putting the bishop on a worse square, h1. 18. Bg2 Bh3 19. Bf3 Bg4 20. Bg2 Bh3 The same position has now arisen for the third time. Under today's rules, a draw could have been claimed. How the rule was read in 1925 is not clear. 21. Bf3 Bg4 According to Réti, Alekhine offered a draw here. 22. Bh1 Réti says no and pulls the bishop back to h1. “At last!” wrote Alekhine. 22… h5 Black uses the time to push his h-pawn toward the white king. 23. b4 a6 24. Rc1 h4 25. a4 hxg3 26. hxg3 Qc7 27. b5 axb5 28. axb5 Re3 The rook goes where the f-pawn can take it, and it stays there for several moves. It cannot be taken: after 29.fxe3 Qxg3+ Black soon mates. 29. Nf3 Réti himself called this move his third mistake, and a fatal one. With 29.Bf3, he wrote, he would have had a good game. It is true that 29.Bf3 would have kept the position about equal. After 29.Nf3 Black is clearly better. 29… cxb5 30. Qxb5 Nc3 The knight jumps in to c3 and attacks both the queen on b5 and the pawn on e2. 31. Qxb7 Qxb7 32. Nxb7 Nxe2+ The knight takes on e2 with check. 33. Kh2 Ne4 34. Rc4 Nxf2 Now the f-pawn is gone, and the rook on e3 is no longer attacked. It has stood there for six moves. 35. Bg2 Be6 36. Rcc2 Ng4+ 37. Kh3 Ne5+ 38. Kh2 Rxf3 The rook takes the knight on f3. 39. Rxe2 Ng4+ 40. Kh3 Ne3+ 41. Kh2 Nxc2 42. Bxf3 Nd4 Réti resigned. The knight attacks both the rook on e2 and the bishop on f3, and White loses more material.

PGN – the game as text for other chess programs
[Event "Baden-Baden tournament 1925"]
[Site "Baden-Baden"]
[Date "1925.04.25"]
[Round "?"]
[White "Richard Réti"]
[Black "Alexander Alekhine"]
[Result "0-1"]
[ECO "A00"]

1. g3 e5 2. Nf3 e4 3. Nd4 d5 4. d3 exd3 5. Qxd3 Nf6 6. Bg2 Bb4+ 7. Bd2 Bxd2+ 8. Nxd2 O-O 9. c4 Na6 10. cxd5 Nb4 11. Qc4 Nbxd5 12. N2b3 c6 13. O-O Re8 14. Rfd1 Bg4 15. Rd2 Qc8 16. Nc5 Bh3 17. Bf3 Bg4 18. Bg2 Bh3 19. Bf3 Bg4 20. Bg2 Bh3 21. Bf3 Bg4 22. Bh1 h5 23. b4 a6 24. Rc1 h4 25. a4 hxg3 26. hxg3 Qc7 27. b5 axb5 28. axb5 Re3 29. Nf3 cxb5 30. Qxb5 Nc3 31. Qxb7 Qxb7 32. Nxb7 Nxe2+ 33. Kh2 Ne4 34. Rc4 Nxf2 35. Bg2 Be6 36. Rcc2 Ng4+ 37. Kh3 Ne5+ 38. Kh2 Rxf3 39. Rxe2 Ng4+ 40. Kh3 Ne3+ 41. Kh2 Nxc2 42. Bxf3 Nd4 0-1

Download .pgn

Sources

  • Edward Winter: Réti v Alekhine, Baden-Baden, 1925 (the three versions and their sources, Réti's notes in La Prensa according to Christian Sánchez)
  • PGN Mentor, Alekhine.pgn
  • Edward Winter: Chess Notes 3784 (Chernev on the game)
  • Wikipedia: Alexander Alekhine (tournament results)
  • Wikipedia: Richard Réti
  • Wikipedia: King's Fianchetto Opening (1.g3, also called the Benko Opening; Benko against Fischer and Tal at Curaçao in 1962)
  • Wikipedia: Pal Benko (born 1928)

Edward Winter has found three printed versions of the game. We follow version A, from Siegbert Tarrasch's tournament book (Berlin, 1925) and the tournament book from Caissa Editions (1991): it is identical character for character with Winter's text, 84 half-moves. Réti resigned after 42…Nd4. We chose it because two sources close to the game agree: Tarrasch's tournament book of the same year and Réti himself, who wrote in La Prensa that …h5 was played on move 22, after Alekhine had offered a draw the move before, and who numbers his own mistakes (24.Rc1, 27.b5, 29.Nf3) the same way. Version B, with the repetition one cycle shorter, is the one in Alekhine's own notes (L'Echiquier, May 1925, and his books) and in most other printings of 1925, among them Rubinstein's score in La Nation Belge; Rubinstein played in the tournament himself. Version C, with no repetition, is in the Wiener Schachzeitung and the Deutsche Schachzeitung of May 1925. Winter writes that it is currently unknown which version is right. PGN Mentor has version B and adds two moves, 41.Rf2 Nxf3+ 42.Rxf3 Bd5, that none of Winter's printed sources have. From 22.Bh1 (20.Bh1 in version B) all versions are identical move for move. The date, April 25, 1925, comes from Sánchez's account of Réti's article, quoted by Winter. Every move has also been replayed by computer and checked against the rules of chess.

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Updated November 14, 2026