Critical lines against the Tartakower Caro-Kann with 9. . . . h5

Are there any good, fairly detailed resources (books, Chessable courses, etc) that offer ideas for how White can play for an advantage against the Tartakower variation of the Caro Kann, especially the "new" line where Black plays h7-h5, like so?

Negi's otherwise excellent book on the French and Caro is too old to cover that h5 line, which has become quite popular lately, even at the club level.

Or is it just time for me to switch to the Advance Variation?

Did you find a good rescource for this?

Hope you find something. I've never got to learn 5...exf6, as 5...gxf6 continues to serve me well. But at some point it probably has to happen ;-)

Probably not, I play this as black and I love when my opponent castles queenside. Black gets a lot of play and even Andras Toth doesn’t recommend castling queenside because it’s quite dangerous. It’s alright but castling kingside should be better imo.

Speaking of Andras Toth he has a really good 1.e4 course on Chessable which covers this. The video is £60 on sale which might be ok depending on your budget. The course is probably not worth it without video tho

Switching to the advance is what I would do though. Giri’s 1.e4 pt.2 covers this as well as some other openings most notably the advance French. He recommends the short variation and I would probably get the book version.

in case you thinking to switch to advcance variation, you can find detailed analysis here https://openings101.org/caro-kann-defence-advance-variation

You can definitely play for a win in that variation. It might not be the opposite side castling all the time but you are definitely still playing for a win. And you can easily achieve a draw if you would like fr

I'm just going to copy and paste what I recommended in another thread, when another member asked about playing against the Tartakower Caro-Kann:

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I don't play 1.e4 so ... take what I say from a point of inexperience.

But I do play the Black side of the Caro-Kann - and I can say that I find the White players who keep pieces on the board longer to be more of a challenge.

So I would suggest avoiding an early NxNf6, and considering something like this, instead:

And if Black plays an early ...h6, to kick the knight away:

You could treat the h6 pawn as a "hook" that weakens Black's kingside, and have White castle queenside.

Then g2-g4-g5 comes into contact with Black's kingside quicker, because of the h6 pawn.

Thanks -- that's very interesting. I know that first line, which is usually reached by way of the Karpov variation (I play Bd3 instead of Bc4). I'll think about whether I want to deal with Black's alternatives (like h6). Looking at the databases, it looks as if Black almost never allows the transposition with Nbd7 (either at the master level or the club level), so I'd have to treat the "sidelines" as the main line.

I'm not sure what you mean, here. Nbd7 in which line / at which move?

In either case, my suggestion is to consider avoiding the Tartakower, since (IMO) it immediately gives Black the game he wants (that's why he's playing an early ...Nf6 in the first place).

Of course, there's nothing wrong with playing NxN - it's mostly a matter of preference.

But, speaking from the Black side, I find the White players who avoid early exchanges to be a bit more difficult to play against.

I mean black almost never plays 5 ... Nbd7, as in your first diagram. That's a transposition to the Karpov variation (4 ... Nd7 5 Ng6 Ngf6), but Black usually claims they can do better after Ng5, with either h6 or Bf5 (which makes sense -- get the bishop out ahead of the knight blocking it).

Hmm. We must be using different databases.

5...Nbd7 is the top move in the database I use (ChessTempo):

But yes, you're right that Black has other options. ...h6 and ...Bf5 are both completely reasonable moves, as well.

I would recommend Bc4 in response to ...Bf5, instead of Bd3 - for the same reason mentioned earlier - avoiding early exchanges to keep more pieces on the board.

Give it a try, perhaps. But if you end up deciding that you like the feel of playing into the Tartakower more, then I'd stick with that. It's your call.

I assume the Chesstempo database is including transpositions among those 1500+ games with Nbd7. Go back a move -- does it show there are 1500+ games after Ng5? If it only shows a few dozen, that means that that 1500 set of games only exist if you count transpositions. Some databases do that, and it can be useful, but it can also be very misleading. Here's a database that doesn't -- it only shows what's actually played within a given position -- this one doesn't have a single master game where Black went Nbd7 (which really doesn't seem like a very logical move here).

https://www.365chess.com/opening.php?m=10&n=7018&ms=e4.c6.d4.d5.Nc3.dxe4.Nxe4.Nf6.Ng5&ns=3.31.21.32.90.96.91.97.7018

(And it's rare in lower-level games too, judging by the Lichess database).

I believe you're right - ChessTempo seems to be showing transpositions from the Karpov variation there.

So you'd probably want to focus on ...Bf5 and ...h6 as the most likely responses you'd see, as you mentioned.

Although you might run into a few rare ...Nbd7's from those who are trying to transpose to the Karpov.