Here's a correspondence game I played ~10 years ago in the aftermath of the experimental game above. I'd need to look at it again to provide any useful comment, but I don't remember thinking Black was in any serious trouble.

1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.e5 Bf5 4.Nc3 a6 5.Be3 Qc7 6.g4 Bd7 7.f4 e6 8.Nf3 c5 9.Qd2 cxd4 10.Nxd4 Bb4 11.Be2 Ne7 12.a3 Bxc3 13.Qxc3 Qxc3+ 14.bxc3 b5 15.Nb3 O-O 16.Kd2 Rc8 17.Bc5 Ng6 18.Rhf1 Be8 19.Bd6 Nd7 20.Bd3 f6 21.Rae1 Bf7 22.Rf2 Ra7 23.Nd4 fxe5 24.fxe5 Nc5 25.Ref1 Ne4+ 26.Bxe4 dxe4 27.Re2 Ne7 28.Bxe7 Rxe7 29.Rxe4 Rd7 30.Re3 Rd5 31.Kc1 Rcc5 32.Nf3 h6 33.Kb2 Rc4 1/2-1/2

Maybe 12.a3 lets Black off the hook. But I'm pretty confident that Black also has better resources than what I played.

It pains me to look through my analysis above, but what is the current status of the early 4...a6 in the Advance Caro?

HgMan wrote on 01/22/07 at 13:02:41:

They can still repent and change their evil ways by transposing with 7.h4.
Quote:

I'll be interested to see how they (and you of course) deal with it. I am not convinced that this is the case as the forward pawns are also good in the endgame.

Yes: I hope I will manage to avoid the Willempie Variation of the Advanced Caro...   

I still feel badly about having abandoned this game.  But the line still fascinates me, and I would like to try to fill in the analysis at some point.  I was reminded of this game just recently, when a new correspondence game against a player rated 2636  ( )began with the moves: 1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.e5 Bf5 4.Nc3.  I paused, thought long and hard, and pushed 4...a6.  Hoping for a better result this time out, but am confident that I have a good feel for what comes next...

Dear Willempie and colleagues,

After a protracted illness, I am slowly returning to work (and play!).  I apologize for my lengthy silence and feel very badly for having "gone silent" in our game.  From a sporting perspective, I think the only thing I might properly do is resign.  My game might be salvageable, but I think I am worse going into this ending.  So, congratulations to my worthy and patient opponent.

I would, however, like to continue analysis of this line as I recuperate, and would welcome thoughts from Willempie and others during the post-mortem.

Again, my apologies.  I have really missed my friends on colleagues at Chesspub...

HgMan

Doesn't exchanging with the d-pawn give me a passed pawn and some counterplay?  I'm rapidly losing confidence in my position, but it seems to me that an eventual dxe5 might actually provide me with a window of opportunity...

HgMan wrote on 08/14/06 at 21:22:15:

Oops!

Diagram should be fixed now.