Excelsior!

Trawling through my old archives I came across an interesting game from the 2002 Olympiad. It was played on the lower boards, and while it wasn't flawless chess, it did contain one interesting feature. From move 16 to move 20 White marches his pawn from a2 to a8, whereupon it promotes (of course).
The notes to this game originally appeared in an early "Open and Shut" column for Australasian Chess


Volpinari,D (2048) - Besse,Timothy [B84]
Olympiad Bled SLO (11), 06.11.2002

1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 a6 6.Be2 e6 7.0-0 Be7 8.Be3 b5 9.Bf3 e5 10.Nf5 0-0 11.Nd5 For the previous 10 moves both players have followed established theory, which on the lower boards of the Olympiad is quite impressive. This move for White is a novelty, although Fritz chose it after a mili-seconds thought. 11...Nc6 [11...Nxd5 12.Qxd5+-] 12.Ndxe7+ Nxe7 13.Nxd6 h6 14.Qd2 Be6 15.Rfd1 Qc7 (D)
In the problem world the idea of moving a pawn from its starting position to promotion is known as Excelsior. It is a much rarer occurence in over the board play. 16.a4 Rfd8 17.axb5 Bc4?? [17...Nc8 18.b6 Nxb6 19.Qb4 Nbd7 allowed Black to hold on.] 18.b6 Qc6 19.b7 Rxd6 Allowing the pawn to fulfil its destiny 20.bxa8Q+ 1-0