diff --git a/DeepSpeech.py b/DeepSpeech.py
index 8492fa66..4e11b1f9 100755
--- a/DeepSpeech.py
+++ b/DeepSpeech.py
@@ -466,11 +466,48 @@ def train():
     with tfv1.Session(config=Config.session_config) as session:
         log_debug('Session opened.')
 
-        tfv1.get_default_graph().finalize()
-
         # Loading or initializing
         loaded = False
-        if FLAGS.load in ['auto', 'last']:
+
+        # Initialize training from a CuDNN RNN checkpoint
+        if FLAGS.cudnn_checkpoint:
+            if FLAGS.use_cudnn_rnn:
+                log_error('Trying to use --cudnn_checkpoint but --use_cudnn_rnn '
+                          'was specified. The --cudnn_checkpoint flag is only '
+                          'needed when converting a CuDNN RNN checkpoint to '
+                          'a CPU-capable graph. If your system is capable of '
+                          'using CuDNN RNN, you can just specify the CuDNN RNN '
+                          'checkpoint normally with --checkpoint_dir.')
+                exit(1)
+
+            log_info('Converting CuDNN RNN checkpoint from {}'.format(FLAGS.cudnn_checkpoint))
+            ckpt = tfv1.train.load_checkpoint(FLAGS.cudnn_checkpoint)
+            missing_variables = []
+
+            # Load compatible variables from checkpoint
+            for v in tfv1.global_variables():
+                try:
+                    v.load(ckpt.get_tensor(v.op.name), session=session)
+                except tf.errors.NotFoundError:
+                    missing_variables.append(v)
+
+            # Check that the only missing variables are the Adam moment tensors
+            if any('Adam' not in v.op.name for v in missing_variables):
+                log_error('Tried to load a CuDNN RNN checkpoint but there were '
+                          'more missing variables than just the Adam moment '
+                          'tensors.')
+                exit(1)
+
+            # Initialize Adam moment tensors from scratch to allow use of CuDNN
+            # RNN checkpoints.
+            log_info('Initializing missing Adam moment tensors.')
+            init_op = tfv1.variables_initializer(missing_variables)
+            session.run(init_op)
+            loaded = True
+
+        tfv1.get_default_graph().finalize()
+
+        if not loaded and FLAGS.load in ['auto', 'last']:
             loaded = try_loading(session, checkpoint_saver, checkpoint_filename, 'most recent')
         if not loaded and FLAGS.load in ['auto', 'best']:
             loaded = try_loading(session, best_dev_saver, best_dev_filename, 'best validation')
diff --git a/util/flags.py b/util/flags.py
index 923b4471..6cebb3a6 100644
--- a/util/flags.py
+++ b/util/flags.py
@@ -56,6 +56,7 @@ def create_flags():
     f.DEFINE_integer('inter_op_parallelism_threads', 0, 'number of inter-op parallelism threads - see tf.ConfigProto for more details. USE OF THIS FLAG IS UNSUPPORTED')
     f.DEFINE_integer('intra_op_parallelism_threads', 0, 'number of intra-op parallelism threads - see tf.ConfigProto for more details. USE OF THIS FLAG IS UNSUPPORTED')
     f.DEFINE_boolean('use_cudnn_rnn', False, 'use CuDNN RNN backend for training on GPU. Note that checkpoints created with this flag can only be used with CuDNN RNN, i.e. fine tuning on a CPU device will not work')
+    f.DEFINE_string('cudnn_checkpoint', '', 'path to a checkpoint created using --use_cudnn_rnn. Specifying this flag allows one to convert a CuDNN RNN checkpoint to a checkpoint capable of running on a CPU graph.')
 
     # Sample limits