Ok, Sherlock Holmses of this sub-forum, I need your help. This will seem completely random, but I had a lot of time on my hands and I couldn't figure this **** out by myself.
So I was following the Olympiad today and I saw a good friend of mine going completely nuts and dropping a queen in one move in a winning position:
http://www.chessbomb.com/arena/2014-...drigal_Mariano
I went on chess-results to check what is the rating of this Mariano Madrigal fella, and to my surprise I saw that he is an International Master, even though he is rated only 2156! I decided that he is probably some 90 year old guy who used to be above 2400 and just started dropping ELO like crazy. I still decide to go to his FIDE profile and I am surprised again - this guy is born in 1994!
http://ratings.fide.com/card.phtml?event=6100961
Now what really surprised me was the summary of his title, seen at the bottom of that page: "Title registered by President, IM, Event 71200". Hm.. Strange?
I have never seen anything like that. Usually the titles are confirmed in the Congress. We can take the same Kantans for example:
http://ratings.fide.com/card.phtml?event=11602945
IM title status approved by Fide Congress in Khanty Mansiysk in 2014. That's how it is for every other IM and GM that I know.
So, let's return to this Madrigal fella. I thought that the only chance for him to have an IM title IF it's not based on some shenanigans is to win one of the tournaments for which Fide gives out titles. I went on his history and found out that his IM title has appeared after he played this tournament:
http://ratings.fide.com/individual_c...2012-08-01&t=0
Oookay, so it is a sub-zonal tournament, which has specific FIDE rules. I hop on to Fide Handbook and check the requirements for IM title in a sub-zonal: a) 1st place (didn't happen) b) if 12 round tourney, 2450+ performance (didn't happen) c) if 9 round tourney, 66.66% (didn't happen, he only played 8 rounds).
So can someone please figure out why this guy has an IM title, which is approved single-handedly by the President?
Also, allow me to say that if I misinterpreted the rules and he actually gained his IM Title (not a norm, title!) from that tournament, where all he had to do was score 5.5/8 versus some underrated IM's, underrated FMs and 2200s, then I am moving the hell to central to America and expect me to be a GM after some sub-zonals.