Alejandro RamÃrez (chess player)
Alejandro Ramírez Álvarez (* 21 June 1988 in San José (Costa Rica) ) is a costa - Rican chess player. Since December 2010 he plays for the United States Chess Federation.
Ramírez learned chess already the age of four. In 1998 he won the Pan- American Championship U10, at the age of nine he was FIDE Master, the age of 13 he was awarded the FIDE International Master title. Soon after, he was financially supported by Costa Rican company and received from the University of San Jose a private school education, to devote himself entirely to chess can.
In 2002, he first played for Costa Rica at the Chess Olympiad in Bled and made by a draw against Russian Alexander Morozevich world's elite players for attention. In 2004 he became Grand Master after grandmaster norms him were in Santo Domingo, Havana and at the zone tournament in Guayaquil, which he won jointly with the Cuban Leinier Domínguez, succeeded in the previous year. Ramírez was then, according to Sergei Karjakin 's second- youngest grandmaster in the world. He won the 2004 the zone tournament in San José (Costa Rica) and qualified for the FIDE world championship in knockout system in Tripoli in the same year. There Ramirez retired in the first round against the eventual tournament winner Rustam Kasimjanov after rapid chess jump- off, the match ended 1-1 regularly.
Ramirez, the only Grand Master of Costa Rica, is considered alongside the Cubans Leinier Domínguez and Lázaro Bruzón as the biggest rising star in the chess Central America. Prior to joining the U.S. Chess Federation, he led the Elo ranking of Costa Rica to a large margin. His current and previous highest Elo rating is 2594 (as of September 2011).