grandmaster
Which title was conferred to Matthias Blübaum in 2015?
Matthias Blübaum Matthias Blübaum ( born 18 April 1997 ) is a German chess grandmaster . He is the No . 2 ranked German player as of February 2021 . Blübaum began playing chess at the age of six and emerged as part of the Prinzengruppe at age twelve . He earned his international master title in 2012 and was awarded the grandmaster title in 2015 . A member of the German team that won the 2015 European Youth Team Chess Championship , he has since represented his nation at the European Team Chess Championship and Chess Olympiad . Personal life . Matthias Blübaum was born in Lemgo , North Rhine-Westphalia on 18 April 1997 , and comes from a chess family . His father , Karl-Ernst , has an Elo rating of 2253 as of 2014 , and is a several-time winner of the Ostwestfalen Chess Championship . He has three sisters , two of whom competed in the top group of the German Girls Chess Championship . Blübaum skipped ahead a year in elementary school and received his Abitur at the age of 17 . , he was studying physics and mathematics at Bielefeld University . In a 2020 interview , he stated he was studying for his masters degree in mathematics , and that he was still unsure whether he would become a professional chess player . Chess career . Prinzengruppe . Blübaum learned to play chess when he was six years old , and began a systematic training schedule at the age of eight . He received wide attention at the age of 12 as part of the Prinzengruppe , a group of four young , talented German players ( princes ) who were projected to become grandmasters ( kings ) by German national junior coach Bernd Vökler . The group , consisting of Blübaum , Rasmus Svane , Dennis Wagner , and Alexander Donchenko , completed the objective set for them in 2016 , when Svane earned his final grandmaster ( GM ) norm and thus became the fourth and final member of the group to achieve the title of GM . The German Chess Federation named Blübaum the U14 Player of the Year of 2011 . Notable achievements in the year were his attainment of the FIDE master title and his third-place finish at the German U18 Chess Championship . Also in 2011 , he placed sixth at the World U14 Chess Championship , scoring 6½/9 Blübaum earned his first international master ( IM ) norm at the in April 2011 , scoring 6½/9 , and his second at the Helmut Kohls Tournament in July 2011 , scoring 6/9 . He achieved his final IM norm at the German Chess Championship in March 2012 , scoring 5½/9 . He was awarded the title by FIDE in April 2012 , at the age of 14 . He participated in the World Junior Chess Championship in August , placing twenty-fifth with a score of 8/13 and in the World U18 Chess Championship in November , scoring 7/11 for a fourteenth-place finish . He placed twelfth in the 2013 German Chess Championship , scoring 5½/9 Blübaum earned his first two GM norms in the 2012/2013 and 2013/2014 Chess Bundesliga seasons , with scores of 6½/9 and 8/12 , respectively . In September 2014 , he competed in the 2nd Grenke Chess Classic , scoring 3½/7 for a fifth-place finish . He scored his first victory over a 2700+ opponent in this event , defeating the German No . 1 Arkadij Naiditsch in the second round . Later in September , Blübaum competed again in the World U18 Chess Championship , placing fourth with a score of 7½/11 At the 2014 Bavarian Chess Championship , held from 25 October to 2 November , he achieved his third GM norm , scoring 7/9 . He earned an additional GM norm at the German Chess Championship in November 2014 , scoring 6/9 . He was officially awarded the GM title by FIDE in April 2015 , at the age of 18 . In July 2015 , he competed for Germany on board 1 at the European Youth Team Chess Championship . He scored 5½/7 helping Germany win the tournament . In September , he placed third at the World Junior Chess Championship with 9/13 one point behind Jan-Krzysztof Duda and Mikhail Antipov . Antipov won the tournament due to a better tiebreak score than Duda . 2016 . Blübaum recorded several tournament victories in 2016 . He won the Grenke Chess Open held in March , scoring 7½/9 Vladimir Fedoseev , Nikita Vitiugov , Milos Perunović , Ni Hua and Francisco Vallejo Pons also scored 7½/9 ; Blübaum won due to performing best on the tiebreak system . In April , he finished clear first in the Accentus Young Masters tournament with 7/9 half a point ahead of Benjámin Gledura and Noël Studer . He won the Xtracon Chess Open in July , scoring 8/10 Alexei Shirov , Bassem Amin , Jonathan Carlstedt , Mihail Marin , Jon Ludvig Hammer and Jean-Marc Degraeve also finished on 8/10 ; Blübaum won on tiebreak . In September , he competed for Germany on board 3 at the 42nd Chess Olympiad . He was his nations best performer , scoring 7½/10 for a of 2744 . In the final round of the tournament , he defeated Tarvo Seeman of Estonia from a drawn position , which gave the gold medal to the United States . If Blübaum had drawn with Seeman , Ukraine would have won gold by way of the Sonneborn–Berger tiebreak system . 2017 . Blübaum competed in the Aeroflot Open , held from 21 February to 1 March . He tied for 21st with Abhijeet Gupta on a score of 5½/9 . Later in March , he participated in the first edition of the Sharjah Masters tournament , scoring 6½/9 for an 18th-place finish . In April , he competed in the 4th Grenke Chess Classic , having received an invitation to the event after winning the 2016 Grenke Chess Open . It was his first elite round-robin tournament . He tied for last with a score of 2/7 recording draws with Fabiano Caruana , Magnus Carlsen , Hou Yifan and Georg Meier , and losing to Levon Aronian , Arkadij Naiditsch and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave . From 30 May to 10 June , Blübaum took part in the 2017 European Individual Chess Championship . He scored 8/11 half a point behind Maxim Matlakov , Baadur Jobava and Vladimir Fedoseev who all tied for first–third . Matlakov won the tournament on tiebreak . Blübaum placed 12th , and so qualified for the Chess World Cup . Also in June , he won the German Chess Federations 2016 U20 Player of the Year award , in recognition of his three tournament victories and strong performance at the 42nd Chess Olympiad . He competed in the 45th Dortmund Sparkassen Chess Meeting , held from 15 to 22 July . He finished fifth , scoring 3/7 Earlier in July , he transferred from SV Werder Bremen to Schachfreunde Deizisau e.V . in a switch-up of his Chess Bundesliga team . He had played for SV Werden Bremen from 2012 up until this move . In September , he participated in the Chess World Cup 2017 . He defeated Sandro Mareco 1½–½ in the first round to advance to the second round , where he was paired with Wesley So . He drew with So in the classical portion of the match , then was defeated in the rapid tiebreaks and eliminated from the tournament . From 28 October to 6 November , he competed for Germany on board 3 at the 2017 European Team Chess Championship . He scored 4½/8 as Germany placed eighth . 2018 . In January , Blübaum competed in the Tata Steel Challengers . He finished seventh , scoring 6½/13 In February , he participated in the Aeroflot Open . He placed 63rd out of 92 , scoring 4/9 From 31 March to 9 April , Blübaum participated in the 5th Grenke Chess Classic . He finished sixth with a score of 4½/9 recording a victory over Viswanathan Anand in the process . In May , he was named the 2017 U20 Player of the Year by the German Chess Federation , receiving 24.6% of the vote . He competed in the Riga Technical University Open in August . He performed poorly ; as the second seed , he finished 36th with 6/9 Blübaum represented Germany on board 3 at the 43rd Chess Olympiad , from 24 September to 5 October . He went undefeated , scoring 6/10 as Germany finished 13th with 16/22 match points . In December , he competed in the Zürich Christmas Open . As the second seed , he placed 14th with a score of 4½/7 2019 . In March , Blübaum participated in the European Individual Chess Championship . He placed 46th with 7/11 From 18 to 22 April , he competed in the Grenke Chess Open . He tied for 1st–8th on 7½/9 finishing sixth on tiebreak . Daniel Fridman won the event . Blübaum placed fifth out of eight at the German Masters , held in Magdeburg from 25 May to 1 June . He scored 4/7 At the FIDE Grand Swiss Tournament 2019 held on the Isle of Man from 10 to 21 October , Blübaum placed 81st with 5½/11 He represented Germany again at the European Team Chess Championship in Batumi , from 24 October to 2 November . He scored 3½/6 as Germany placed eighth . 2020 . In January , Blübaum won the 9th Volksbank-Cup with a perfect score of 9/9 , the first in the tournaments history . In his first over-the-board tournament since the social restrictions related to the COVID-19 outbreak , Blübaum won the German Blitz Championship , with a score of 25½/29 Afterwards , he competed in the German Masters , held in Magdeburg . He scored 5/7 to finish clear-first . Blübaum became the highest-rated German player for the first time in the October 2020 FIDE rating list , with a rating of 2672 . From 31 October to 8 November , he participated in the Tegernsse Masters , placing second with 5/8 one-and-a-half points behind winner Alexander Donchenko .