When Tumblr is down, I am forced to look at actual news sites for information. 
Sometimes, in between election articles and fashion reviews, a news story like this one appears.
A minor factual quibble: With an up-to-the-minute rating of 2065, Rochelle Ballantyne is not exactly ājust a few wins fromā breaking 2200. However, that nitpicking should not stop us from enjoying positive coverage of chess in mainstream media. I recommend listening to the entire story.
8 wins (with no losses or draws) against 2200 players in the same event (so bonus points are earned) or 7 wins against 2300 players would do it, according to the ratings estimator.
The probability of such a result is rather slim, though.
Back in 1997-98, Nakamura went from A player to Master in about 7 months. At the time, it was thought he had the fastest progression through Expert, Iām not sure if anyone has improved upon that since then.
Fischer went from 1700+ in May 1956 to ~2250 in May 1957, IIRC. He almost certainly did it in fewer games/events than Nakamura, even if he didnāt do it in 7 months.
As for Ms. Ballantyne, although the odds on her achieving those specific results are slim, she certainly lives in the right city to pull off that feat.
I was glad to see the article and hope her the best of results in the future!
The name sounded familiar.
At the 2010 all-girls in the 18&under championship section she ended up tied for first at 5-1 (two draws in rounds 3 and 4) with Danni Chen (one loss in round 2) and Rochelle had better tie-breaks (regardless of whether you were using median, modified median, solkoff, cumulative or sonnenborn-berger).
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