On April 30, Riot Games turned on Valorant's ranked queues for the very first time. In less than four hours, Twitch streamer C9 TenZ had been placed in Valorant's Immortal 1 ranked tier. He started the next day at Immortal 3, Valorant's second-highest rank. Five hours after he started streaming, less than 30 hours after ranked launches, TenZ became North America's first Valorant-ranked player.
Valorant is Valorant's highest rank, as frustrating as the naming might be. There are no further tiers within the Valorant rank, and so no further hurdles to climb. Nevertheless, the Valorant rank is the most prestigious achievement within the online multiplayer shooter right now.
To be fair, TenZ did likely have an advantage over most other players. Not only have they been playing Valorant's closed beta for a long time, but their unranked hidden MMR was certainly very high. That enabled TenZ to get sorted into Immortal 1 in placements, while most players will drop to Immortal, Diamond, Platinum, or lower even if they win all 5 placement matches.
While it may not have been entirely fair, there's no argument that TenZ earned and deserved his North American first. In his final match as an Immortal 3, matched up against some of Valorant's best players, TenZ managed to go 30-15. The team overall won 13 matches to their opponents' 9. He carried the game and is likely to do so as a Valorant going forward.
Those who were hoping to reach Valorant first and just missed it, or those not yet in the Closed Beta and who didn't get a chance, there's still hope. Riot plans on resetting the ranked brackets with the launch of Valorant. Another North American first will be up for grabs.
Valorant releases summer 2020 on PC.