Riot General Manager Pfernandes recently announced on the official Brazilian forums that the servers hosting Brazilian players' matches are finally running on their turf. Courtesy of Chrome, here's the translated post:
“Evocator! It is with great joy that I come to you communicate that the League of Legends servers, hosted in Brazil, are already functioning, and this morning we began the process of gradual transfer of games for the new data center. For this transition to be a period of adjustment and tuning, which can take several weeks, players can now go into matches with reduced latency. Over time, the frequency of matches with the old latency will decrease and finally disappear. Demos a great first step in our commitment to reduce latency in BR matches the platform, providing a better gaming experience to the Brazilians. But it is important to remember that many factors can influence the performance of the game: the quality of broadband in your area, access routes used by your internet provider, type of used connection (3G, wi-fi) etc.. Hope like novelty and celebrate this achievement with us! Thanks for the confidence, patience and messages of encouragement throughout this process. You are responsible for the great success of this game in Brazil and hope to share many more achievements in the coming years. 'll see you in the Fields of Justice!”
The Brazilian servers had apparently previously been hosted in Miami, lending our South American friends ping times in excess of 250ms. Early reports have claimed vast improvements: sometimes pings as short as 10-30ms. With luck, this will spell a healthy boost to the BR competitive scene. Good luck out there, Summoners!