Hello,

it is not stated in the rules where timing begins and ends. I would think the frame after you select new game and the frame after fanfare starts on King K Rool. It appears all times on the leaderboards use this convention except Diegolazor4 who begins his timer at fade out of menu leading to a half second difference in times (which would also put him at 16:03 due to his timer being at 16:02.74 at final split unless someone did a frame count on the run).

Cheers, Jesse