From the 2003's edition, in Poitiers, France to the 2008's Masters edition in Paris, California, there are six players, including four as a team, that have actually touched the Golden medal of the Quake III Electronic Sports World Cup. Three of them were still present for the 2008's Finals, just two weeks ago in San Jose.

The Golden Boys

Having decided to write this feature only on the 19th of August, meaning six day ahead of the 2008 Grand Finals of the ESWC, that was actually somewhat hard to catch the players who were going to try to get another gold medal in the event, as they were already on the road to San Jose for the most of them.



My first idea was to let the players speak for themselves, telling us how they were reacting during their slow climb to the highest place of the podium, but I should have started this feature a lot before the actual event and didn't think of this fast enough to be honest, so this will more likely be a view on these legendary players.



Anton 'Cooller' Singov, 22 years old
The Quake Tsar

Anton's breakthrough was in 2002, when he was able to win the WCG in 2on2 with his fellow countryman Death in Daejon, Korea.

Since then, he went on to hit the highest rank during the QLAN, a few months later, as well as a lot of Russian events such as the ASUS Cups or the qualifications for the 2003's ESWC and WCG.

Then came one of the biggest Quake 3 tournament ever, the 2003's ESWC finals, where Anton could just prove his domination after an epic battle for the title in front of Zero4 during the Grand Finals of the event, which was his first ESWC trophy and probably one of the most wanted, with players such as LeXeR, fazz, uNkind or fox.

This event must be special to him, as it was the first time we would see a great show like this in esports, with a big crowd and all the things that actually make an esport, a sport.

His second appearance in France, one year later, didn't brought him another gold, but still a bronze medal, which could come quite as a shock knowing that was played with four players each playing one duel and Russia ever been one of the top notch Quake scene, however, the Sweden stole the gold and the USA went for the silver.

Then came 2005, where the ESWC was hosting it's "first last quake 3 tournament ever", the crop of the cream gathered in Paris, for one last big battle and $6'000 to go for the winner.

This time again, Anton went on to win the whole event, battling it out against another American in the Grand Finals, for another epic match, that he won with two maps to one over czm.

The 2006's edition saw the first ESWC without Quake 3 on the game's list, replaced by it's little brother, the Fourth of the series, even if this was probably the biggest and most impressive edition of all the ESWC, the result is less interesting as we're focusing on Quake 3 here, but it's still to be noted that Anton went just one step away of a fourth consecutive podium in the World Cup, as he finished fourth here, just behind the Dutch player Forever.

In 2007, the ESWC decided to use Quake 4 one last time, where the young Polish Av3k could rise up against it's spiritual mentor during the Grand Finals - Anton - giving Singov another podium with this time a silver medal, just ahead of the French Winz, who had won a gold medal just one year earlier.

Finally, during the last edition of the ESWC, a couple of weeks ago, Anton was kinda cursed with bad luck as he went draw with the two Americans of his group - Chance and Zero4 - with four victories for one lose, but wasn't to advance due to a weaker maps won/lost difference.

However, this might give him something to think about when, the next year, he'll comeback for the first ever edition on Quake Live, and will be eager to win against both of them to avenge his unlucky loss in San Jose.



Alexey ‘Cypher’ Yanusheuski, 18 years old
The Young Storm

Alexey's career breakthrough was most probably his second place in the 2006's Quake 4 ESWC, where he went up to the Grand Finals against the French home player Winz, sending a message to the fellow quakers.

However, we wouldn't hear about him until Quake 3 came back into the minds with the announcement of the ESWC, as his major breakthrough would most probably be this year, where he first went on to win his first ever ESWC event, the ESWC Masters of Paris.

There, the not-so-young-anymore Belarusian didn't even lost one single map from the whole event, beating names like Fooki, czm, Av3k and fox by the biggest margin...

Knowing all of them already had won a medal during an ESWC event, either on Quake 3 (Fooki, fox won a gold medal with Sweden in 2004 while czm won a silver medal in 2005) or on Quake 4, as Av3k was the title holder since the last Quake 4 edition in 2007, is absolutely freaking out.

This was his first gold, and certainly not the last of the season... He went on and continued his incredible winning streak in the United States as he flawlessly won the Quakecon, on Quake Live this time.

In the Grand Finals of this event, he was up against one of the most famous Quake player ever, Zero4, who himself told him "When I was beating LeXeR in the WCG final, you were ten years old.", this quote just show how extraordinary the Alexey's work is, he had a lot of experience and time to catch back from such legends as Zero4, Cooller or czm, but he has just shown in more or less a month, winning three of the biggest tournaments on the circuit, that he was the one making the sun and the rain actually.

With the announcement of his team-mate Av3k not having a VISA to come to San Jose, he was definitely the biggest favourite for the title, as nobody had defeated him during the 2008's season before this tournament.

However, Alexey went on to lose his first match of the season during the first group stage, against the American's rapha, still he was going to get to the second group stage, where he would come out on top, not losing any match over k1llsen, czm and Chance, two of them being big Quake legends.

The playoff stage would then just be a formality, not dropping a single map during his two matches, against rapha, who had beaten him before in the tournament and then against the German k1llsen during the Grand Finals.



Magnus 'fojji' Olsson, 24 years old
The Old Fox

Beside the two East-Europeans, Magnus, is the only player from the 2004's Sweden delegation that won the gold medal ahead of both the USA and Russia, who is still playing the game nowadays.

However, the status of Quake God isn't stolen by Magnus, even if he never won another gold during an ESWC event, first he went on a really epic match against Zero4 during the ESWC 2004 Grand Finals, where both Nations were tied up after two games (that was best-of-three - 1 map per player), Magnus could finally beat his American opponent after the overtime.

In 2005, he went on the podium one more time, beating another American - Socrates - during his third/fourth place decider, earning him a well deserved bronze medal.

During the Quake 4 era, he didn't do much things as it wasn't really it's type of game, but when Quake 3 stroke back this year, he first was able to get a silver medal during the ESWC Masters of Paris, losing to Belarus's Cypher in the Grand Finals.

After that he went to the Quakecon, where he got on a more or less respectable top six rank, to finally get a bronze medal during the GameGune in Spain, ahead of players such as Cooller or czm.

Unfortunately he couldn't get through the playoff stage during the 2008's ESWC as he went with a three-loss streak on three matches during the second group stage, losing to rapha, Zero4 and Jibo.

Conclusion

We will now see how the Quakers will react to Quake Live, but if the oldschool players are gathered with the new faces like in this last ESWC's edition, things might get spicy for 2009!

Only six players (counting four as a team), actually won an ESWC Quake 3 event, which one will get the next title? Might be a known face, might be the return of a legend, or the comfortable sit of a new one, what is sure is that even if the USA ever had a medalist in any Q3 ESWC Finals since 2003 to 2008, except during the Masters, they still have to bring us a Champion...