Since the IEM North American Finals in New York back in October, where he placed fourth behind fellow qualifiers Vo0, DaHanG and rapha, Nelson has been traveling and finishing up his PhD, which hasn’t left him much time for practice. “I had been really looking forward to playing consistently and getting into good shape for the world finals,” he says, “but I ended up having to travel more or less non stop in the months in between. During the few days I’ve been home in between those trips, I apparently never managed to clean my desk off enough to have room to set up my keyboard and mouse pad to play some Quake.”

In the past two weeks, he has begun to finally pick it up, but most will say that his preparation has come much too late. “I played in a 4v4 tourney [a week and a half ago] and a duel tourney [last weekend]. I hope to play some more duels this week. I don’t seem to be playing too badly and have a few more days to adopt a proper duel mentality. I’ll practice with whoever I can.”