TryhardThor on meeting Mande, making Pro League and more

Young Danish Apex Legends player TryhardThor is set to make his Pro League debut later today. The 16-year-old is a fan favourite in EMEA, with a growing and fiercely loyal fanbase backing him.

His streaming career been incredibly successful for someone at such a young age. He comfortably maintains viewers bigger than several EMEA pro players. Now, with team Atlas, he has the chance to show what he can do on the big stage.

esports.gg spoke to TryhardThor ahead of the ALGS Split 2 Pro League getting underway.

Gaming is a hobby that TryhardThor has carried throughout his life. He explains he's been a gamer since "my parents were changing my diapers" with him graduating from iPad games to his first console, a Playstation 3.

Starting his gaming journey on a Playstation 3 means that Thor was initially a controller player. Grinding Fortnite (what else!) with his friends after school. However, the attraction of Mouse and Keyboard encouraged him to swap during his Fortnite days.

However, TryhardThor might not have ever picked up Apex if not for his Dad.

"I remember I used to watch a lot of Ninja back in the day. So I saw he was playing Apex when it dropped. And I was like, ah, that's cringe dude, why is he not playing Fortnite?! But then my Dad had read something. He saw some article about Apex and it was apparently breaking records with players when it was first released. So he was like, oh you should try that.

"So I downloaded it and ever since then I've kind of just been on the grind."

Since picking up Apex Legends Thor hasn't looked back. He was initially a "pub grinder" but had never considered streaming until encouraged too by his friends.

"I had some friends and stuff that were said, oh wait, maybe you should start streaming, you're just spending so much time on the game. You could say I was very shy back then.

"I wanted to cry if I had to talk to people, I was like shit man I don't know if I can do that. But I finally got the courage and have been streaming ever since."

TryhardThor says he has met a lot of good players simply through solo queue ranked games and being a consistent streamer.

"Once I started streaming, I started meeting some really good players that asked me to play, and then I would play with them, and then they introduced me to more people. And then, yeah, suddenly I had enough people to play with to get Pred!"

For Thor, there have been some big inspirations and help on his Apex Legends journey.

"I remember on my fifth day of streaming, I was duo queuing with a friend and we duo queued into Shiv seven games in a row. He must have actually been like the only guy solo queuing that day we were the only duo!

"We actually had some good games, then after after stream he raided me. He was really really big back then. It was like a 6k raid! So I was there sitting sitting there on my fifth day of stream and suddenly I just had 6000 people watching me. That kicked off my streaming.

"I went from having like 5 viewers to actually having multiple viewers coming back each day.

"Later on in my career I solo queued into GDolphin also. That's how I met Dolphin, who I've played so much with. I've played a lot of ranked with Dolphin, while we were both streaming, he's raided me many times and we've also played comp. A lot of the big Apex names I've met have all been through solo queue rank!"

Perhaps the biggest inspiration for TryhardThor is Mande. A fellow Dane, the two players don't just share a nationality but they also have very similar playstyles.

"So in my Twitch bio, I had 'favourite streamer, Mande'. I used to watch a lot of Mande back in the day, I loved how Mande played. I've always enjoyed M&K gaming and Mande is the biggest M&K player ever. Not saying he doesn't miss a lot of shots though! But his playstyle is very M&K like.

"So I've always been a huge fan of Mande. I can't quite remember how we first met. I just have killed him in ranked with my Twitch in my name a few times. Which made him go and look at my stream, or some of his viewers did and told him I had his name in my bio as favourite streamer."

TryhardThor would later go on to play with Mande, his long time idol.

"Then later on I went into his chat, saw he was duo queueing and asked, "yo do you wanna play?" Then, because he knew me or had at least seen my name before he said sure. Since then I've gotten many raids from Mande, I met him at the London Playoffs, he's a super nice guy."

How did TryhardThor, a longtime diehard Mande fan feel when playing with his idol for the first time?

"Dude, I was sitting there shaking! I was like oh no, I can't make a mistake dude. But you know, Mande is just that guy. He doesn't really give a sh*t. Rather than worrying about losing, he just wants to have a good time.

"But I was definitely stressing. I really wanted to do good. But I think now we've played many times since, and all of the other big names I've played with, it's definitely just something you get used to. You just adapt and learn to cope with it."

Thor has also leaned on Mande for advice at times, he recalls one particular set of advice that his idol has given him.

"He would always say that you just have to be funnier and better than everyone else. Like better than everyone else at Apex and funnier than everyone else. And then, you know, people would be like, damn, OK, so this guy's just the better streamer.

"For comp, he also told me that for comp his advice was don't do bad or don't do sh*t because people won't watch it then. You know, you gotta do good in the big leagues otherwise people will just start counting you out."

Like a lot of young gamers, getting the support of your parents can be a key factor for if you are able to commit the time needed to make it in the industry. TryhardThor's parents have never had a real issue with him pursuing his gaming dream. His Dad sometimes can be seen in Thor's Twitch chat, even gifting subs from time to time.

"I've never really been too much of a troublemaker. I've always been the kid just observing the other kid's crazy stuff that they're doing. Like some kid would be throwing chairs around in class, and I'd just be sat there like damn dude... okay. Just anchoring!

"So my parents, they were always okay [with gaming] because I wasn't really getting into trouble or anything. Plus, I wasn't playing that much back in the day, so they were okay with it. But with streaming, the fact I'm actually making money from playing games and stuff, they fully support me.  They think I should chase my dreams and just... go for it. You get one shot at this, and I don't want to look back in 20 years and think damn I could've made it."

However, during your school years parents are just half the battle. How do TryhardThor's friends and classmates react to his gaming success?

"I mean at first when I started in High School I was trying to live the Spider-Man life! I was like, I'm not telling ANYONE dude. But eventually, I was like okay it might be time to flex on them, and I eventually told some of my friends.

"So now I have to go through the pain of going to school every day and listening to "Yo Thor, how much money did you make yesterday from streaming dude?"  I swear, they only want to hear how much money I make. No, but it's definitely nice. People at school are nice, when I tell them what I want to do, they're usually just like "oh good for you man!" but they don't really understand it that much, but they find it pretty impressive."

Something that TryhardThor has to contend with is balancing his streaming with school work. Now he is a Pro League player, there is even more time required to prepare. Scrims, VOD reviews and the match days themselves. All while still being in full time Danish education.

"Streaming is a busy lifestyle, I'm not gonna lie. I will wake up in the morning, I will go to school, I'll get home, I'll stream, most days have scrims and then just, you know, go sleep. It's a grind. It's a lot to juggle sometimes.  Most of the time I'll try to do as many assignments and as much homework as I can in school or on the bus. Just to minimize the amount I have to do at home.

"Sometimes I'll have to take fully just a day off to actually recover from all the homework I have to do!"

For TryhardThor and Atlas, the Pro League dream seemed lost at one point. Atlas finished in 9th, one place outside the qualifying positions for Pro League Split 2. However, as often happens, a team disbanded allowing them to get their shot at the top level of Apex Legends.

Thor explains how they found out about the news.

"We heard some rumours before it happened about, potentially a team breaking up. But, you know, I didn't want to get my hopes up too much.  So I kind of just thought, ah, okay, you know, it's probably not going to work out.

"When we got the DM, I think I'd just got home from school. I read Discord and I looked to see if I had any messages, and there it was. It made my day dude! Going from having to play the next CC to suddenly just being in Pro League and literally being in the biggest competition in Apex you know. It's quite an honour."

In a true testament to how close TryhardThor is to his dedicated Twitch community, they were the first people he told.

"First I just posted it on my Discord server. I wanted to let the community know. I wanted to let the boys know. And then, of course, I told my family too. They were so happy for me because they know I've put a lot of time and they know me and the boys scrimmed every day, every week."

For TryhardThor and Atlas, this first split is seen as a learning experience.

"Our main goal for this first split is to definitely just get a lot of experience and learn a lot. I mean, I would be happy if we could just make it to the Regional Finals. I'd be happy with that, but you never know what's going to happen.

"We want to keep up some consistency, and not have a first place and then two 20th places. Just want to keep it consistent and yeah, just get the most out of it as possible and just enjoy playing in Pro League.

"There is a few butterflies in my stomach when I think about it. It's like, damn dude, I'm really about to play against the best players in EU. Sometimes I gotta remind myself that I'm here for a reason, you know. I qualified for this for a reason. And I can't be playing to scared, I can't be respecting them too much. I of course have so much respect for everyone playing, but I can't be letting that get in my way and I just have to look past that."

TryhardThor and Atlas will look to establish themselves when the ALGS Pro League kicks off, later today.