EST Bwipo on stepping away from Tier 1: "The hubris of my ego came back to bite me [...] I'm still a cocky bastard deep down"

Gabriël “” Rau had an unusual 2026 season. After leaving , the veteran toplaner spent the year outside the international Tier 1 scene, playing for in Brazil Tier 2 and eventually helping the team win the Brazilian Challenger Series without dropping a single map. Now, Estral will face the CBLOL Promotion tournament with a spot in Brazil’s top league on the line for 2027.

In an exclusive interview with Sheep Esports, Bwipo discussed his experience playing in Brazil, the reasons behind Estral’s dominance, and how he plans to use his experience in high-pressure matches during the Promotion. The veteran also talked about , his desire to return to Europe and face Rasmus "" Borregaard, the possibility of remaining in CBLOL, his interest in coaching after retirement, the lessons he learned during his year away from international competition and the legacy he wants to leave behind.

Gabriël “Bwipo” Rau : “There's a lot of talent here, to be honest. I think there are some players that know how to play the game well. It's promising stuff. There is a lot to work with. I suppose it didn't really surprise me because, if you think about it rationally, in 2025 beat to get to the finals and then lost to us. In 2026, this year, lost to LØS and lost to . My point is that the talent has always been there, or at least it's been there for a while now. When it comes to the level of gameplay, it's definitely not significantly worse than what I'm used to. That's what I can say for sure.

Bwipo: Simply put, our players are better. I think why the players are better is a more interesting question to answer. I think that it's very important in League of Legends to have a strong idea of how you want to pilot your character and how you want to play. What you want to do and how you want to do it. And I think that our players have better ideas of what they want to do and how they want to do it. That's why the games are more stable. That's why we don't give up as many towers and objectives, because mistakes aren't as apparent. They're not as easy to punish. Now, I do think mistakes are being made. However, I think that due to the nature of the fact that, as a whole, as a team, on average, I'd say we're a lot better than the teams that we've played, other players will come and compensate for your mistakes. When you have tempo because you're winning your lane, you can move and help. That's kind of how League works. It's always how it's worked, it's always how it will work.

Bwipo: For me, the most important thing is using my experience to help people understand what's important in highly stressful matches near the end of the year. I think that a lot of people don't understand what really matters in performance when it comes to the end of the year because when you're going to play those matches, they're literally going to change your career. One has to accept that going to Worlds and performing at Worlds changes your career. Going to Worlds already is a big deal. Performing there, again, it's another layer of stress.

Now, obviously we're talking about the Promotion tournament, but this is where I draw my experience from, which is qualifying for Worlds and playing at the World Championship. In a way, qualifying for CBLOL and getting to play in CBLOL is the same idea. Maybe a little different, but at the end of the year, if you are the team that qualifies for CBLOL and you get promoted to CBLOL with your team beating what would be, currently, I believe a top-four team in CBLOL, that means you have the qualities of being at least a top-four player in CBLOL.

At least within the structure of the team that you're currently on, and that changes the way people perceive you. It has a large influence on your future. And one needs to understand that when you're playing League of Legends under that kind of pressure because it's going to change your life, literally. If you're a pro player, it's going to change the amount of salary you're going to be offered, the opportunities you're going to get, whether or not you even get a job next year. It's all affected by the fact that that one best-of-five, and that is the way the ecosystem works.

How players behave in those circumstances is something that, in my opinion, is already something you can study. People will make mistakes mechanically. People will make mistakes on split-second decision-making. People will make mistakes on macro. People will make mistakes regardless of what you do. You can't avoid the mistakes, but what you can do is practice putting yourself in situations where your character, the champions that you've prepared and you're going to draft, are going to succeed. This is non-negotiable for me, and this is where I use my experience and make a big point out of this.

I don't care that you missed your skills. I don't care that you misplayed a team fight. I don't care that you got caught in a certain situation. It happens. As long as you're in situations and actively pursuing situations where your champion succeeds, it's okay to make mistakes. But the moment that you're agreeing to play team fights, you're agreeing to play the map in a way where you're not utilizing the strengths of the champion that you prepared. I believe that the coach is not responsible for preparing a champion pool. I think a player is responsible for coming on stage and being prepared with the champions that they're going to use in what could be one of the most important series of the year.

Bwipo: We've only had a scrim, and scrims are always different from stage. People play differently, more comfortably. The pressure of the stage definitely changes the way people play the game, in my experience, so it's hard to judge. I can't say. All I know is that (Kim Dong-min) is obviously a very good player, and I already alluded to this in my interview after the finals I played. He will be the first player I play against that will be good enough individually to stand his own at the World Championship level. Now, whether he will or won't, I have no idea, but I think he's got the potential, at the very least.

Bwipo: I learned a lot from him at the start of my career. I was a rookie in 2018 when I played with him, and playing with him made me realize what it takes to be the best. It was always obvious to me that he was one of the best players in Europe, if not the best. Obviously, there was (Martin Larsson) and there was (Zdravets Iliev) on the team, who were some really insane players, in my opinion, and for me those three stand out in the history of the organization that I played with.

Obviously, we had some really talented players over the years outside of those. (Mads Brock-Pedersen) comes to mind, of course. But the point is, for me, Caps is just the final boss. He got inducted into the Hall of Legends just this year. You can't really deny that. It's hard to argue against that. He's the best player in Europe, the greatest of all time in Europe. Winning a championship against him would just be an achievement. Really, it's that simple. I've gone to Europe and I've won my own titles, but I wasn't the reason my team was successful.

I've had the fortune of being on teams where I was given the trust and also earned the trust to be a large shareholder of the success of the team, and I'd like to be a part of a team like that and then have a fair finals against Caps and try to win. I think that's just really exciting. As much as I say that I want to play against Caps, I wouldn't say no to playing with him, that's for damn sure. The guy's obviously a beast. Just to clarify, I'd love to go to Europe, and if I can't play with Caps, I would love to play against him and beat him because I think that's more realistic than joining a team with him.

Though, playing with him would be really cool. The point is that Caps is Europe's final boss. I think any self-respecting competitor wants to beat the best in the region. Just the way it is. It's that simple. It's just the pure feeling of: he's the best, I want to be the best. But ultimately, he's won, what, 14 out of the last 18 splits or some ridiculous number like that. Of course you want to go there and beat him. That's just the way it is. You want to go and beat the best, and that's always what I wanted to do.

Bwipo: I just want to go home to Europe because I like Europe a lot. I think there are a lot of really passionate fans, a lot of really passionate players. It's where it all started for me. I owe a lot to European League of Legends. In a way, I owe everything. If it were up to me, I would find a team I was happy in in Europe. That's it. I know how the market works. I know how the ecosystem works. One cannot be making decisions like this. I can't choose where I'm going to be playing. All I can do is my best, play my best, and then go from there. And that's what I'm focusing on. I want to be a desired player not because of my status, but because I play the game well. I focus on this and work very hard to be a positive contributor to this idea. That's what I'm currently trying to do.

Bwipo: Honestly, the main thing you look at is players. If you're a player, you're interested in working with certain players because, for me, I feel like I can do a lot of good for these players and help them by giving them feedback and honing their strengths. It's something that I'm definitely considering. I look at some names that have come to mind, like, "Oh, it'd be nice to play with this player because I think he's good".

But I'm not in a position right now where I would say, "This is the organization I'm going to see my future with in Brazil." One thing I have done is ask around how it is with organizations as well, because I think it's important when you're an import. If I get the paperwork done, I'm technically not an import in CBLOL, which would obviously be really powerful. So that's something that, if I were to play in CBLOL, it's definitely something I'll get done. My mother is from Brazil, has a Brazilian passport, and I'm eligible to have dual citizenship and be considered a Brazilian citizen. So obviously, if that were to pass, there's a lot of crazy stuff the CBLOL team could do with me, I'm sure.

I think what matters is not looking at imports. I think what matters is looking at a core of players that want to work together and play together. Because for me, I want to win, obviously, and I want to go to Worlds and have a really great team. But at the same time, I really believe that a Brazilian, Portuguese-speaking team can be really good. , for example, is really strong. I think they're a good team. I think they have a lot of potential. The only issue that they could really find themselves having is not having enough, I don't want to say the word leadership because everyone always uses that word to describe what I'm trying to say, but my point is experience and leadership, if that makes sense. They have a lot of good players, but you need to understand what it takes to be a winner.

A lot of people put too much emphasis on things that don't matter as much. This is a big reason why certain teams don't succeed and have a history of choking because they don't put enough emphasis on what it takes to win. It's still something that you learn the hard way. Fearless made it a lot harder to be a good pro player. It was a lot easier back in the day when you could rely on the same three champions and just pick one of those three. It's a lot harder now that there's a lot of different picks, but I think it makes it more exciting.

For me, the CBLOL point is that there's a lot of talent here, there's a lot of players that can do a lot of good. But it's, like I said, a matter of finding a home for me. I'd like an organization where I feel at home, where I feel like there's mutual respect between me and the people that do the business side of things. There is also mutual respect between me and the fans of the organization because I want the fans of the organization that I play for to be happy that I'm on their team. That also matters to me.

Bwipo: To be completely fair, I did in fact miss out on international events in 2022 and 2023. This is actually not the longest I've been away from international competition, just to reiterate. This is just an opportunity to do better. It's an opportunity for personal growth. It's an opportunity to disengage my success as a player from the person I am. And also understand that there's more to life than just being good at League of Legends and performing well at tournaments, right? It's a big part of my life. I'm proud of it. I really care about it and I want to do better.

But the reality of the matter is that there is more to it. I've been able to explore that, which is lovely. I also think I've grown a lot as a person through some of the struggles I've gone through. And I'm grateful for any and all of that. I think I wouldn't say I'm a particularly religious person, but something that stuck with me throughout this year is: when you pray to God and ask for patience, what does he do? It's a question you can think about for a second. And I'll let everyone that listens to this interview ask themselves that. I think I was a very prideful person. I don't think that's a particularly good trait.

The question is, when I asked to change, how would one change? I think through experience is a pretty good way of doing it. The hubris of the decisions I made in my life and my career and the hubris of my ego came back to bite me, and I think it was a great opportunity for me to grow. It was up to me to decide to grow or continue to be a conceited little child that was particularly good at video games. They're still a part of me in there. I wouldn't say I've grown, I've changed completely. I'm still a cocky bastard deep down, I know that.

But I definitely understand my position. I understand the influence I held once better and maybe even still hold because people still respect my opinion about the game. They still respect my opinion about what I think of players, and that was an opinion that I've kind of flung around. It's easy to just never change. It's comfortable to not change, but a change was necessary, and this is the way a change manifested for me. Rather than being upset that it was a difficult one, I'll be grateful that it happened.

Bwipo: I think coaching is ultimately... This is where my personal growth comes into play. I used to say most coaches are terrible at their job. This isn't true. I think most coaches are good at what they do. However, what they do isn't teaching players how to play League of Legends well. What they do is teach players how to be better people and how to be better professionals. There's a big difference here. For me, the focus is simple. I make sure that whoever I work with plays the game well. I think that if I were to be a coach, something I definitely need to improve on is teaching people also how to be a better person, how to take more responsibility in a healthy manner.

There are a million things that go into coaching that matter and are important, and I cannot really quantify all of the things that go into coaching because I haven't looked into it. I can say with certainty is the fact that there are not many coaches that can teach players how to play League of Legends from the ground up, really well and truly from the ground up, and teach a player how to play a strong competitive game. It is very hard to do. That's what appeals to me because I think I'm capable of this. I've already said that within a year I could take any player - one has to specify because ultimately if you're coaching someone and he doesn't want to, you're never going to get anywhere - but any player that wants to put in the work over a year, I think I could get anyone to the Worlds level of play. Obviously, individually. Whether I could pull the team all the way up there or not, I'm not sure.

I don't know if I'm qualified to be a Head Coach, but I think when it comes to individually teaching players what they need to do to succeed, how they need to play, I would say I'm overqualified. I'm very good at this. I'm very confident that I can do this for my team, for the team that I would be coaching, and it's something that I am interested in because I think it's awesome. At the end of the day, I remember in 2018 I wasn't even playing the three games that we won in Madrid in the 2018 Summer Finals, and there was still the fact that I was a part of that experience. I was a part of the team, a part of the preparation.

It still very much felt like I was a part of the team's win. Being a coach is still going to be an awesome experience. The main reason I haven't gone into coaching is realistically that why would I spend so much effort on other people when, if I put the effort into myself, I could do it myself? And until that isn't true, until I reach a point where I feel like when I put in the effort, I'm not good enough, I will pursue playing because that's what I'm passionate about. It's what I love.

Bwipo: A large part of what really drove me to work as hard as I did in was the team I was on. The organization, the name, everything. It meant a lot to me, and also the players. I don't think I'll ever be able to bring back - I pray I will, but I think it will be very hard for me to find a group of people that will make me want to bring back the same intensity that I brought back then. I think even in FlyQuest I was unable to summon the same kind of grindset, if you will. Maybe it's age, right? To be honest with you, I put in the same kind of effort.

Now that I think about it, I think I'm romanticizing my 2018 year a little bit. I was putting in the same or more amount of effort than the other years I was playing. My point is that it's the type of effort you put in. It's not just the amount of hours you put in, but when you set aside your ego and you want to find a solution at all costs for your team so your team can succeed; I think this is the type of situation you want to find yourself in.

And I have to say with confidence that I was unable to summon that kind of confidence, that kind of solution and problem-solving in the teams since the 2018 roster. Interpersonal problems would get in the way. I didn't have that with that 2018 lineup. I put everything on the line. If I had a problem, I would state it clearly: this needs to change so that we can find a solution for this. This, and this. I think I haven’t been able to do that since 2018, and it's one of my regrets in my career. It's something that I want to be able to recreate and find a solution to. But that's just being realistic here.

When you ask me the question, am I still as passionate? Yes, I am. However, I had no limits to what needed to be done in 2018 to win. My ego, none of that. It was all about winning as a team and performing as a team, and that's it. I wanted to see these five players succeed at all costs. And there are moments in my career where I didn't want to have the hard conversations because I just didn't want to. The hassle of going through that, you know. It's hard to have an emotional conversation with someone. It's not an easy thing.

This is what I mean when I mention that there's more to coaching than just teaching a guy how to play the game. You have to have the hard conversations with players when they come up. You have to sit people down and say, "This is unacceptable. This has to change. Your behavior is an issue," or whatever it may be. I was unable to have those kinds of conversations in some of the years that I played, and it is a regret of mine because there was a limit to my desire to win and succeed. I didn't have that in 2018. Don't get me wrong, I have a lot of passion for this game. I put in a lot of hours and I really want to win.

Don't let my answer change your mind about that because I work hard. I'm always high on the ladder and solo queue. I take pride in the fact that I grind solo queue. I take it seriously. I practice my champions hard, and whenever my fans watch me play a champion that I perform on stage, I want them to have the feeling that I am one of the best players in the world on this character. That is why I work really hard because that is my way of showing respect to the people that support me. The hunger is still there. Is it the same hunger? No, it's hard to summon that. It really is. For me, wanting to win that badly was really a combination of finding a set of players and staff that made me feel like I wanted to do anything to see them succeed. It's been hard to make that happen since.

Bwipo: Obviously, the World Championship would be the icing on any cake for any career. It's hard to continue with this conversation without mentioning that. But realistically speaking, what drives me, what I want my legacy to be, is that people find joy in characters that other people didn't. I've always loved League of Legends because of the characters. I'm a big nerd about the lore, the soundtracks, the vibe of a character. Really, when a character has sound work done that is satisfying, it matters to me. It really does. The little things.

For example, Aatrox's ultimate: when he activates it, when it resets, when it expires, it all has very distinct sound cues. I'll take the opportunity here just to shout out the people at Riot Games who worked on those characters and worked on that kind of detail, the lore, the vibe of the character. For example, I really have made efforts to make Mordekaiser work over the course of my career because I love the character. As I played it more, I realized that there are angles here where I can make it work.

It's that moment where I can kind of disconnect competitive play from this formulaic setting of "you have to play the meta, you have to play X, Y and Z," and I can make it closer to what I love the game for, which is that there are 170-something characters at this point. Just pick one you like and play it. I want that to be my legacy. To remember there's a guy that did that. He played the character that he really enjoyed and loved playing. And he did that until he got really good at it, good enough to be World Championship level. Because that's what I've done with many of my characters.

I put in extra effort when I like a champion. Not all of them have worked, I will be honest. Some of them did not work in competitive, even though I really wanted them to, and I tried really hard. But some of them I'm remembered for. Some people still remember me for Volibear. Whenever a fan tells me this, I have to admit that this is definitely what makes me the happiest. It's when someone tells me, "Hey, I watched you play Volibear at Worlds, and because you played that character, I started to fall in love with playing this character too." This makes me the happiest out of anything. I hope my legacy is one of joy and finding joy in playing characters that I love.”