FURIA alym: “Even though we lost, this was the most fun I’ve ever had on stage”

Hotspawn spoke with FURIA player Torogul “alym” Baidyldaev after the team’s elimination from VCT Masters Santiago at the hands of EMEA’s BBL, discussing his journey, his experience at the event, and more. Despite FURIA’s early playoffs exit, both defeats were close, and for alym, despite the loss, the whole experience has been incredibly positive and his individual form incredible.

Hotspawn: Throughout the series and your run in VCT Americas, your impact has been incredible.

How has it been going from T2, to winning Americas, and now playing on this stage?

Alym: It’s pretty exciting. Very exciting.

A lot of big changes and everything is very fast paced. I blinked and last summer I was in college playing tier two, and now I’m in Santiago playing on stages in front of thousands of people. It’s crazy. Time flies. But because so much is happening and everything is so busy, I don’t even notice how fast it’s going. But it’s very exciting and very fun.

Hotspawn: Incredible performance today. You had 13 first kills.

How did you manage that?

Alym: Honestly I don’t know if I have an answer. I feel like today I was just playing my own game. The first map I don’t know if I did, but going into Breeze and the third map I just did whatever I wanted. Every single time I didn’t doubt myself. I was like, “Okay, I just got to shoot my gun.”

So I said, “F*** it. I’m just going to go in and do my thing.” I don’t think about stats too much. After the match I checked the stats and I was like, “Oh, it’s 13. Not too shabby.”

Hotspawn: How has VCT Masters Santiago been for you?

Alym: Very good. Every day after practice, me and the boys — whoever joins us — we grab a Lime scooter and go around Santiago for like an hour or two. Just sightseeing and enjoying the vibes. So far it’s been very welcoming. People have been really kind and everyone is super hyped. I can’t complain. It’s been awesome.

Hotspawn: Your team has great chemistry.

How do you keep a positive mentality even when games aren’t going your way?

Alym: Everyone trusts each other. We know even if we’re down 10–1 or 9–3, whatever we’re down at, we know we still haven’t lost. You don’t lose until you lose. We know we can bring it back, we showed that on Abyss going from 9-3 to 13-11. Unfortunately it didn’t pull through all the way, but we showed we’re capable of and we put up a good fight, just mainly just trusting each other and knowing we’re capable of

Hotspawn: What are your biggest takeaways from facing Paper Rex and BBL?

Alym: Honestly, not much takeaway from the first match against PRX, that was more in my head, more like clouded. I barely remember it. After the first match I was like, “I just wanna forget about it.” But the second match today is completely opposite. I want to remember. Even though we lost, today was the most fun I’ve had ever in my life, playing on stage and I was in my own groove. I was just having fun playing my game and that kind of set the standard for like, “Oh, this is what I want my future to be like. This is what I need to do.”

Hotspawn: What is your biggest goal in esports or life?

Alym: Just make sure people important to me are good. Make sure everybody around me is good. And if all the people I care for are good, I’m good. Anything I do, I try to make sure everybody’s good.

Hotspawn: The losses in Santiago were FURIA’s first of the year.

How do you deal with them?

Alym: After the first loss, it’s like, “It’s okay. We didn’t show up, we know what we’re capable of.” So just play our game, be comfortable, be confident and take our fights. And that’s what we went into today. We took our fights, we were confident, it was a lot better showing. But today, me personally, I’m not sad at all. It’s weird. I feel like I should be sad, but I’m more excited. I’m so excited to play more. I want to go back. I don’t know when we’re playing next, but I want to play split one tomorrow.

I’m so hyped to play. I’m so excited. Even though we lost, I don’t know why it’s like this, but hype, very hype.

THIS GUY IS BUILT DIFFERENT! @alym_val WITH THE 4K! #VALORANTMasters pic.twitter.com/wOaPTL1KJX

— VALORANT Champions Tour (@ValorantEsports) March 8, 2026

Hotspawn: You’re from Kyrgyzstan, then you moved to the U.S., and now you’re playing for a Brazilian organization in FURIA. That’s a long way to come for VALORANT. What has that experience been like for you personally?

What has that journey been like?

Alym: It’s been crazy. I remember the first week when I landed in the U.S. five years ago. I didn’t know much English, just the basics. From there it was just learning one thing at a time. First I focused on learning English and focusing on my studies. Then I started making friends and getting used to everything.

Hotspawn: What were you studying?

Alym: Psychology. It was during COVID around 11th and 12th grade and then when I started college I studied psychology. But I mostly took math classes because I was planning to transfer to mathematics after the first year. Psychology doesn’t really make that much money unless you go all the way to a PhD or Master’s. I didn’t want to study that long, so I wanted to transfer to math because I love math.

But yeah, it’s been crazy. I went from moving to the U.S., learning the language, making friends, going to college, and now I’m playing VALORANT here.

Hotspawn: Did you play Counter-Strike before that?

Was VALORANT your first FPS?

Alym: Shoutout to my brother. He’s a big gamer and he introduced me to most of the games I played. I played CS 1.6 when I was really young, like six, seven, eight years old. Back where I’m from it’s very common for people to go to PC cafés because not everyone has a computer at home. So after school maybe once a week I’d go to a PC café with my friends and play some CS 1.6.

Then in 2015 when I turned 10, my uncle gifted me CS:GO. Buying games there is actually really expensive because of the currency difference, so it was a big gift. I played CS:GO from about age 10 to 12 and got around 2,000 hours. I wasn’t that good though — I was like Gold Nova, pretty average.

Hotspawn: Two thousand hours at 12 years old is crazy.

Alym: I would go to school, come back, and just play games all day. That was basically my routine.

Hotspawn: Your parents let you do that?

Alym: Yeah. My parents were really supportive. The rule was simple, as long as I got good grades, I could do whatever I wanted. I mostly had A’s and a few B’s, so I just finished my schoolwork fast and then played games.

Hotspawn: So when did VALORANT come into the picture?

Alym: The first three years I was in the U.S. I actually played League of Legends. I got to Masters in League. It’s like Immortal in VALORANT. Then my friends in Kyrgyzstan. My brother and our friend group started playing VALORANT and they told me to download it and play with them. The ping was really high, like 120–130. I would just play with them occasionally, maybe once a week or once a month.

Then one of my Kyrgyz friends moved to the U.S., to San Francisco. He told me, “Let’s play on NA servers with good ping.” We started playing together and I was playing maybe once a week. We got to Diamond pretty easily because he was already very good from CS.

Then I started getting better and better. Around March 2024 I decided to actually try. I bought a gaming laptop and started grinding VALORANT every day after school. I hit Radiant on a laptop, which was kind of crazy. After that I got a job, bought a PC, and just kept grinding. That summer I was streaming every day, playing like 10–11 hours a day, instalocking Reyna in ranked every game.

Hotspawn: Were you lurking on Reyna?

Alym: Yeah, I was lurking sometimes, but I was always comming. I was very passionate and always communicating with the team. That summer helped me improve the most mechanically. If you play Reyna every game, you have to win your fights. After that I got scouted by a tier-three team, then tier two, and eventually tier one.

Hotspawn: That’s an amazing journey. One last thing:

How did your parents react when you told them you wanted to go pro?

Alym: They were very skeptical. Typical Asian parents. But they’re actually more open-minded than a lot of people I know. Their main thing was: if this is really what I want to do, they will support me. But they told me to think carefully about dropping college and committing to esports. We had some discussions about it, especially since I was taking a gap year, but in the end they respected my decision. They support me no matter what.

Hotspawn: Do you want to say anything to them or your family watching?

Alym: Just thank you for supporting me and believing in me. It means a lot. My whole family is watching, from Spain, from Kyrgyzstan, from all over the world. They’re watching all the matches, and it really means a lot to me.