Popular streamer and content creator Tyler “Tyler1” Steinkamp has reached Challenger rank after maining top lane.
After grinding the solo queue ladder all season, Tyler1 has finally reached his goal of getting to Challenger rank by only playing in the top lane. It took him 1,741 games and a lot of hours playing both on and off stream. His overall win rate was at a solid 52% but the journey still ended up being much longer than most fans and probably himself would have imagined.
Tyler1 responds to hitting Challenger with top lane, including Cho’Gath and Urgot
Tyler1 celebrated the last victory with a big victorious scream in classic Tyler1 fashion. By hitting Challenger in top, Tyler1 completes another one of his challenges. Last year, he did the same by playing jungle and previously he has reached Challenger through bot lane as well. The next potential challenge for the dedicated streamer would be either reaching Challenger in mid or support.
On his journey to the top of the ladder, Tyler1 has played a big variety of champions. His most played champion is Cho’Gath, with a total of 342 games played. Cho’Gath is also one of the champions he performed best on, winning 56% of all games on the big void monster. His second-most played is Urgot with 302 games, followed up by Irelia with 234 games. Despite playing her a lot, Irelia wasn’t the one bringing in LP for Tyler1 with a poor win rate of 45%.
Tyler1 has also tried some more unusual picks in the top lane such as Quinn, Heimerdinger, and Ivern in games where he didn’t get the top-lane position. All these games have rewarded Tyler1 with 645 LP currently, putting him at rank 282 on the North American server.
Tyler1 shares his thoughts on top lane
Shortly after hitting his goal, Tyler1 had room to reflect a bit over his journey and top lane as a position. Despite hundreds of games in the lane, Tyler1 isn’t a fan of the current state of the top lane. He thinks the lane itself is too long and is too reliant on the jungler to gank.
“Thank god I’m done with this role,” Tyler1 said. “Top lane sucks to play. The lane is too long and it’s way too luck.”
According to Tyler1, the lane is often camped by the junglers and even other roles at times. This makes it hard to have an impact in the role, as it’s often risky to take on fights. Tyler1’s strategy, in the end, was to play the lane safely and just avoid dying. By doing so, the rest of the map was able to gain leads and ultimately win.
