Like football players taking to the field in a giant stadium, the 12 finalists passed through a glowing “hype tunnel,” some wearing jerseys bearing sponsorship logos. They approached the neon-lit stage to cheers as the announcer shouted introductions and cameras captured their every move.
The men then sat down at their desktop computers, opened a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet and began typing.
Excel, a program that performs complex mathematical calculations on behalf of humans, is often associated with corporate drudgery, and rightfully so. But last month, at an esports arena in Las Vegas that usually hosts Fortnite and League of Legends tournaments, spreadsheet-savvy financial professionals gathered to solve extreme problems in front of an audience of about 400 people. Complex Excel puzzles, they were treated like minor celebrities.
Organizers call the event the “Microsoft Excel World Championship.” “Yes, it’s a thing,” the official website says.
Up for grabs are a $5,000 prize, a wrestling-style championship belt and the title of world’s best spreadsheet maker. But organizer Andrew Grigolyunovich had bigger dreams. He hopes to turn Excel Racing into a popular eSports where pros compete for million-dollar prizes and major league glory.
“Excel has always been considered a back-office product,” said Mr. Grigolyunovich, a Sudoku champion from Latvia. But in Vegas, “these guys who are working, I don’t want to say boring jobs – but, you know, regular jobs – they can be stars.”
If this seems too ambitious, we’d like to introduce you to Erik Oehm, a software developer from San Francisco who has a front-row seat to the action.
“This is the Super Bowl for Excel nerds,” Mr. Orm said. “If Excel is the center of your universe, it’s like hanging out with LeBron James and Kobe Bryant.”
The “Excel LeBron James” who was introduced in Vegas was Diarmuid Early, 39, an Irish financial consultant living in New York who wore jeans, sandals and a midriff-like t-shirt. Muscle-patterned jerseys enter the arena. This Kobe Bryant is 37-year-old Andrew Ngai, the soft-spoken actuary from Australia known as “The Annihilator” who started as the three-time defending champion world championship.
“We’re friends – for now,” Mr. Early joked as they posed for a photo. But his anxiety is palpable.
“I might be taking it too seriously,” he said. “I’m very invested in this.”
The format of the finals is a simulation of the online role-playing game “World of Warcraft”. It took 12 people (this particular nerd day is mostly a male affair) to devise an Excel formula to track 20 avatars and their vital signs. If that sounds extremely complicated, it’s this: Players are given a seven-page instruction manual.
To prepare, Early adjusted the width of the Excel columns with the precision of a point guard preparing for a three-pointer. Mr Wei queued up to watch the “Focus Music” collection on YouTube.
The announcer kicked off the 40-minute event—”Five, four, three, two, one, Excel!”—and the 12 players leaned over their keyboards and began typing in formulas. An example: “=CountChar(下(D5),”W”)” Ask a competitor, Michael Jarman, to count how many times the letter “W” appears in a spreadsheet.
The goal is to score as many points as possible while staying ahead in rolling eliminations. When a series of answers appeared in the Excel column, Mr. Wei had taken a significant lead, and gasps could be heard. Then he ran into a problem, and so did Mr. Earle. As the two front-runners frantically tried to figure things out, Mr. Jarman came out ahead.
“Oh my God, oh my God,” Mr. Orm shouted.
“Well, that’s ridiculous.”
The first spreadsheet was VisiCalc, an “electronic blackboard” that could automate paper-and-pencil calculations. Microsoft launched Excel in 1985. (Google says more than 3 billion people use its suite of free products, including Gmail and a spreadsheet program called Sheets.)
Part of the appeal and intimidation factor of spreadsheets is their undefined scope. For example, Excel can be a tool for appointment organizers or for sorting out a country’s coronavirus cases.
Bob Frankston, founder of VisiCalc, said in almost philosophical terms that those who view Excel solely as a financial tool miss its enormous potential. “They don’t realize it’s a mirror of their thoughts,” he said. “The financial planning tools they see are in their heads.”
But for millions of people, it remains just a tool to complete the tasks assigned to them by corporate executives. This perhaps says something about our times: that our tools of enslavement are also the foundation of our games.
The first Excel competition ModelOff started in 2012.
When ModelOff folded after seven years, Mr. Grigolyunovich, a former competitor, founded the Financial Modeling World Cup, an organization that hosts Excel championships and other events. The tournament, which has several corporate sponsors including Microsoft, was held in an in-person format for the first time last year. He said shortened rounds, knockout rounds, commentators and a pre-fight “hype tunnel” are all designed to heighten tension and attract viewers.
“I remember thinking, ‘Well, this is ridiculous, why are we doing this?'” Mr. Jarman, a 30-year-old British financial consultant who lives in Toronto, said of the tunnel. “But it’s all in fun. If other esports are doing it, we should do it too.
Mr Grigoryunovich said his vision for future tournaments included bigger spectators, bigger sponsors and a million-dollar prize for the winner. Currently, many fans know the Excel Championship through ESPN’s annual obscure sports showcase, which is sandwiched between competitions such as Speed Chess and the World Dog Surfing Championship.
reluctant competitor
Competitors in Las Vegas say winning requires not only superior expertise but also problem-solving acumen, calmness under pressure and intuition, or luck. Combined with the excitement of the crowd, they say, the game starts to feel like an unpredictable, if not intense, sport.
They seemed less interested in Mr. Grigoryunovich’s vision of fame and fortune than in adapting their staid niche hobby to a televised transition. Most of them come to explore with other Excel enthusiasts. In between rounds, they attended spreadsheet workshops and added each other on LinkedIn.
Several contestants said more competition might have helped create some excitement, but they were too polite and too friendly with each other to initiate any competition.
“Basically, everything they do is to make it more entertaining for the audience, but also more traumatic for the competitors,” Mr. Early said.
There was a whiff of celebrity in the air, though, and Mr. Earle and Mr. Wei (the LeBron and Kobe Bryant of Excel) were inundated with requests for selfies.
“This guy is awesome,” quarterfinalist Joy Hezekiah Andriamalala, a finance student from Madagascar, told reporters after taking a photo with Ngai. “Do you know him? Personally?
Wei appeared to have come to terms with the possibility of losing his winning streak, admitting it was “pretty cool” to be a minor celebrity for a few days. He said he has started to view competitive Excel as a sport rather than a hobby and has set aside more time for practice.
On stage, the leader attempted to stop Mr. Jarman from claiming the championship belt. Mr Early won the semi-final by turning a maze of colorful cells and emoji screens into numbers. In the final, Mr. Wei tried a Hail Mary: filling his remaining cells with random numbers.
As the clock ticked down to zero, Mr. Jarman turned and stared at the leaderboard.
“Ten seconds, will anything happen?” shouts the narrator Oz du Soleil. Nothing was done.
Mr. Jarman jumped from his seat, his hands in the air and his face covered with sweat. The audience erupted. “Look at that! Look at that!” cried M. Dussole.
Mr. Jarman held up his championship belt as someone sprinkled sequins on his head. Mr. Orm let out a sigh of relief.
“You’ll never see that with Google Sheets,” he said. “You’ll never have this level of enthusiasm.”
