The fifth season of the Intel Grand Slam, a $1 million prize for CS:GO teams who win three ESL Pro Tour Masters events and one ESL Pro Tour Championship event in a span of 10 tournaments, will commence with IEM Rio 2023 this week and all the CS:GO accomplishments during this time will carry over to Counter-Strike 2, ESL confirmed today in a press release.
“Once the highly anticipated Counter-Strike 2 is released and implemented into the ESL Pro Tour (EPT) ecosystem, any eligible event wins in CS:GO will count towards the Intel Grand Slam and as such a team can complete their run with wins in both CS:GO and CS2,” ESL said. CS2 is currently in limited test access and is expected to release worldwide this summer.
The Intel Grand Slam is arguably the most prestigious prize in CS:GO because it rewards the team who dominated the scene the most in a span of 10 events. FaZe Clan won season four after they lifted the ESL Pro League season 17 trophy in March, on top of winning IEM Katowice, IEM Cologne, and ESL Pro League season 15 in 2022.
The Intel Grand Slam has existed since 2017 and Astralis won the first edition in 2018 after taking ESL Pro League season eight’s title. Team Liquid won four big ESL events in a row in 2019 in less than three months and secured season two’s prize, while the third season was won by Natus Vincere in 2021 after they lifted the trophies of IEM Cologne and ESL Pro League season 15 in the second semester of that year.
It’s unclear when ESL will switch its tournaments to CS2. The tournament organizer told Dot Esports in March that it would move to CS2 once it’s reasonable. The BLAST Paris Major will be the last Valve-sponsored event for CS:GO and the first CS2 Major will be played in 2024.
