The first episode of the “American Ninja Warrior 4 Compilation” series to air on NBC on Saturday nights from 8-9 pm Eastern will be a recap of “some of the best scenes” from the Southwest region. I assume this means both the opening regional round as well as the regional finals. This is in line with my expectations that of the 8 one-hour episodes of this “season”, the first 6 will be one-hour treatments of each region, and then the last 2 one-hour episodes will cover the National Finals in Las Vegas.
The February 16th episode will cover the Southeast Region. I don’t have visibility for later episodes. If you learn the schedule per the regions beyond that, please let me know and I will re-post it!
Airing Schedule Feb 2nd – Southwest Region Feb 9th – Northeast Region Feb 16th – Southeast Region Feb 23rd – ? March 2nd – ? March 9th – ? March 16th – National Finals in Las Vegas March 23rd – National Finals in Las Vegas
I’ll also say more broadly that the fact NBC is doing this compilation season is a great signal about their commitment to the franchise. This will build a bigger audience for the show in advance of American Ninja Warrior 5 to air the summer of 2013, and most likely is secondarily being done to drum up more competitors to compete in American Ninja Warrior 5 that is likely to go down in late March and April this year.
Here is a list of the 90 national finalists in American Ninja Warrior 4 who advanced to Las Vegas to compete on the Mt. Midoriyama replica uber-course that was built there. There will be 10 wildcards added to these 90 competitors to make an even 100 runners, which is the traditional number that competed in the original Ninja Warrior Japan (Sasuke) for many years. The identity of these wildcards will be revealed when the show airs.
15 finalists from each of the 6 regions (listed below in order of finish) fought their way through their respective regional rounds and then the regional finals to advance to the first finals of American Ninja Warrior held in the US. Mad props to all these competitors, and hit LIKE to applaud them and share this list to spread the word of their awesomeness!
Southwest Evan Dollard Jesse La Flair Kole Stevens Remi Bakkar Brent Steffenson Chad Simpson Derek Nakamoto Dorian Cedars Dan Mast Paul Darnell Sedderick Bassett Ryan Thompson Dylan Curry Ronnie Shalvis Jr Michael “Frosti” Zernow
Midwest Matthew Derouen Andrew Karsen Jack Morgan Stephen Volcko Arthur Skov Michael Silenzi Nick ‘Lovin’ Stephforn Johnathan Morin Scott Robinson Will Dodd Joshua Grant Andrew Lowes Nate Aye Nick Kostner Cade Halada
Northeast Tim Shieff Luis Moco Dan Galiczynski Chris Wilczewski Elet Hall Travis Graves Jesse Villareal Christopher DiGangi Andrew Wood Danny Johnson Bradley Smith Jr. Phillip Pirollo John Sapinoso Matt Mings Michael Pericoloso
Northwest James McGrath Travis Furlanic David Campbell Sean Noble Kyle Cochrane Justin Sweeney Josh Horsley Nathan Sausedo Justin Walcker J.B. Douglas Kevan Reoli Ben Snead Brian Kretsch Gunner Bahn Patrick McGrath
Midsouth Paul Kasemir Brandon Douglass Brian Arnold Jaret Salas Kevin Klein Sat Khalsa Ahmed Toure Josh Lobeck Lorin Ball Jake Smith Bob Pondrom Nathaniel Spencer James Wyatt Tremayne Dortch Alan Connealy
Southeast David “Flip” Rodriguez Drew Dreschel Travis Rosen Jared “J.J.” Woods Michael Ekhert Bull Bullard Sean Morris William Brown Thomas Hall Brendan Kelly Andy Taylor Adam Grossman Niko Bogucki Tony Reddick Paul O’Connor
The “Mid-South” region, also previously called “South Central”, is on deck tonight on G4 and tomorrow (Monday) on NBC. There are a number of amazing athletes and veteran competitors in this tough region, quite a number of them from the dominant APEX Movement pack out of Colorado.
Jake “Love” Smith – Finalist from American Ninja Warrior 3, where he failed on the double salmon ladder in Japan, and professional free-runner who also competed in G4’s great Jump City: Seattle parkour/freerunning competition, Jake makes things look easy that are hard. A true threat to win it all. One of many APEX competitors in this region. Paul Kasemir – Paul is a two-time American Ninja Warrior finalist, and competed in Sasuke (Ninja Warrior Japan) two times, reaching the third stage both times. Paul is ridiculously smooth and fast, and like his team-mate Jake Smith is one of the handful of competitors who are a threat to take down the $500k on top of Mt Midoriyama Las Vegas. Jereme Sanders – Jereme is an icon in the parkour community having been a member of The Tribe, widely recognized as America’s first parkour team, and has competed in multiple seasons of American Ninja Warrior and in the single season of Jump City: Seattle. Jereme has a ton of experience attacking obstacles in his life, and a day on the course of American Ninja Warrior is just another day of play for him, so he’s a big threat to go deep out of the Mid South region. Jaret Salas – Jaret is a first-timer to American Ninja Warrior, but I’ve been training with him for the last year and the dude is sick. Incredibly strong, agile, well-conditioned athlete that might just come out of nowhere and shock everybody. 505 in the house! Josh Kronberg – Josh is a member of our unofficial “Middle-Aged Ninja Dads Club” of competitors. He’s a very dedicated competitor, and just barely missed advancing to the semi-finals in American Ninja Warrior 3. He’s got a great obstacle course in his backyard that he’s built and he’s trained on (including letting me play on it a few times), and he’s a very focused strong athlete with a lot of practical experience under his belt. Look for him to go far. Check out the competitor interview he gave me earlier. 505 in the house! Risa Scott – One of the top women of American Ninja Warrior, and another amazing competitor from Team Apex, I can’t even do the Human Flag in my imagination as long as Risa can do it in real life (YouTube it if you don’t believe me). Risa is a threat to become the first woman to complete the opening stage in American Ninja Warrior. Old Men of Austin – Interestingly enough, two of the strongest older competitors in all of American Ninja Warrior both hail out of Austin: Jason Bischoff and Craig Stiles, ages 44 and 48 respectively. They’ll be holding it down for the middle-aged guys in the Mid South! Chris Okruhlik – Check out the interview and bio in the post below for more info on Chris! Check out his competitor interview.
As always, there are many deserving competitors that I’m neglecting here…forgive me.
Chris Okruhlik, or more commonly known as Chris O, does a great interview for us talking about his experiences training for and competing in the world’s toughest obstacle course competition. Chris O competed in ANW2 and this season’s ANW4 in the South-Central region which airs this Sunday and Monday. He was shown in American Ninja Warrior 2 running in his trademark sleeveless tuxedo shirt, and will hopefully be shown in this season’s South-Central episodes.
Chris has a ton of heart, and is known in the competitor community for his enthusiasm and the strong support he gives his ninja brethren. I can attest to this personally…when I was battling for a spot in this season’s American Ninja Warrior I know Chris was working behind-the-scenes as a guaranteed invite to highlight that they needed to let me run!
So enjoy his story, and remember to root Chris O on every time he steps on the course!
In the third installment in my series on great competitors in American Ninja Warrior, I bring you Josh Kronberg who competed in ANW2 and ANW3. He just missed making the semi-finals in ANW3, and I think is a real sleeper competitor to shock some people in ANW4. He’s been training like a madman, and has a great course in his backyard that he’s built up with trademark obstacles like the jumping bars, the salmon ladder, and the unstable bridge among others. I’ve had a chance to hang out and train with him, and he’s a humble nice guy with serious determination to be the first American Ninja Warrior. In fact, I’m going down to Albuquerque to train with him again next week…lucky me! Hope you guys enjoy his story, and encourage him in his dreams.
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