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General Climbing Discussion

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Climbing Mediawatch 28-Jul-2017 At 10:15:51 AM PThomson

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I'm with RodW on this one - I don't believe that there was any great conspiracy, merely that they were applying the same standards as has been upheld by the franchise everywhere else.

This isn't about "crowning a ninja warrior" because it was the best competitor from the pool that entered, it's about crowning a ninja warrior who is transcendentally good. If anything, it's this adherence to a higher standard (rather than just awarding the "best performer of the night") that originally set the series apart from others in a similar vein.

In the original Japanese, and subsequent US and UK series, the ludicrously hard "race stages" (with a nutty timer) and incredibly rare success have featured in their respective finals, and I wouldn't be surprised if its a part of the requirements for licensing the franchise for a localised version, that our standards for "transcendentally good" individuals to qualify for "ninja" don't slip.

If you've watched the foreign finals whereby individuals have actually succeeded, you're looking at athletes with Lee, Ben, Andrea and Tom's skillset, but applying a year (or more) specific training for the course, and you can see in their performance the difference between our professional rock climbers (and how they move on the obstacles), versus professional "ninja warrior competitors".

- Paul