Description is technically correct, but misleading.
He was the SECOND person to finish the 4th course, but the first person to win ANW. He was 3.5 seconds faster than the Frist American Ninja Warrior, making him the winner of the $1million prize, but not the title of First ANW.

*quality

Boosting this quality contribution up in the Hot Listing - declared quality by Mordhaus.

*blocked in Canada because we don't believe in ninjas.

https://sites.google.com/site/fiveholeninjas/_/rsrc/1396309390002/home/hockeyNinja_final.png?height=320&width=286

This video has been flagged as having an embed that is Region Blocked to not function in certain geographical locations - declared blocked by Payback.

What a monster. Both guys are so deserving. Both in their 30's!!

On a less joyous note, I take pretty serious issue with the way ANW runs the competition. Once I found out about the original Sasuke, I went back and watched every single season. Because it's awesome. But I feel like the Japanese organizers of Sasuke clearly understood that the competition was "competitors versus course", not "competitor versus competitor". In that vein, any set of competitors who complete the course should be equally rewarded.

Can you imagine dedicating your life to completing that course, succeeding (as one of only two people in the world, over nearly a decade of competition), then walking away with nothing because the other guy was an insignificant amount faster than you?

Props to Isaac for at least mentioning "share the money" in the post-interview (not included in this sift).

Another way I massively disagree with ANW is that they significantly redesigned the courses for every year of competition. Some variation is essential to testing the competitors' adaptability, but with so much new stuff each year they excluded lots of top talent due to bad luck or running order. Cynically, maybe to avoid paying the prize money. Last year was particularly bad with only two guys making it to stage 3. I feel like this year the pendulum swung back a little too far (or maybe "farther than intended") which is why they actually had two winners. That said, that new cliffhanger is ridiculous, but at least it's a variation on existing obstacles instead of something totally unique.

Lastly, let's not forget ANW's "USA versus The World". Really? That's so stereotypically American it's sick, especially for an adopted competition.

I finally just finished watching the 3 hour finale on my DVR (kept trying to avoid this spoiler post) and was thoroughly happy with the results.

I'm way on board with your sentiments, but must add my 2 cents.

First, I think it's important to realize it's not the way ANW runs the show that causes the competitors to behave the way they do; it's the American competitors themselves who share that undesirable selfish, braggadocious attitude/philosophy. Even when you watch the Japanese Sasuke competitions, when there's an American competing surrounded by Japanese competitors inside Japan, you still feel that same air of arrogance.

I've been watching the Sasuke for many years and started watching ANW before it was ANW (even in the first "seasons" on Attack of the Show where the competitors had bounce on a trampoline and swing on some monkey bars to earn their way to Japan). The American attitude always been something that bothers me and takes a huge chunk out of my interest.

I always find it disconcerting the way they don't explain any details, such as why Geoff got to climb first (which is why he gets to claim he's the first person to ever reach the top).

The other thing I've been crying "foul" on is that they seemed to lighten it up on the obstacles. This year there were 38 people to go to round 2. That's ridiculous. But what's worse is that round 2 had way too long a time limit. Normally competitors who succeed on stage 2 have about a second left when they hit the button, but many of those who went through to stage 3 had around 30 seconds on the clock.

I had to rewind a couple of times, but I confirmed Isaac said "share the moment" not the money.

My wife and I were both displeased that Geoff announced he gets to say he's the first to beat stage 4. That's such a poor attitude, and I liked Popeye a lot more until then. And regardless how they decided who got to go first, I think they both have to be considered as equally the first to finish stage 4. (Side note: I was really bummed they didn't use the loud "bang! bang!" sounds to start stage 4 like they do in Japan.)

I myself don't have a problem with the very redesigned courses each season.

The USA versus the World bullshit is some serious bullshit that's hard to swallow. Not only is the whole "our country is better than you" concept horrible, but the actual competition is shit. It's not the same beating the course one rested person at a time. But also last year the Europeans brought in a rock climber who knew nothing about Ninja Warrior and just sent him in fully rested to do the arm-centric work.

Boy, we could get together and write a dissertation on this subject.

Did you miss the moment when Isaac was given the option (I think based on his time on stage 3) and chose to go second? I was quite confused by that, he gave away the title of "first ANW", but at least he gets the title of "first winner"....oh, and the money.

Yes, I totally missed that. Thanks for filling me in. That makes a huge difference.

My guess is the choice to go second was for the money (again, in typical American [and not Japanese] fashion) because if he'd gone first then Geoff would have had the benchmark to beat, and that's a big motivator.

I couldn't figure it out at first.
It did give him the time he had to beat, but on stage 4 I don't think either of them did anything besides their absolute best to go fast (guy 1 certainly didn't TRY to just make it by 1/3 of a second). At first I was thinking that it was like the other stages, he was trying to see how others might do it, but then I realized it's simply climbing a rope, and it's incredibly unlikely either would change their strategy based on how the other contestant climbed. At that point, the only reason I could see for wanting to go second is he got that extra few minutes to rest between stage 3 and 4...and that makes sense to me. Those extra few minutes of rest might be all it took to give him the win.

That's definitely a big factor and maybe the only one in his mind, having the time to rest your muscles and work some of that lactic acid out.

I still think the other thing can also be a big factor. It's not for learning strategy, but it's a big motivator to know how quickly you must go in order to win a million dollars. No matter how fast you think your fastest is, when you have that huge carrot dangling out in front of you, it gives you a good kick in the ass and you're able to push yourself to go even faster than your fastest.

Similar to the mother lifting a car to get her baby out from under it.

Rather than "I hope my fastest is fast enough," you are forced to push yourself to "I am going to beat Popeye's time!"

How about those forearms, man. Sick impressive.

Moving this video to RFlagg's personal queue. It failed to receive enough votes to get sifted up to the front page within 2 days.

*beg

Sending this video to Beggar's Canyon to plea for a little attention - beg requested by original submitter RFlagg.

I wonder how he would do in American Gladiators.