I couldn't figure out why he did that till his interview. He said he wanted as much time between stage 2 and 3 as possible. His thought process was that he'd have no issue with 2 and needed rest for 3. Kinda makes sense but clearly didn't work out how he intended.

It was a terrible course design in stage 2. I have to believe that NBC didn't want 7 people attempting stage 3 again like last year and decided to ramp up the difficulty. There were a lot of experienced, elite athletes in that group of 18 and only two made it. The rope jungle would make for an interesting obstacle on an untimed course, but it was needlessly complicated for a timed event. A perfect design enables a few people to come up just short at the final obstacle. There were simply too many inherent difficulties with each obstacle this year. The entire energy of the night was destroyed when Brian Arnold went out so early.

I thought the weatherman had a really good shot at getting farther into stage 3. I think his lack of rock climbing experience probably cost him. You have to have rock climbing experience to make it past stage 3, period.

I did think they cut back on the silly pandering this episode. They showed every competitor in order and did not go overboard on the background fluff.

I am probably more looking forward to the USA vs The World episode of next week. I can only think of one or two legitimate top contenders from Europe, so their inclusion will be interesting.

It was heartbreaking to watch that course chew up all those favorites.

I found it interesting that they went out of their way to not show who was on team USA for the showdown next week. I expect Arnold and Stephanson at least.

Should be fun.

They mentioned they hadn't picked teams yet for the Americans. Some of the veterans apparently got upset for not getting picked last year. I had no idea they passed on David Campbell last year, that boggles the mind.

Brutal stage 2...no one will ever complete this.

I wonder what they were talking about because I found this:
'American Ninja Warrior' 2014: Meet The Contestants Of 'USA Vs. The World'

I am just relaying the inane comments by the two commentators during broadcast. Matt Iseman seems to know what is going on most of the time, but I wonder how much of their commentary is live.

If I were NBC, I would split Ninja Warrior into two different shows spread out over one television season. A general contest like this past season and a team competition of all-stars. They could even include some gender balance if they desperately wanted women on the all-star teams.

I like that idea. Heck, even let them form up their own teams to challenge each other... they've already got that 'Wolfpack' with Brian Arnold and his buddies. There seem to be a lot of other favorites who already train together who could also form teams. A mini tournament of these matchups would be fun to watch and I think those guys would love the competition and rivalries.

Do they still air the Japanese version in the US? G4 used to air it, but it seems like it didn't make the transition to the Esquire Network.

Finally got caught up with this. It was really nice to see Kacy make it to stage 1, but she had no chance of getting through the jumping spider. She is just too small. They say that it gets narrower the further in you get, but how far would she have had to jump in to be able to actually reach the sides. One guy mentioned doing a sort of walk typoe manuver to get further in, but that didnt work out so well. I found it interesting that in Kacy's interview after she fell, she was completely dry, with perfect hair.
I too thought stage 2 was extrememly difficult looking. That rope jungle seemed to give alot of people trouble. And the chain hang thing that roates looked tough because you only got one shot to get to the platform, otherwise you were dead in the water.

I remember in the JPN version they could and would change the distance in those types of challenges to match the person's height so it's fair for everyone. It was kinda BS that she had zero chance of getting through the jumping spider. No amount of training can make your arms longer or you taller...

Apparently when Stage 2 had finished and there were only 2 finishers and they were both non rock climbing studs, they changed Stage 3 to make it a bit easier

Still didn't help

The one adjustment that was needed on Stage 2 was the landing platform for the metal spin to be altered. It wasn't in the right spot and made it close to impossible

Stage 2 would have been fine if they had simply shortened the rope jungle. People would fall on the pipe slider, though it seemed a bit random.

USA vs. The World (USA vs. Japan vs. Europe) is on until 11 tonight. So far Tim Sheif had the fastest time ever on Stage 1 with 1:02.72.

Japan looks terrible for the second year in a row. I guess the height differential is killing their chances.

I'm so happy that they basically gave away the ending

The USA team didn't perform up to expectations, though it was great seeing four different people finish stage 3.

That was incredible drama from the team competition, I think they need a season-long team contest with a more balanced scoring system.

Tim Sheif was electric in stage one, though he's competed before in ANW and has won the freerunning world championship.

I was incredibly impressed by that world champion rock climber from Canada by way of France, Sean McColl. He demolished stage 3 and only missed destroying the record due to a mistimed jump. He immediately jumps to the top of the list as the most favored contender to actually beat stage 4 in competition. He also made that incredible leap on stage 2 where he literally bounced off the platform but held on.

The Americans underwhelmed, their team was geared towards the first two stages and had no true Stage 3 contenders except Brian Arnold. With the massive amount of points given to Stage 3 compared to the other stages, it makes sense to carry two or three dedicated rock climbers. This is the case where carrying someone like David Campbell might have helped.

A few things about the Japanese team. A couple of their all-stars are getting up in their age and haven't been legitimate Stage 4 threats in the past few Sasukes. A couple of very big names from Japan didn't compete for the all-stars. I think they have a tough time adjusting to the bigger dimensions of the American course except for Stage 3.

Which is odd because when they used to send the American guys over to do the Sasuke course in the earlier seasons of ANW they overall didn't do that well. You'd think they would dominate that course after seeing this.

This is a fun show. My oldest daughter loves it.

I think the rigors of international travel to and from Japan aren't conducive to producing incredible athletic accomplishments. Olympic athletes almost always settle in for a couple of weeks before competition. I think the Japanese competitors are flown right over without much prep time.

There are differences in the obstacles between here and Japan. I bet we see the crazy cliffhanger from Japan hit the American version next year.

I had to watch this on-demand because my broadcast recording was screwed up. The on-demand could not be FF'd, so I couldn't skip through anything. It was pretty good, but just before the Stage 4 tie-breaker I checked the MNF game status and when I came back the recording started from the beginning again...two hours earlier than I had left off. So with no FF available, I deleted the show and went online to see the tie-breaker results and never saw Stage 4.

BRUTAL!! It was short but incredibly dramatic.

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Stage 4 ended up being super close since Rosen regularly trains on ropes. I imagine Rosen would have won if he had been ten years younger. Rosen's window is closing very soon, the guy is pushing 40.

Forget about being 10 years younger, if Rosen had hit the buzzer on his first attempt, he would have won. I was surprised that hte pro rock climber went to using his legs as well as his arms so quickly on the rope.