When you watch American Ninja Warrior on TV, you may be wondering what all the different obstacles are and where they came from. In fact, if you come into Rebounderz Rohnert Park, you probably want to know exactly what an obstacle is called in order to be able to articulate your experience with someone else. You don’t want to be go up to your friend or your child and say, “I messed up that one hanging thingy,” or, “I probably need to try that massive stair stepper bit.” Not only are those sentences difficult to understand what is being talked about, but they’re also just plain silly. Here at Rebounderz Rohnert Park, when you come try our ninja courses, we want you to know what you’re trying out and maybe a few techniques on how to get through various, unique obstacles.

Salmon Ladder

The salmon ladder is one of the toughest obstacles in American Ninja Warrior, because it uses solely upper body strength. (Who are we kidding, almost all of the obstacles use solely upper body strength). During the salmon ladder, you hold onto a bar and use momentum to jump the bar up rung by rung. The goal is to climb the ladder in this manner and can include anywhere from four to eight jumps in order to make it to the top. In order to even attempt this obstacle, really work on both bicep and tricep strength.

Pole Grasper

A rather difficult obstacle, especially if you’re on the shorter side, the pole grasper occurs in stage three of American Ninja Warrior. This is where several poles are set up a bit like fire escape poles and you have to hang on one, then transition to the next and so on. During the obstacle, the distance between the poles gets further and further, up to roughly five feet. There are a couple of techniques. Some ninjas do it a bit like a monkey where you have a foot and a hand on each pole at a time. For smaller individuals, you have to jump to make the farther distances.

Cannonball Alley

Cannonball alley has taken out many competitors in American Ninja Warrior to the point where many people weren’t sure how possible it actually was. This obstacle is made up of three balls that hang from wires. Each ball gets progressively bigger and the last one is about the size of a bowling ball. Competitors hang from each and have to maneuver from one to another without losing their grip and falling. The shape of the grips and the size increase makes it exceptionally difficult to maneuver this obstacle later in the course.

These are just a few of the many, many obstacles that competitors of American Ninja Warrior have seen on the courses throughout the many seasons of the competition. If you’re not daunted by a challenge and you want to tackle the same type of training that competitors go through for the show, come by our ninja course at Rebounderz of Rohnert Park today!