It’s March 14, 2015 in Venice, California where I’m competing in the city qualifying round for Season 7 of American Ninja Warrior, and I’m eying the course’s first obstacle, eagerly awaiting the queue to start. This is my first run through the iconic American Ninja Warrior course, and that year I made it through the first four obstacles – the quintuple steps, silk slider, tilting table and spin cycle. Unfortunately, my run that season came to an end with the fifth obstacle, the hourglass drop.
That first elimination during my first appearance on American Ninja Warrior could, in some ways, be viewed as the end. The end of a portion of my life that was often full of struggles, where I coped with having an alcoholic mother, being bullied by kids who didn’t understand my heritage, and losing some of my closest friends to suicide. But for me, hearing that starting queue was the culmination of a lot of hard work and perseverance that marked the beginning of the next exciting, impactful stage of my life.
For those who may not know, I’m from a small community in Western Alaska called Unalakleet that around 680 people call home. It’s a tight-knit, safe community where everyone knows each other and walking to your neighbor’s home takes only minutes, even if they live across town. A place I’m proud to call home. For all the things I love about my hometown, village life can have its drawbacks. For much of my childhood and on into young adulthood, our access to internet connectivity was nearly non-existent. We didn’t have access to basic online resources and platforms – Facebook, YouTube, etc. – that most people in urban areas had long since taken for granted. But connectivity has changed a lot since I was a kid. GCI brought internet to Unalakleet and my life began its slow transformation into the one I enjoy so much today.
I had never heard of American Ninja Warrior until around 2014, several years after the show made its television debut. But once I did, and after a lot of encouragement from friends and family, I began to train. With a little bit of rural Alaskan ingenuity, we even built our own version of the obstacle course, complete with a warped wall. Being accepted onto the show was only part of the process – actually getting to the show was another obstacle entirely. Fortunately for me, GCI stepped in to sponsor my effort to become an American Ninja Warrior—something that changed my life.
On top of making it possible me to submit my American Ninja Warrior audition video online, something that would have been impossible only handful of years earlier, connectivity has proven to be even more crucial in the years that followed. Since gaining a following on the show, I’ve been able to engage my true passion – mentoring kids. I visit their schools and interact with students on a personal level. My goal is to encourage them to work hard, be disciplined, and find confidence in who they are, building relationships and life skills. And even when I’m not able to see them in person, I’m able to use platforms like Facebook and Instagram to engage with people on a daily basis, even when we’ve had to stick around our homes during COVID-19. I was able to partner with GCI this spring to host a series of workouts on Facebook Live, encouraging Alaskans to stay active and healthy, all from my home in Unalakleet. Access to reliable internet has given me the opportunity to change lives on a scale I never could have dreamed.
A lot has changed since I made my first appearance on American Ninja Warrior in 2015. I’ve competed in five seasons of the show, so far. And when I’m not on the obstacle course I’m fortunate to be in a position where I can positively impact the lives of young people around the state I call home. It’s kind of crazy to think about how one internet connection in a small Alaska village can have such a massive impact.