ME Student Competes on American Ninja Warrior

Josh Levin says com­peting on Amer­ican Ninja War­rior is much harder than it looks on TV. He would know—the rising North­eastern Uni­ver­sity senior and highly accom­plished rock climber has done just that.

On the NBC show, con­tes­tants nav­i­gate chal­lenging four-​​stage obstacle courses in cities across the country. After com­peting in city qual­i­fiers and then city finals, the remaining con­tes­tants move on to the finals in Las Vegas. Season 8 pre­mieres Wednesday night at 8 p.m. and fea­tures the Los Angeles qualifier—which was taped in April and where Levin com­peted with about 100 other contestants.

Levin’s per­for­mance in the qual­i­fier can’t be revealed until the episode airs. He’s hosting a viewing party Wednesday night for family and friends back home in Cal­i­fornia, where he’s also cur­rently working on co-​​op at Apple.

It is a competition…but at least for me it’s never about beating someone else. It’s that we want to rise together in the com­mu­nity to defeat these obsta­cles. As a model for a com­pe­ti­tion, that’s really unique and really cool.
— Josh Levin, E’17, on how he views com­peting on Amer­ican Ninja Warrior

Josh Levin, E’17, com­petes on Amer­ican Ninja War­rior. Photo by: Brandon Hickman/​NBC

How he got there

Levin, E’17, is a mechan­ical engi­neering major and co-​​founder of the North­eastern Climbing Team. He says his journey to Amer­ican Ninja War­rior began during child­hood when he dis­cov­ered his pas­sion for myriad phys­ical activ­i­ties and com­pe­ti­tion. As a kid he tried flying trapeze and earned his second-​​degree black belt. But when he took his first rock-​​climbing lesson at age 4, he was hooked.

Levin won his first national cham­pi­onship at age 9 in speed climbing. Over the next decade of com­peting in the U.S. and more than 20 coun­tries, he cap­tured 18 more national cham­pi­onships as well as mul­tiple U.S. speed climbing records and the bronze medal at the 2008 Youth World Championships.

He has trained at Amer­ican Ninja War­rior gyms across the country and had hoped to apply last season before a torn labrum in his left shoulder side­lined him from rock climbing and training for a full year.

Last season two com­peti­tors became the first ever to com­plete all the stages in the Las Vegas finals, and the faster of the two won the $1 mil­lion prize. Now nearly fully healed, Levin has his sights set on becoming the youngest winner ever.

Com­peting for his mentor

Levin credits much of his suc­cess and pas­sion for climbing to his mentor and first coach, Stacey Li Col­lver. In 2003, she was diag­nosed with an incur­able lung dis­ease and is cur­rently on the wait list for a second double-​​lung trans­plant. Levin said that if he were to win Amer­ican Ninja War­rior, he would donate a por­tion of his win­nings for her med­ical expenses.

In his appli­ca­tion video for the show, Levin said, “She’s the biggest inspi­ra­tion in my life, and I want to win this for her.”