Urban Ninja - Tooting Bec

---

Balance Beam.(i) Nothing structurely amazing in terms of build but a good classic obstacle all the same.

At the Urban Ninja event there were two courses. Tame and Insane. We all raced in the time trial on the Tame course but were allowed in our 60 minutes practice session to try out some of the Insane obstacles too. (No one attempted an Insane time trial while we were there).

Here are a selection of obstacles from the event. We didn't attempt all of them as some of the drops looked far too risky to attempt for novices, better left for parkour pros. (An (i) has been put next to the so called 'insane,' obstacles).

Tough Monkey and Ceiling Climb. (i) I wasn't comfortable with the drop height of the inclining and declining monkey bars as you can see towards the left of the picture, especially if I were to get tired part way through the climb so I skipped that. 

The ceiling climb was quite fun though, which then leads to the next obstacle....

Reverse Dyno. (i) You are required to climb up from the inverted position up the wall, then jump from one wall to the other. The gap was just far too much for me. As I stood at the top I ran through all the possible scenarios that could occur in my attempt and could only see broken limbs. If there'd been water below I would have considered it.

I drew quite a crowd (including one of the event's cameraman), being the only person at the time to manage to get up there. They were all rooting for me to make it, but I felt the braver thing was to climb down amidst the peer pressure. 

Step Control. They seem to space these slightly closer than the ones on Ninja Warrior, yet these were just about the right spacing to complete.

Monkey Bars. It's a standard obstacle but a good one. The drop was quite high down so made it a bit more intimidating than normal.

Rope Cling. I remember they had something similar at Rough Runner but with buoys at the bottom which people struggled with. The platforms on these made it slightly easier.

Salmon Ladder. (i) Do a pull up but then launch the bar up to the next slot. None of our group managed to do this. A seriously tough challenge, one I'd love to be able to complete in the future.

Monkey Cling. (i) Spring up from the trampette below and then spread out your arms and legs to cling on to the walls, shifting your way across the 10 metres of parallel walls, just like Jackie Chan. 

I think this obstacle would be an advantage for taller people.
Failed on this one myself. Andy rocks it here.

Trapeze. The first time attempting to swing off this trapeze is quite intimidating. Just scared you're gonna fall, smack your chin on the bar or worse. However after the first time it's quite fun.

Core Crunch. (i) This was one of the obstacles which the shorter people found easier and the taller people found difficult or impossible. Floju shows us how it's done in this pic.

Crushing Crimps. (i) Three blocks of wood that are only 4cm in depth so you're using just your finger tips to hold on. What makes this extra tricky are the gaps. 

Very happy to have done this, especially as my time trial competitor (who beat me by over a minute!) couldn't do this one.

Insane Pipe Scramble. (Warped Wall). (i) This is 50cm taller than the one on Ninja Warrior. I really wanted to complete this one the most but with no luck. My friend Pavel however owns the wall here.

---

If you are successful in completing the time trial by finishing all obstacles on the Tame course then you get one of these awesome shuriken medals. For those that finish the Insane will get an extra big shuriken. 

Below I discover that the medal is also a handy bottle opener.

Urban Ninja bottle opener

Thanks for today. It was good fun and we understand why the Insane course is so called. We've also discovered a secondary use for the awesome medal.

Posted by Scream At My Face on Monday, 4 May 2015

Credits for the soundtrack of the main Urban Ninja movie goes to:

Ninja (Indikings) / CC BY-NC-SA 3.0