- As a senior studying marketing at UW-Madison,
Andrew Philibeck spends most of his time
studying and working as a resident assistant.
But he's also working towards becoming an extreme athlete.
[fast rock music]
- I've been a competitor my whole life.
In high school football, wrestling, track,
I did pretty well.
- Andrew graduated from a Green Bay area high school
in 2013 as an accomplished athlete.
Always looking for a new challenge,
he decided to try to become a college athlete.
- My sophomore year, I tried to walk on the wrestling team.
Ended up not working out so well.
I got a pretty horrible concussion
which actually ended my wrestling career.
That's what brought me to Ninja Warrior training.
[rewind sound]
That's what brought me to Ninja Warrior training.
I had been watching the show since I was younger,
when it was Sasuke, with my family.
And I told my parents,
"I think I could be really good at that show."
- American Ninja Warrior features hundreds of athletes
competing on an obstacle course designed
to challenge contestants' physical and mental abilities.
Fortunately, Andrew was prepared to face any challenges
the obstacle course threw at him.
[splash]
[horn blowing]
- Oh, he grabbed the wrong hold!
- So before the show I knew that I needed to be confident.
I needed to trust in my faith with God.
So I decided to create my own headband,
which is right here: Mark 9: Verse 23,
which means all things are possible to those who believe.
- Andrew decided to form a Wisconsin team for an upcoming
college edition of the Ninja Warrior competition.
He recruited fellow Badger students,
Zach Kemmer and Taylor Amman, to compete on the show with him.
[uptempo music]
To prepare for the competition, Andrew also converted
his dorm room into a mini-ninja obstacle course
so he could train every day before the competition
in August of 2016.
- I used to be a pretty big weightlifter,
but that's something you don't do in Ninja training.
It's a lot of pull ups.
A lot of hand grip so you do cliff hangers.
You need to be trying out the salmon ladder.
You need to be trying out cannonball alley.
You need to just be trying out all different kinds of things.
Otherwise you're not going to be ready for the actual show.
- After months of training, Team Wisconsin
was ready to take on the competition.
- Standing at that start line, it was a lot of adrenaline.
I knew I had to go fast because I knew the kid next to me
had been training for quite a while.
- Once Andrew took off, there was no looking back.
- I knew I won when I hit the buzzer,
but I was a little bit disappointed because
I had told the team before the race
we cannot get our feet wet.
We cannot do that on the warped wall.
I was relieved I was able to get the win
to help our team get some confidence going in,
even though we had a slip up.
- Despite the water mishap,
Team Wisconsin continued their dominant run
and landed in the championship race against MIT.
- I turned on the burners.
And I went as fast as I possibly could.
And I made up a ton of time.
- Despite falling behind early,
Andrew and Team Wisconsin went just fast enough to get the win.
- So it took until Zach came down
and they announced over the speakers,
"Wisconsin had won by 0.9 seconds."
So then, we're like, "Wow, we just won the entire show."
- With one Ninja Warrior victory under his belt,
Andrew now hopes to continue his success on the individual
American Ninja Warrior show after college graduation.
- Personally this sport means a lot to me.
It means showing off my faith.
I think that's the biggest thing.
I'm able to show off my faith on a national competition.
And showing that with my beliefs,
I'm able to compete at a high level.
And I'm not just on the level where I can make it on the show,
I'm on the level where I can win the show.