Where are the rest of the Elite Parkour guys ?

[peterpack]

Guys like Frosty, Jesse Le flair, Levi Meuingberg, Tim Sheriff etc

They have all done well before

Are NBC limiting the number of competitors from a certain discipline ?

[vaughngk]

Levi hasn't competed since ANW 4 Jessie Le Flair competed this year but went out early and cut from broadcast. Tim Shiffe also didn't compete this year in the regular season but did compete on Team Europe during the special and other top parkour athletes also didn't compete. It should be pointed out that while parkour do great on the First stage and in qualifiers they do poorly in City Finals and later Vegas Stages aka Lorin Ball, Jesse Le Flair and even Levi Meunbergy. No offense to those who do Parkour but for this course being great at Parkour is not good enough which is why the new top elites in these competitions are rock climbers.

[jork122]

I wonder if Shieff had a *hush hush* deal with NBC--hey, we'll give you a free spot on the World team but don't compete this year. His absence was strange, given that he was featured quite prominently in ANW's 4 and 5.

La Flair failed the slack line at the end when his hand touched the obstacle, and it was on youtube as a bootleg. He did a corkscrew off the slack line in frustration.

Levi's now a farmer.

Back when the show was hipster and really catered to the teens and 20-somethings, parkour led the forefront. Most of ANW1 to ANW3 (G4 era) showcased parkour influenced guys, stuntmen, and the like. I think there's an argument to made that yeah, they are not as equipped to handle upper body, but also that the show caters more to families so they're getting phased out that way. But they are always exciting to watch, some are really good (quite a few competitors are not full fledge parkour-letes but are clearly influenced) and should always have a place in ANW.

[Amber]

Forgot, but was Paul Darnell in ANW 6?

[kangaroo]

Flip is another parkour guy and he went out in qualifying.

Elet hall Is pretty much one he just use the woods as his play ground instead of the city

[arsenette]

IMO Only but it seems to me that a lot of the pro free runners are not happy with NBC and pulled out. That number has been growing over the past few years.

[vaughngk]

Sept 12, 2014 12:51:08 GMT -5 arsenette said:

IMO Only but it seems to me that a lot of the pro free runners are not happy with NBC and pulled out. That number has been growing over the past few years.

Why would parkour people be upset with NBC?

[arsenette]

Sept 12, 2014 14:10:29 GMT -5 vaughngk said:

Sept 12, 2014 12:51:08 GMT -5 arsenette said:

IMO Only but it seems to me that a lot of the pro free runners are not happy with NBC and pulled out. That number has been growing over the past few years.

Why would parkour people be upset with NBC?

I see you haven't really been listening to our arguments over the past 3 years about NBC policy and crap in the background. The crap in the background is far worse than the utter BS coming out of TBS.

[Amber]

IIRC, didn't Jake Smith, Amos Rendao, and Brandon Douglas quit ANW because they don't like how the show in ran anymore?

[arsenette]

That's a loooooooong conversation. You'd have go to back to when NBC took over. There was open discussion about the bulls**t politics that a lot of people were not happy about. Hell most if not all of Tempest packed up and went home and found better things to do.

[Amber]

Is that perhaps the reason Levi quit?

[vaughngk]

I have been watching the show for years but became a forum member recently. So not really aware of the things that make people so angry about how NBC handles the show. But when it comes to parkour guys what's there beef with the show?

[Amber]

My biggest pet peeve with the show is people are now sent to Vegas instead of Japan.

Perhaps the parkour guys think the same and now no longer compete.

[arsenette]

I think because we've discussed it at naseum when NBC first came in (which would have preceded all the new people) many are reluctant to "keep bringing it up". That might explain why so many scream at me in particular for bringing this stuff up even though it's relevant. They just dismiss it as "my disdain for NBC" and just yell "yeah we get it.. now STFU". I see that those of us who are here forget that this is actually "old news" to us but "new news" to anyone else coming in. The new people just go "wait what is it?". There have been many instances of clashes with the competitors (not just free runners) during ANW with NBC. Some were subtle, some were overt. Most of the bigger problems come from top brass because the ones on the field are really actually nice. They however don't hold the authority so they get unfairly thrown into that group. Most of the problems came in during the NBC switch over where they dropped the Sasuke license and changed production hiring incompetent people who didn't know the show and subsequently built dangerous obstacles that hurt people. Whenever any complaint about the obstacles were made they were dismissed as just whining over obstacles made more difficult when in fact they were trying to help people not get severely injured. Then you have the issues of the rift with Japan where NBC just spit on their face, told them to pack their bags and go home. Then there's the ban on any American going to Japan on their own dime because NBC wants to hold their stars to the show they don't want to be in. A lot of the guys just wanted to go back to Japan and were now stuck in ANW against their will because NBC was just being a**es. The selection of the USA team in Sasuke 25 chaffed a lot of people because it was an NBC political decision. Over time with their personal issues with NBC management (some of which are private) they have been slowly moving away from the show. Some publicly, others privately. But that has been a steady stream of people leaving the show. To be fair, this has been going on from way back in the G4 days when some of the ANC guys publicly quit the show over their treatment. So this is considered "old news" and whenever people like me bring it up they consider me having a vendetta over the show.

[RiderLeangle]

Minor clarification there, Sasuke 25 was before NBC even got involved and while it was still G4's show, and I don't know what the big deal about that was since they were the clears in 23 so they theoretically had a TBS invite from that, I do think they should have been sent for 24 but with how last minute everything was for 24 I can understand why G4 couldn't send anyone. I definitely do want to back up the point of the field crew being good despite all the s*** that goes on behind the scenes, both in Baltimore and St Louis my experience dealing with them was pretty damn good, my only complaint was how the Bridge of Blades was set but considering the rain I can understand why they did that

[arsenette]

Sept 12, 2014 15:32:14 GMT -5 RiderLeangle said:

Minor clarification there, Sasuke 25 was before NBC even got involved and while it was still G4's show, and I don't know what the big deal about that was since they were the clears in 23 so they theoretically had a TBS invite from that, I do think they should have been sent for 24 but with how last minute everything was for 24 I can understand why G4 couldn't send anyone. I definitely do want to back up the point of the field crew being good despite all the s*** that goes on behind the scenes, both in Baltimore and St Louis my experience dealing with them was pretty damn good, my only complaint was how the Bridge of Blades was set but considering the rain I can understand why they did that

That's why I said this crap was going on for a long time because despite NBC taking over, Comcast is the owner of both G4 and NBC so they remained the same and they were the ones with the contract with M9 and TBS. I screwed up the tourneys. I should have said 28 because that was the one that reaaaaally pissed off a lot of people. (the first of the Rising) NBC still had control (and STILL has control) over the USA participants regardless if they are from ANW but ESPECIALLY if they are even remotely connected to ANW at any point in their careers. What happened in 28 (and thanks Rider for the clarification as everything now mixes in my head) was TBS went to Comcast saying "who's coming from the USA" and they balked for a while then said "okay 3 from ANW are going" but not the 3 that TBS asked for. Comcast's decision was sending people that were not stars so that if TBS cut them it wouldn't be an incident and because they were "nobodys" they wouldn't progress to the latter stages causing problems for ANW because by this time ANW was a separate show. To top it off the 3 that were sent had to pay for their own travel and accommodations. So a lot of the ANW guys who wanted to go back (Sasuke 27 stage 3 powerhouses) were deliberately blackballed by NBC because their presence would endanger their new policy of divorcing from Japan and going off on their own. Once the ink was signed (between 28-29) NBC no longer had a legal obligation to send anyone to Japan because they deleted that paragraph from the contract. However, they kept rights to ANW people going on to the "rival" show because they said it would bring confusion. So when 30 came around and a bunch of Americans went to the ASEAN Open (I think there were 17 in total?) NBC lost their marbles. TBS in an act of good faith asked NBC for permission for Drew to come on since he was the overall winner and NBC relented so long as it didn't have ANW all over it.

[peterpack]

arsenette, very interesting info

So what if someone who has never been on ANW wanted to go on sasuke and made it through and qualified. NBC couldn't do anything about it could they ?

And either way, NBC doesn't have the competitors signed to contracts do they ? i don't see how NBC can have any say at all on what the competitors do outside ANW unless they pay them for exclusivity

[greenday61892]

Edit: missed a key post somehow; carry on.

[arsenette]

Sept 16, 2014 10:20:55 GMT -5 peterpack said:

arsenette, very interesting info

So what if someone who has never been on ANW wanted to go on sasuke and made it through and qualified. NBC couldn't do anything about it could they ?

And either way, NBC doesn't have the competitors signed to contracts do they ? i don't see how NBC can have any say at all on what the competitors do outside ANW unless they pay them for exclusivity

That's the problem that exists now and TBS is trying to wrap their heads around it. They got screwed by M9 in their dying breathe when NBC called them back to the table to force negotiate themselves out of the contract they previously had. At the time Rising had not been announced so TBS had very little cards to play with. Since then though they've been trying to figure out wtf to do. Drew and company helped by going out of their way to go to Malaysia and that was one of the "outs" they came up with. Those who live in Japan (like Jin) could apply and go in the Japanese audition pool. Now with Drew being heavily liked and with a good result it's even more complicated for Sasuke 31 next year. I know they haven't even thought of what they are going to do. I did ask Inui directly on that. They are hoping they will be in a better position next year to deal with the existing problem with lack of foreigners (specifically Americans) on their own show.