[SPOILERS] Anyone lost faith in....?

[dakohosu]

Having seen Keitaro's first Stage 3 performance, has anyone lost faith in him being able to do as well as he's always been hyped up to be?

[subtleagent]

Not really, it was a renewal and he had just broken a 5 fail streak on Stage 2. If he continues to fail early in Stage 3 then maybe, but as of now I really don't have much of an opinion.

[dakohosu]

The fact that it was a renewal didn't make a difference to his run. He got a really poor jump on the Sidewinder which would've resulted in a fail even without the rotating pole. This is why I'm way more understanding of Ryo's fail given that it was on a new obstacle, and he's already shown that he's capable of at least reaching the Vertical Limit in competition.

I don't know, a lot (including his social media posts and just a hunch on my part) suggested as though he was under huge pressure given that it took him years to reach Stage 3, and I think he knew a lot of expectations were on him. The fail also seemed like a huge rookie error as well where his leg just slipped when he tried to make the jump, which I feel could've been due to said mental pressure.

I just feel as though there's a huge disparity between performance in practice and in competition; Hioki and Sato have both shown that they can repeatedly clear the Cliffhanger jumps several times in tandem, but can never do it in competition. No idea why, I suppose exhaustion from previous obstacles, pressure, difference between their home courses and the real thing, etc. but it seems to be a running theme. Keitaro's hype is mainly due to what he's shown he can do in practice and only in practice as he'd never had a chance to attempt those obstacles under the spotlight. I'm just wondering whether it'll be the same for Keitaro; don't get me wrong, I very much doubt he'll become the usual Cliffhanger fodder because he's an Unlimited Cliffer and has beaten entire Stage 3 backyard courses before, but I don't think doing so indefinitely warrants that he'll 'absolutely destroy' Stage 3 in competition as many say he does. His fail in 39 shows that regardless of pedigree, inexperience does count.

[azn]

If team formats return for foreign shows once the world turns normal, I'd love to see him be a member of Team Japan for a *insert foreign NW* vs The World type of show. It might be a different stage but we could at least see how he does on that shows stage 3.

In terms of SASUKE though, I'll be generous and let him slide, but I've lost a lot of confidence in him, if he fails early in stage 3 - if he can even make stage 3 again - his next go then I doubt he'll reach the latter half of the third stage.

Definitely a very unfortunate career arch for him but progress is progress no matter how slow it was. Good on him for finally clearing.

[dakohosu]

Not sure about the NW vs the World thing. Remember how badly most of Team Japan did even on Stage 3, even Yuuji failed on the Floating Boards. Keitaro wouldn’t have trained for a lot of those new obstacles so I’m not entirely sure he’d do that well; most of his Stage 3-specific training is on the current iteration on Sasuke. Obvs Ryo and Yusuke did really well even on those shows though so we would have to see.

I think he will reach Stage 3 again, especially now that Stage 2 has been nerfed and he’s probably built up some confidence from finally breaking through. I’m sure he’s aggressively training on the Sidewinder as we speak. I’m willing to let this slide due to pressure and inexperience, but I’d say if he fails on or before the Cliffhanger next time out though then my hope for him clearing will take a huge hit.

Besides, Araki’s very similar to Keitaro in that both are long time fans and are experienced climbers, and he failed the Cliffhanger in his Stage 3 attempt. It once again comes back to seeing competitors clear Stage 3 in practice hence building up a lot of hype around how they’d do in competition, to the level that in almost every case they tend to under deliver.