Interview with Mary Leighton, The Commentator Ninja

Mary Leighton the Commentator Ninja.  I love watching American Ninja Warrior and have watched it for many a year. I have written a number of stories on it. One of the stories was on Sean Darling-Hammond. For a number of years, I have watched a friend pursue this journey.

 

Her sister, Briana, wrote this story. Thank you so much!

A conversation with Season 14 of American Ninja Warrior contestant (and New Hampshire native!) Mary Leighton, aka The Commentator Ninja.

 

Can you give a little intro on what you do?

 

First and foremost, I am a ninja coach and athlete. I coach ninjas, I coached the competitive team at Ultimate Obstacles, which is my home gym. We train them for competitions. I train myself for competitions. And I also commentate at competitions. So I’ll do the live stream and talk about what’s going on and keep the viewers informed about how things are going. 

 

I also have a YouTube channel called The Commentator Ninja Channel, where I talk about hot topics in the sport, things that are impacting it, give advice on how to approach obstacles. We like to do tech talks where we talk about new things that are coming out in the community. How should you approach it? How o you get ready for the next competition, a whole bunch of stuff like that.

 

So how did you first get into ninja?

 

I was watching TV before work and American Ninja Warrior came on. 

 

And I watched Josh Levin’s Stage 3 run in the USA vs. the World special. And I was blown away by the impressive feats of physical fitness that I was watching.

 

I thought it was so cool. I’ve always been a fan of human movement—so I got really into the show American Ninja Warrior.

 

And I was at work one day- and I was excited to see the next episode and see what came up. And someone said “Wait you were on the show?”

 

And I was like, “Are you kidding, no! Absolutely not. I’m just excited to watch it.”

 

Then I watched the episode that night. And on that episode there was an athlete. I think it was Allyssa Beird. Who talked about how she drove 45 mins the opposite direction of her work to go train at the gym. And I was like, I could do that. I could drive 45 mins to a gym to be a ninja and I could get good at being a ninja. So I googled Ninja gyms near me and I found Ultimate Obstacles. And I took a class and I’ve been there ever since. 

 

 

Wow, that’s some dedication to drive 45 mins.

 

Yeah, I actually drove a hour.

 

Where do you think you got that dedication from?

 

I’ve always been just kind of intrinsically a very high achiever. I’ve been very goal oriented, pretty much my entire life and just always up for a challenge. I tend to have a wide variety of interests. And I like to achieve mastery of something. When I feel like I’ve gotten really good at something and I don’t have any more to learn, I tend to get bored. And Ninja is one of those sports where there is always something new to learn, you can always get better. And so I think that’s really what captured my interest.

 

So how many years have you been a ninja?

 

I started training for ninja in 2017. So about five years.

 

Five years. As someone who just kind of started this out of the blue, and then eventually ended up on the show, what was that transition like? Where were you year one compared to year five?

 

I definitely got stronger from year one to year five. You know, all of my muscles are stronger. My physical capabilities definitely increased. I wouldn’t say that I was at my strongest when I competed on the show. But what was at its strongest was my ability to compete. My competition mindset. 

 

That’s something that’s really important when you go on the show is just being able to handle the pressure of the competition. And trust your body to do what you know it knows how to do. 

 

At my first competition in year one, I didn’t know anything about visualization, I didn’t know how to plan out doing an obstacle, I didn’t know, how to look at an obstacle and be like, okay, do I have the skills to do that? 

 

That’s a really critical piece of going to competition, if you want to look at the court, say, okay, I know how to do this obstacle, here’s my plan. And, you know, most competitions that I go to, I can usually figure out what obstacle I’m going to fail on. 

 

And if I get to that obstacle, and I fail on it, I’m not disappointed. 

 

I’m just like, okay, that’s where I am, I feel like I executed according to my skill level. And I know what I have to work on next time. So I would say that definitely gave me an advantage mentally going into the show, and that’s really where I would say there was a lot of growth from year one to year five.

 

Was the goal always to get on the show? Was there an I’m dating this sport kind of experience at the beginning? Or was it always like, this is a committed relationship -we’re in it to win it.

 

I think it was always a committed relationship. You know, as the years kind of went on, and I got more involved in the ninja community—one thing people don’t really know is that the show itself is completely separate from the ninja community. 

 

The ninja community is very involved in the show, obviously, but outside of the show, there is the ninja community, which is your local gym, your local competitions, national competition leagues, or international competition leagues. And so there’s a whole subculture that a lot of people aren’t necessarily aware of when they watch American Ninja Warrior. 

 

I was very committed to getting good at competition at the local leagues, the local competitions. That was really kind of my focus and training. And I knew that, you know, as I progressed, and was able to do competitions, at the local level, that I’d be good on the show, because believe it or not, local competitions are actually harder than the show. 

 

I’ve always been committed to the sport. But I think my commitment, as an athlete was kind of brought into question, when I had to go through what’s called Atlas Orthogonal adjustment. It’s basically a very delicate adjustment of the top two vertebrae of your spine. And I had to undergo that based off of some injuries frommy outside of ninja lifeI’d gotten a concussion and the hit to the head had transferred down to the top of my spine.

 

So undergoing those adjustments, it’s overall much better for you long term, and it’s very beneficial. But it’s also one of those treatments that’s not super well known and there’s not a direct pathway for every person.

 

So most people when they have like, a shoulder reconstruction, or a total knee replacement, there are certain protocols you can follow. And you know that the average person is going to take eight to 12 weeks to progress to stage two of their recovery process. 

 

And they’re going to take another four weeks to get to stage three. But there’s nothing like that with Atlas Orthogonal. It’s very dependent on the person, very dependent on their age, their ability to follow their recovery plan. 

 

And so when I had the adjustment for the first time, my chiropractor basically told me, “Yeah, I don’t know if you’ll ever be able to do it again.” And so I was presented with this sort of very real and very upsetting vision of—and it wasn’t even like a present decision. It wasn’t a decision I had to make right then. But I had to start asking myself, do I want to keep doing ninja or do I want to value  my long term health and obviously, the obvious choice is your long term health is the most important, but you know, when it comes to giving up doing something you love, it makes it a lot harder to go with that obvious choice.

 

What was the recovery process like? Were you ever close to giving up before you got on the show?

 

Yeah, I actually was really close to giving up before being on the show. Basically, I didn’t know, my chiropractor didn’t know, nobody knew how long it would take me to get to a fully recovered state. 

 

I did not know how well I could handle doing ninja with the adjustment to my neck. So the first adjustment happened in April of 2021. And so from that point on, you know, I would have to see the chiropractor, every week, every two weeks. 

 

From April to December of 2021, which is when all of the Ninjas apply for the show, I didn’t really have a solid idea of what I could do ninja wise. The first several weeks, I was barely able to do anything, I couldn’t do anything,

I could go for a walk, that’s basically what I could do. I joke that, you know, if I couldn’t do ninja anymore, I would become a power walker, and then I’m gonna go to the Olympics for that. And then I went and I walked around the path at my local park, and there was a woman that was half my size, walking way faster than me. And I was like, you know, maybe that’s not a good choice. 

 

It was very much an up and down recovery process, you know, I’d go four or five weeks where I could do the ninja training. The thing with recovery with the adjustment is that your body is kind of constantly adjusting. Your body constantly  goes from your spine is straight to your spine is not straight. And it can go back and forth between the two, I kind of didn’t really truly know, what was normal at any given time in the recovery process. 

 

And it caused a lot of anxiety. And, you know, I would go to the gym, and I’d be worried, like, is every training session going to be the training session where I decide Ninja is too risky for me to keep doing this?

 

I wouldn’t say I was feeling really confident with where I was at in the recovery process. 

 

But I knew that my story was good. I had recently decided to make my ninja nickname The Commentator Ninja, because I commentate at local competitions. And that’s something that, you know, I’ve always done, it kind of signifies who I am in the ninja community. And it’s also something that’s not dependent on me being an athlete. So it just really felt like this is something that’s always going to be true. 

 

Even as I was debating, do I continue in the sport—do I continue as an athlete? I knew that even if I stopped competing, even if I stopped training for ninja, I would still be a coach, I would still be a commentator, I would still help run events, and just really push to make the sport a better thing. 

 

I knew this year, I was like, you know what, I have a character now. If anything gets me on the show. So I put in my application, I kind of had a feeling that I was like, I think this is my year. But even with that I kind of had doubts. I was like, Is this really a choice that I should make, is this really something I should do? You know, on the show, there’s some balance obstacles where you can really eat it if you don’t do it right.

 

When I applied for the show, I was obviously, super, super excited about getting the call, getting the opportunity to finally go on the show, you know, I’ve been a part of the ninja community and a lot of my friends have been on the show for years before I got to so I knew it was such an experience to look forward to. 

 

But there was definitely a piece of me that was very conflicted and very filled with anxiety about it, because I said, Yeah, this is a cool opportunity. But what if I get hurt again? What if I get another concussion?

 

So what kind of helped you get through the anxiety? And through that experience?

 

Honestly, this one was really, truly just the passing of time. And having falls, and then going to the chiropractor, and realizing I was okay. 

 

Yeah, that was really the only thing that was able to, to kind of help me was having, like actual data points to say, hey, Mary, you have this really tough fall, and your neck didn’t go out of adjustment. 

 

Are ninja nicknames a big thing? Is that something that you need to get on the show? Or is that something people just give each other in the gym?

 

So I actually didn’t have a ninja nickname. And so The Commentator Ninja was what I found. Usually you know, kids who do ninja they’re trying to get on American Ninja Warrior, Jr. and adults who are doing it they want to get on American Ninja Warrior. 

 

And so a lot of us have like shirts that we sell. And it’s a lot easier to design a shirt for yourself if you have a shtick, you have a nickname. Most ninja nicknames just kind of came out of ninjas who did stuff besides just ninja.

 

So my friend Heather, she’s the Rare Ninja. And outside of ninja, she researches like very rare diseases and helps, you know, pharmaceutical companies, or biotech companies, you know, get their drugs on the market. So that’s an example of a niche nickname. One of the coaches I know, his nickname is the Ninja in Khakis because he would always wear khakis whenever he ran. But yeah, I think that ninja nicknames mostly came out of  just trying to have this persona or the interesting thing about you that differentiates you from other ninjas and kind of makes you stand out among all of the other applicants who are trying to get on the show.

 

So there are fans of the show, and then you have nicknames. So you’re trying to appeal to that, or just make good television. Is there any aspect of that where it’s like, you want more fans? Do you think the fans have any input on who comes back? Does that maybe influence people in the boardrooms being like, this person was really popular online, so we’re gonna have them back again.

 

Yeah, I mean, getting on the show is completely reliant on the producers and whatever sort of theme they’re targeting to have on the show. 

 

A lot of ninjas joke you have to have a sob story in order to get on ANW. And that’s not the case. You don’t have to have a sob story. But you do need to have something that provides entertainment value, whether that is just your personality,  like some sort of weird thing that you like to do, some sort of quirk. Maybe you’re really good at Rubik’s cubes and you can do them super fast. Maybe you have drones, you just need something that differentiates you from other people, and gives the producers an opportunity to create a storyline around you. 

 

So for example, my storyline as The Commentator Ninja, what I said in my audition video was Matt and Akbar if I hit a buzzer, I’m going to commentate with you. And so, you know my storyline they ended up showing on the show was that I’m a budding broadcaster, and they actually gave me the opportunity to commentate on my run. 

 

So honestly, that’s what got me airtime, was that I was The Commentator Ninja, it wasn’t just that I was Mary Leighton and I’m a great athlete, it was that I do this thing that nobody else does, commentate on my own run.

 

What did it feel like to achieve your dream of being on American Ninja Warrior?

 

Oh, dude, it was awesome. It was so cool. My dream was never to hit a buzzer— that’s my my goal for this next year. If I get the honor to compete again, just because I’ll be able to train at full force leading up to the show now that I am more recovered from my injury. 

 

I’ve been watching the show for the last five years, I was super involved in the community, I know all the people that were on the show, so to be there with them, and to get to compete with them, it was just so special. It was such a great experience. 

 

Especially because a lot of the ninjas from Massachusetts who got selected for the show, we all got to travel together, we all got to encourage one another, we all got to support each other on our sidelines. 

 

And you know, it was really satisfying  to do it, because I definitely had people when I started the journey five years ago that were like, “Uh you’re not like an athlete, like you can’t like—what, like you want to be on the show? you’re crazy.”

 

And so yeah, it was very satisfying to to finally do it, to have persevered and, you know, put in the work to audition for the show so many years in a row and finally get the opportunity.

 

Is it normal for people to have about five years training before they get on the show? Or is it just kind of dependent on how you progress and if you have a good story?

 

Totally dependent on the story, there are people that are really naturally good at ninja, either because they have really good experience in other sports or, you know, they’re just naturally good athletes. So you see a lot of crossover from parkour and gymnastics and rock climbing, those athletes tend to kind of already have a little bit of an edge when it comes to training for ninja. Because they already have body awareness, they already have grip strength, they already have just kind of that innate ability to control their bodies. 

 

So I wouldn’t say there’s a standard, I would say most ninjas have to apply at least two or three times before they get on the show. But you do have those people that just applied once and they got on and that’s awesome for them.

 

How important is it to have a good coach?

 

Oh, my God, I’m so glad you asked. It’s critically important for a lot of reasons.

 

Ninja is such a mental sport, it’s not only extremely physical, but it is really, really incredibly mental as well. And there are days where you’ll be training and you just hit a wall, not the Warped Wall, you just hit, like, a training wall. 

 

You might start to feel down on yourself, there might be a skill that you’re not getting you might not be progressing through your competitions as well as you want. 

 

You need that person there to tell you, hey, you know, look at your progress from point A to point B, look at where you were a year ago, and where you are now and the progress you’ve had. Just having someone there to not only guide you through the sport in the physical sense, but also the mental sense. 

 

You’ve talked about how the ninja community is a big thing What is the community like?

 

Oh, it’s awesome.  Some of my closest friends are from the ninja community. They’re people that I’ve met at competitions, and we just stayed in contact and helped each other through various situations in our lives. 

 

You know, you do really form a bond with people who get to see you face failure on a weekly basis. So there’s definitely a strong bond that gets formed. 

 

But you know, one thing that I really like right now about the New England ninja community, is that we have our own league. It’s called NINA. When you go to competitions, you see other people from gyms, and, you know, when there are kids from other gyms that I know, who don’t have a coach there, I’m super happy to step in and coach them. And I also know all of the other coaches from the other gyms will also do the same for my kids, if I wasn’t at a competition, it’s really, really great to see that support. 

 

The parents are awesome. They help support us, they support our journeys to ANW, they support any sort of like, charity competition, or things that we’re doing. Like, it’s really a community that pulls together when there’s a cause that needs support. And so it’s really awesome.

 

That’s cool. Is there fundraising that happens for specific things? You mentioned, selling merch, is the sold merch just for  the TV show? Or is it used as a way to raise revenue for causes?

 

It can be both, a lot of ninjas will sell shirts. Before this last year, American Ninja Warrior didn’t pay for athletes to be on the show. So athletes had to cover the cost of their own hotel, they had to cover their travel costs and everything like that. This year, ANW did cover it. So before, a lot of it was just raising money for the cost of being on the show. But, you know, a lot of Ninjas do sell their merch to benefit charities. 

 

When I sold my shirts, I have used the proceeds from that to benefit an organization called Neighborhood Ninjas. They are working on building a playground in a neighborhood that doesn’t have a ton of resources, so that kids can have access to ninja. 

 

So you see a lot of either fundraising, or you know, some people do just sell merch to make money. There are ninjas that do ninja full time. And that’s one way that they can increase their revenue.

 

Do you have any advice to people who want to try ninja for the first time?

 

Just try it. I think everyone should be a ninja.  That is my personal philosophy on life. 

 

Don’t be afraid of it. The number one thing, if anyone wants to try Ninja is like, don’t take yourself too seriously. I’ve been doing this for five years, and I still like completely eat  it, like nine times out of ten when I’m in the gym. 

 

The whole point of trying something new is that you’re not going to be good at it right off the bat. And that’s one of the beautiful things about ninja, you know, what really has kept me in the sport to begin with is that, you know, I could consider myself a good competitor. But there are still so many obstacles that I could mess up on at any point in time. You’re always kind of a beginner. 

 

So do just try it. Make sure that you get a good warm up in before you get going. But just go have fun. Try it out, see how you’re doing, ask a coach who’s at the gym where you’re at to give you some pointers on how to do the obstacles.

 

What positive things does ninja bring to the greater community?

 

I think it just brings people together, diving more into, you know, the causes that ninjas get behind. My buddy, Jonathan, recently ran a competition series. Him and his buddy, Luke Dillon just decided to do it. But the benefits of all the competitions they ran, you know, the proceeds went to the Boys and Girls Club in Worcester. And Boys and Girls Club in Worcester, you know, works with kids who don’t have enough resources to give them resources to either compete in sports, give them  career coaching, help them with school, it does a whole bunch of awesome things. And what’s really great is that in the ninja community,  people sign up for competitions to help raise money for these causes. 

 

You don’t have to do comps every weekend. But the ninja community really does sign up for those things and helps create money for those causes. So that is one really positive thing is just that, you know, as much as ninjas are in this sport for their own personal satisfaction, you do see a lot of ninjas taking a broader focus and asking themselves like, okay, Ninja has done so much for me, how can I use this awesome sport to do really good things for other people?

 

Where can people go to learn more about ninja if they want to?

 

Reach out to somebody in the ninja community. Let them know what you’re looking for. And they’ll direct you in the right way. My DMs are always open. Feel free to reach out to me on Instagram or Facebook. I’d be happy to guide you in the right direction depending on what you’re interested in.

Thank you both Mary and Briana. I am proud to have known you and your family over the years.

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