With calculated leaps, displays of strength, and races up a 14.5-foot curved wall, both a Wilmette doctor and a Libertyville High School student have advanced to the semi-finals of the NBC-TV American Ninja Warrior competition show by making it through the athletically demanding obstacle course.
The semifinals for the show, where the ninja course tests participants’ strength, agility and balance, will air this month. The segment featuring Steven Bachta, 44, of Wilmette, a pediatric doctor at NorthShore Evanston and Highland Park hospitals who also teaches medical students and residents, is set to air Monday, July 14, and that of his fellow ninja contestant Kenzie Hughes, 16, who will be entering her senior year of high school and hopes to go into physical therapy, will air July 28, according to NBC spokespersons.
Bachta and Hughes know each other from training at ninja gyms in the area, he said.
“It’s kind of a small world,” he said. “She’s an amazing ninja, and she’s been doing it since she was very young.”
“The ninja community has been amazing, and it’s kind of a tight-knit and smaller community,” Bachta said, describing how many ninja athletes train together at local facilities. “It’s always fun to talk to the kids about what it’s like to be on the TV show, because a lot of them want to eventually do that.”
Both Bachta and Hughes learned about the NBC show by watching it on television — or, in Bachta’s case, by his young daughters watching American Ninja Warrior Junior and then wanting to compete.
Hughes started watching the show about eight years ago and her family supported her interest, taking her to an ANW-inspired gym in Chicago where a younger Hughes “fell in love” with the sport. And during COVID, her father Chris Hughes even built a mini course in the backyard.
Bachta, whose moniker on the show is “Docta Bachta,” took his first real leap into the sport after the pandemic ended.
“It just so happens, Chicago has like, five or six really good ninja gyms,” he said. “And so once the lockdown was lifted, we kind of ventured out to these gyms.”
He trains at the Ultimate Ninjas North Shore facility in Glenview, along with his two daughters. Sydney, 10, was ranked third at the World Ninja League Championships in Greensboro, North Carolina in June, and Logan, 7, ranked 10th at the same championships, he said.
That makes both of them around the same age Hughes was when she got interested in ninja.
‘Like a dream come true’
Hughes started gymnastics at 2 years old, and had also done flag football, figure skating, softball, soccer and a “bunch of random sports.”
Hughes’ mother Mia Hughes said her daughter had previously applied to be on American Ninja Warrior Junior, but was ultimately not selected. When the age to enter the American Ninja Warrior was lowered to 15, the teen jumped at the opportunity.
Mia Hughes talked about the moment they got the call, at eight o’clock on a Wednesday evening.
“I ran the phone up to her, I filmed the call … it was like a dream come true,” Mia Hughes said.
The outpouring of support the teen saw from friends and family was “overwhelming,” Kenzie Hughes said, and going to Las Vegas to be in front of tv cameras was “nerve-wracking.” But while she struggled with all the cameras watching her, when she got to the starting line, it all dropped away, she said.
Hughes said she also got to meet numerous other ninja competitors while in Vegas and that they shared advice and tips.
“Everyone’s there to support each other, and it doesn’t matter how you do or they do, it’s just, all together we want to be the best we can.”
Despite the physicality of the sport, it’s “way more mental than physical,” Hughes said.
She had to change her mentality, she said, after she became too focused on perfection.
“It was really helpful to be on the show, because then that’s where I realized — I really do love the sport and I want to keep going and try to be the best I can,” Hughes said.
For her parents, their daughter’s skill and passion for ninja came as a surprise.
“It’s great to see her shine, and when she took that starting line … I was just really proud of her,” Mia Hughes said, wiping her eyes.
But the lessons she wants her daughter to take away from the experience aren’t about success. Instead, they’re about failure. Her daughter used to be “really, really hard on herself,” Mia Hughes said, so it was heartening to hear her talk about rediscovering the love of the sport.
“Everyone fails, no matter what…Failure, it happens, and that’s a thing in life,” Mia Hughes said.
After high school, Hughes plans to pursue physical therapy studies in college, drawing from her own experiences handling injuries and pains. She hopes to attend school in Florida to be close to her older sister Kylie.
She doesn’t plan on giving up on ninja, however, saying she will be applying for next season as well.
Encouraging blood donations
Bachta, who has competed twice before on American Ninja Warrior, teaches in addition to his role as a pediatric doctor. As director of pediatric education at NorthShore, he’s a clinical assistant professor at the University of Chicago’s Pritzker School of Medicine.
He works 24-hour shifts at the Evanston and Highland Park hospitals, likening the shifts to those of firefighters, he said, because it involves being on call even when he’s sleeping.
“You always have to be ready to go. You can lay down and rest, but at any moment, you could have to rush to a delivery or the emergency room, and you have to be sharp,” Bachta said of the lifestyle. “It’s not really sleep when you’re there. It’s more just like resting until you’re needed.”
Because of his schedule, Bachta said he is able to have more flexibility when it comes to ninja training and also competing on NBC. This season’s shows taped last September in Las Vegas, requiring the contestants to keep their lips sealed about the results for the past 10 months.
“It makes it a little challenging,” Bachta said of the travel requirements to appear on the show. “But it works. My colleagues have been great and understanding.”
His group of fellow ninjas trains at other ninja facilities besides the Glenview one to get a feel for different obstacles, Bachta said. The group also trains at night, largely because the NBC show films at night, sometimes all through the night, he explained, and he wants to be conditioned to get into athletic mode in the late hours.
Bachta is competing to encourage people to donate blood. He’s been donating since he was a student at Maine East High School in Park Ridge, and said now that he’s a doctor, he sees firsthand how critical blood transfusions are for trauma and ER patients, cancer patients, and mothers who hemorrhage.
“In high school, I donated because I thought, ‘I can do this and help people,’ but now as a doctor, I can see this full circle,” he said. He still donates on a regular basis.