Shenandoah Pharmacy Professor Makes Second ‘American Ninja Warrior’ Appearance
Dr. Jennifer Bryant also brings her ninja training to work with her
When an “American Ninja Warrior” works at your university, you shouldn’t be surprised to see a pull-up bar spanning the top of her office doorway.
Pull-ups for top marks and training
At Shenandoah University, at the top of Virginia in Winchester, that ninja warrior is Jennifer Bryant, Ph.D. Dr. Bryant is a professor at the Bernard J. Dunn School of Pharmacy in the Health Professions Building on the campus of Winchester Medical Center. Her students know the bar, because she’s been known to do pull-ups for the number of A’s and B’s made on various exams. She’s also done push-ups for the same reason, she said. “If anybody wants to come join me, a lot of times we’ll go down to the fitness center here just because there’s more space and people want to watch.” Sometimes, students will just find her hanging by her arms in her doorway, working on her grip.
Grip strength is essential for ninja warrior competitions, which Bryant began competing in six or seven years ago, when her son started participating in the activity. She thought it looked fun and, after attending open gym sessions, she was hooked. And soon, she was competing in the sport’s biggest contest – NBC’s “American Ninja Warrior” television competition. Bryant is a two-time ANW vet. She competed in 2022-23’s Season 14, and she’s been tapped for Season 19. She recently traveled from Virginia to Las Vegas to test her mettle on the ANW obstacles against inky overnight skies, but there’s nothing more that can be divulged about her results until the show returns to screens in Summer 2027.
You’re never too old to be a ninja warrior
She’s ended up competing in ANW twice because she’s applied to the show persistently, year after year. There’s a couple of reasons for that, particularly after her first appearance, she said.
First of all, I’m just a very competitive person, and I wanted to do better on the course, right? And then, second of all, I think I’ve kept applying because the show is amazing, but it is being kind of dominated by the teenagers, because they are young and agile, and they don’t have jobs, and they can train whenever they want, and I think I wanted to just be that representative of someone who’s 47 and has a job and kids, and I go to their sporting events and all of that, and I don’t have time to do everything a 15-year-old does. But I can still do enough to get out there and show that I can do it. So I think that’s the other sort of thing that pushes me to be like, Hey, you can still do it. It’s not too late. Age is just a number.”
Shenandoah University School of Pharmacy Professor Jennifer Bryant, Ph.D.
Along with ninja warrior competitions, Bryant teaches, plays basketball once a week, does weekly yoga, occasionally rock climbs (it’s also good cross-training for ninja warrior activities), and raises her children with her husband as part of an active family. “That’s pretty much all I have time for because the ninja gym we go to is an hour away. If we go, it’s a whole evening and we pack dinner – it’s a lot.”
It’s a lot indeed, but in a great way.
