I Am An American Gladiator

I don’t remember specifically the first time I watched the show, but my favorite part was at the end when they would run the Eliminator. It was just like this crazy wild obstacle course that, as a kid, I thought I would do really well on.

My roommate Ed was at NBC’s website and he came across open calls in our area and said, “Dude, check this out; there is an open call for American gladiators”.

He asked if I wanted to go for it. "Absolutely I want to go out for it; I used to love watching that show as a kid; let’s do it!"

I started training and going to the gym. Two weeks later I roped in my buddy Chris to come with us as well. We arrived at 7:30 in the morning, and there were already a 100 people in line. We sat in the parking lot for six hours waiting for the opportunity to audition.

My friend bailed after two hours, so I sat there for the remaining four. I was the 104th person to go up that day, but I wasn’t going to back down. I was committed to this; it was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

Two days later there was an initial call back, which was an extensive 25-minute interview. Basically they were trying to find out if you had a story to tell, what you would do with the prize money, and what it was that was going to be driving you.

The first time I saw the gladiators was actually when I lined up for the first event, which was the gauntlet. The personal assistants were always on their radios making sure that when the contestants were around in a certain area, the gladiators were not.