Guam's Deren Perez has competed in the American Ninja Warrior circuit several times. He's represented the island in Barbados, Philippines, UK, Vietnam and the US over the span of 5 years.

Perez said, "So I actually started back in 2015. I did my first Ninja competition and ended up in 1st place that weekend out of 1,500 competitors. From there I knew that this was my calling and I wanted to do it on a professional level."

Perez recently took part in the American Ninja Warrior Qualifying Round. His run wasn't televised but says he made it to the semifinals.

Perez said,"There was about 100 competitors and the top 30 get into the semifinals. To get into the top 30 was a big deal for me especially having Covid just before. It threw my training off, I lost over 12-pounds of body weight so I was really struggling to get fit again. I had about a weeks time by the time I got over Covid and was cleared until competition day. So it was a really tough course for me and I was really happy and surprised that I was relying on my previous training to get me through into the qualifying round."

Deren and the family just moved back to the island a few weeks ago. He's home on military orders and has plans on helping build the sport on Guam. He wants to give other athletes the same opportunity to compete stateside.

Perez said, "Being in American Ninja Warrior or the Ninja Warrior community these past few years, it's definitely really built my confidence. Having big names like Daniel Gill, Naje Richardson, Megan Martinan and the winner of the female edition for Ninja Warrior. These guys I've trained with and I know them personally. Just having them in my corner and learning from them it really helps me as an athlete build my game up to the expectation of elite athletes."