When Jessie Graff was 12 years old, she wasn't set on becoming a pioneering athlete. She was set on becoming a super hero. More specifically, a warrior princess: Xena. "She was just this strong, heroic woman who rode around on a horse with a sword, and I wanted to be a hero like her," Jessie says. "I'd tape every episode and go back and watch them and just pick apart the form of what she was doing. How she would do these flying sidekicks. And so I would kick down all the dead trees in the woods near my house." Jessie braided her hair and even cut her bangs to look like Xena. But looking like Xena wasn’t enough. "I remember, there was a bully who was whacking his jacket at this girl who didn't have very many friends in school," Jessie says. "And I was, like, this little, 50 pound kid in sixth grade. I was a shrimp. And I just ran up and round-kicked him in the stomach. And he was so confused. He stopped, and he just looked at me, like, 'Did you just kick me?' Like, he didn't even know. And I was, like, 'Yeah!' And then I just walked to class. " Jessie filled her mother in on her plan. "I told her, 'When I grow up, I'm gonna be the next Xena,'" Jessie recalls. "And she was a Broadway dancer and an actress, and she was, like, 'Well, you know, maybe you could be your own hero?' And I was, like, 'No, no. When Lucy Lawless retires, they're gonna need a new Xena, because obviously the world can't be without Xena. I'll just take her place. I'll be ready by then.'" Warrior Princess Training Young Jessie did all she could to prepare herself for a future as a warrior princess. She took circus classes, trained in flying trapeze and competed in gymnastics. Then in high school, she picked up pole vaulting. She earned a scholarship to Nebraska — and pursued a second dream: the Olympics. Jessie put the superhero plan on hold so she could focus on the pole vaulting. Soon she was within an inch and a half of qualifying for Olympic trials. But during her junior year of college, Jessie stopped improving – she wasn’t vaulting any higher. "I needed a new motivation," Jessie says. "And I saw this ad on TV — it was, like, E! Entertainment or something — and they were, like, 'Yeah, they wanna make a new Wonder Woman movie and they haven't decided who to cast yet. They're thinking maybe somebody unknown.' And I was, like, 'I gotta do it. I wanna do it.'"

"I'd accidentally given her the resume that I made for the circus when I was in high school. I didn't realize it. And before I had a chance to explain, she's just telling me about stunts." Jessie Graff

So the summer before her senior year, when Jessie was home in Maryland, she got a meeting with her mom’s agent in Washington D.C. "I took the train into the city and brought a head shot, a resume — all the stuff you're supposed to bring --and handed it to her," Jessie recalls. "And she looked over it and she goes, 'What is this? Do you even act? Why are you here? You know what? You should be a stunt woman. Here.' And she just shooed me out of the office, as my head is spinning trying to understand what's happened. ‘Cause I'd accidentally given her the resume that I made for the circus when I was in high school. I didn't realize it. And before I had a chance to explain, she's just telling me about stunts. And it all suddenly just hit me, like, 'Why didn't I think of this? Of course, a stunt woman. What could be more perfect?''" This Is Where You Belong Jessie started reading and researching all she could about life as a stunt double. She planned to move to LA after graduation, so she started studying maps of the city’s neighborhoods. And even before finishing school, Jessie got her first opportunity: it was a big one. Most stunt doubles start out with relatively simple maneuvers — say, pretending to trip and fall. But when Jessie was on spring break, a non-union project needed a woman to do a backwards fall off a 50-foot building. Jessie hadn’t joined the union yet, so she was one of the few people eligible for the job — that, and she was willing to fall backwards off a 50-foot building. She got the gig. After some debate over which air bag to use, Jessie was on the building's roof in the dark of night pretending to be chased by a ghost. "The moment my feet left the building and I was in the air, all the stress was gone," she says. "And it was like, 'Oh, this is where you belong. You're falling through the air.' And that's what feels like home to me. I wanted to do it again, but they were like, 'No, that was perfect, we're done. Moving on.' So it went quickly." Jessie was hooked. In 2007 she graduated, moved to LA and began looking for more work. "My first year in LA, I auditioned for all the live stunt shows," Jessie says. "And I was really excited about the Pirate's Dinner Adventure one because there's singing and sword fights and trampolines and circus stuff — everything I love. Only it turned out that the female character is actually a mute gypsy who gets kidnapped by pirates, so she doesn't get to do any fights and is just the damsel in distress the whole time. So I was a little disappointed." Still, Jessie took the job. (And in her free time she learned one of the male pirate roles — though she never got to perform it.) And soon she found better stunt work. By her fourth year in LA, she was booked solid. Then in 2013, she ended up on a TV show that doesn’t involve any acting: American Ninja Warrior.

"The moment my feet left the building and I was in the air, all the stress was gone. And it was like, 'Oh, this is where you belong. You're falling through the air.' And that's what feels like home to me." Jessie Graff