Physical: Asia winners revealed – full final leaderboard and country standings

The winners of the first season of Physical: Asia have been revealed. An international spin-off of Netflix's hit South Korean fitness reality show, Physical: 100, the gladiator-style competition launched on October 28 with teams from eight countries competing in several challenges that test strength, endurance, willpower and strategy.

What's Physical: Asia about?

Similar to Physical: 100, contestants – both women and men – go head-to-head in challenges. But instead of individual contestants, this one is a showdown of countries, selected for their sporting histories and distinct characteristics, according to Netflix. A total of 48 athletes feature in Physical: Asia, six each from eight countries: South Korea, Japan, Thailand, Mongolia, Turkey, Indonesia, Australia and the Philippines.

Star contestants included Filipino boxer Manny Pacquiao, the only eight-division world champion in history, and Australian UFC middleweight champion Robert “The Reaper” Whittaker.

Fans of Physical: 100 will also be familiar with some of the members of the South Korean team: season two winner Amotti, UFC star Dong-hyun “Stun Gun” Kim from season two, and wrestler Jang Eun-sil and skeleton racer and Olympic gold medallist Yun Sung-bin from the first season.

What's at stake?

Besides national pride, the winning team walked away with a cash prize of 1 billion Korean won ($700,000), vastly upping the stakes from the 300 million Korean won prize in the first and second seasons of Physical: 100.

What were the challenges?

Territorial Conquest challenge, set on a sand dune. Photo: Netflix

“We built the set across an area the size of five soccer fields, using 1,200 metric tonnes of sand and 40 metric tonnes of steel,” producer Jang Ho-gi said. “Our goal was to harmonise the diverse histories and cultures of Korea and Asia.”

In the first challenge, Territorial Conquest, all eight teams competed for four available platforms set atop a sand dune. Their goal was to get as many team members as possible on one platform while wrestling one another amid the shifting sands dunes.

Like musical chairs, the available platforms were then reduced to two and finally one, as teams with the least number of members on platforms were sent out of the game.

In the second challenge, Shipwreck Salvage, two teams competed to haul cargo from a shipwreck to a designated collection point within 20 minutes. The team that accumulated the greatest total weight of cargo within that time was named the winner. Four winning teams emerge from the eight countries, with the other four losing teams going into a Death Match to remain in the competition.

Contestants haul cargo in the Shipwreck Salvage challenge. Photo: Netflix

A slightly altered version from Physical: 100, Death Match required contestants to gain possession of a ball in an arena and then place the ball in their opponent's box. The challenge consisted of five rounds, with each round increasing the team size – from one member to five members per team for the final round. Two teams emerged as winners, with the two losing teams out of the competition.

The stakes were upped in the third challenge, Team Rep Match, where the six remaining teams were split into two groups of three. Each country then picked a representative to compete for four matches.

For the first match, two contestants from each team were required to race and jump over hurdles in the fastest time possible. In the second match, two members were made to hang on to two stone totems each, weighing 135kg per totem, with the team holding on to totems for the longest time earning the highest points.