Parkour: Running free through urban and rural obstacle courses
Parkour (or le parkour in French) is an extreme sport whose practitioners must traverse obstacles in a rural or urban setting as quickly as possible by going over, under or through them. It is best described
as “the art of moving through your environment using only your body and the surroundings to propel yourself.” The chief aim of parkour is to overcome obstacles fluidly, with speed, strength and originality.
Parkour was originally started in France by David Belle, who was only 15 when he single-handedly developed parkour into a cohesive discipline in 1988. Belle was inspired by the ‘natural method of physical education’ of Georges
Hébert, which was in turn inspired by the indigenous tribes in Africa at the beginning of the 20th century. The sport gained a lot of popularity in France and rapidly spread all over the world. Today, it is popular among thrill-seekers and extreme
sport enthusiasts.
Parkour isn’t just a sport – it is a philosophy of freedom and its expression. It is about overcoming mental, emotional and physical barriers.
A practitioner of Parkour is called a traceur (or traceuse, for females). The two most primary characteristics of a traceur are speed and efficiency. There is no going back in parkour; the traceur only moves forward along the quickest
routes available while performing leaps, vaults, rolls and landings to avoid or overcome whatever lies in his path.
Since parkour is a relatively new sport, there is very little literature on it. Newcomers to the sport rely on the online community of parkour practitioners to get started running through streets and vaulting from rooftop to rooftop
on their own. The most popular online parkour community is ‘Urban Freeflow’ which has a library of articles, videos and photos about parkour as well as message boards where interested parties can learn more about the sport, sport, get support, and organise
meetings to practice parkour in crews. The parkour community provides safety and is essential for a traceur’s growth and skill development. Parkour crews participate in ‘sessions’ or ‘jams’ which involve different games, such as ‘follow the leader’, in which
each traceur performs the exact same moves as the one before. Community participation in this way is vital as it provides non-professionals with a good opportunity to learn from more experienced traceurs and improve their own skills at their own pace in an
undemanding environment.
Parkour has made an immense impact in the few decades during which it has been in practice. It has spawned a similar sport, ‘freerunning’, which focuses less on efficiency and speed and more on performing moves in an artistic and
graceful way. Unlike in parkour, going backwards is not considered a breach of the discipline in freerunning.
After parkour gained attention in the media, militaries around the world started incorporating the discipline in their training programmes. A soldier who can sprint through dense urban areas is a necessity in today’s warfare, where
urban areas are usually the battlefields.
Just 22 years old now, parkour is destined to gain even more popularity in the years to come, as it garners increasing attention in the media and at sports arenas. Just as skateboarding was once a new wave for youngsters to express
and practice their freedom, parkour will be the new sport that will overtake the imaginations of people in cities all over the world.
Some common elements of parkour
Cat Leap: In this move, the traceur runs up and launches from a take-off point at a 45-degree angle. As he approaches the wall, he shifts his body so as to be sitting in mid-air with legs bent to absorb the shock upon making contact
with the wall. As his feet touch the wall, he grabs the ledge and bends his knees for power to push himself upwards and over the ledge.
Underbar: This move consists of simply jumping or diving through a gap between obstacles.
Precision Jump: The traceur balances on the edge of a drop, such as a roof or wall, and sizes up the distance to his next landing point. He leans forward, bending his knees and launches himself. Once in the air, he raises his arms
and straightens his body. Upon landing, he bends his knees to slow down and thus makes a precise jump from one point to another.
Roll: When the traceur lands from a height, he bends his knees as he lands and uses his forward momentum to enter a roll that absorbs the shock of the landing. This enables him to land, roll and keep moving so that he is back on
his feet and running in one fluid movement.
Speed Vault: The traceur approaches the wall at high speed, lays one hand on the ledge and leans sideways as he jumps over the wall, lands on the other side and continues running without any break in momentum.
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