When Sha Mualimm-ak, a 21-year-old who lives in the Bronx, N.Y., and Nick Maurer, a 20-year-old from New Jersey, get together, gravity is nowhere to be found. The two athletes train anywhere from 15 to 20 hours a week doing parkour, or “the act of moving from point A to point B using the obstacles in your path to increase your efficiency.” But parkour in action is a thing of beauty: flips and twists up walls, over fences and onto thin beams, all done with precision and grace.
There are hundreds of thousands of YouTube videos of top parkour athletes performing breathtaking jumps and flips. But the edited clips don’t show the work and thought behind the practice of parkour: Before each trick, the athlete takes several dry runs, concentrating hard on the potential takeoff and landing possibilities, so when it’s actually performed, it works. And when Mualimm-ak decides, after several minutes of planning, that a trick shouldn’t be attempted, he simply walks away and moves on to the next thing.
The grandfather of all things parkour was a French naval officer named George Hébert, who helped evacuate over 700 people from the island of Martinique after a volcano erupted in 1902. Hébert was impressed by the way the natives of the island moved so easily and naturally to safety, and went on to develop a training discipline for the French military that involved climbing, running and maneuvering through manmade obstacle courses.
French Special Forces called the technique “parcours du combattant,” and in the 1990s, several Parisian teens transferred it to an urban setting and changed the name to “parkour.” Today parkour competitions are held across the world, and classes for adults and kids can be found in gymnasiums around the country. Parkour was further popularized by the opening chase scene in the 2006 James Bond movie “Casino Royale,” as well as MTV’s “Ultimate Parkour Challenge” series.
“The biggest misconception around parkour is that it’s all about jumping off rooftops,” said Victor Bevine, co-founder and CEO of the World Freerunning Parkour Federation. (Parkour typically is used to describe moving efficiently, while freerunning incorporate flips and tricks in the movement. The WFPF doesn’t consider them separate disciplines.)
Bevine said: “But that’s a very small part of it, done by athletes at the highest skill level. Parkour really is about learning how to move creatively and efficiently through your environment. It’s movement as metaphor: In parkour, you face your fears and deal with any obstacles in your way, and that has an impact on the rest of your life. It’s more like a martial art than an extreme sport.”
Brian Taylor of Denver was a veteran break-dancer searching online for a specific flip when he came across a parkour video and was hooked. He now teaches five parkour classes a week to 60 students at the Goodson Recreation Center in Centennial, Colo. “My number one focus is safety,” said Taylor. “We do an exercise called the ‘120.’ It’s 30 push-ups, 30 sit-ups, 30 landings and 30 rolls. We do a lot of jumping in parkour, and if you go up, you have to come back down, so you have to learn how to land safety.”
When Adrian Gonzalez of Miami was considering joining the police force, he started using parkour videos as a physical training tool and decided instead to become a professional freerunner. In 2010, Gonzalez opened the Miami Freerunning and Parkour Academy, where five coaches train over 300 students. “We get young, rambunctious kids who are active and energetic,” said Gonzalez. “Here they find a home where that kind of energy is embraced. And the games they do, which involve running, jumping and climbing, and which they’re often told not to do, can be done safely and enjoyed here at the academy.”
Gonzalez and Taylor also teach adults, typically young professionals looking for a different approach to fitness. “When you’re adult, you get set in your ways,” said Taylor. “For example, a ‘Kong’ is a vault that we do. It requires dedication and commitment. You can’t half-ass a Kong, or you’re going to wipe out. Adults are usually afraid of doing things out of their comfort zone, so I have to break them out of the fear and say, ‘Don’t slow down. You need to speed up to do this.’ ”
“We’re such robots in terms of the way we move through our environment,” added Bevine. “We’re told to use the sidewalk, use the stairs. Parkour for adults is about getting back to a sense of play and looking at your environment in a creative way.”
The WFPF has high hopes for the future of parkour. It is putting together a teacher certification program, and would like to see the activity eventually become an Olympic sport, one where the elite athletes get the recognition and sponsorships they deserve.
“Kids are going nuts for this,” said Taylor. “I’d really like to see cities and governments build parks for us. They do it for skateboarders and BMX bikers. But parkour is everywhere now. I’d really like to see the cities step up and give us something to climb on.”
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There are hundreds of thousands of YouTube videos of top parkour athletes performing breathtaking jumps and flips. But the edited clips don’t show the work and thought behind the practice of parkour: Before each trick, the athlete takes several dry runs, concentrating hard on the potential takeoff and landing possibilities, so when it’s actually performed, it works. And when Mualimm-ak decides, after several minutes of planning, that a trick shouldn’t be attempted, he simply walks away and moves on to the next thing.
The grandfather of all things parkour was a French naval officer named George Hébert, who helped evacuate over 700 people from the island of Martinique after a volcano erupted in 1902. Hébert was impressed by the way the natives of the island moved so easily and naturally to safety, and went on to develop a training discipline for the French military that involved climbing, running and maneuvering through manmade obstacle courses.
French Special Forces called the technique “parcours du combattant,” and in the 1990s, several Parisian teens transferred it to an urban setting and changed the name to “parkour.” Today parkour competitions are held across the world, and classes for adults and kids can be found in gymnasiums around the country. Parkour was further popularized by the opening chase scene in the 2006 James Bond movie “Casino Royale,” as well as MTV’s “Ultimate Parkour Challenge” series.
“The biggest misconception around parkour is that it’s all about jumping off rooftops,” said Victor Bevine, co-founder and CEO of the World Freerunning Parkour Federation. (Parkour typically is used to describe moving efficiently, while freerunning incorporate flips and tricks in the movement. The WFPF doesn’t consider them separate disciplines.)
Bevine said: “But that’s a very small part of it, done by athletes at the highest skill level. Parkour really is about learning how to move creatively and efficiently through your environment. It’s movement as metaphor: In parkour, you face your fears and deal with any obstacles in your way, and that has an impact on the rest of your life. It’s more like a martial art than an extreme sport.”
Brian Taylor of Denver was a veteran break-dancer searching online for a specific flip when he came across a parkour video and was hooked. He now teaches five parkour classes a week to 60 students at the Goodson Recreation Center in Centennial, Colo. “My number one focus is safety,” said Taylor. “We do an exercise called the ‘120.’ It’s 30 push-ups, 30 sit-ups, 30 landings and 30 rolls. We do a lot of jumping in parkour, and if you go up, you have to come back down, so you have to learn how to land safety.”
When Adrian Gonzalez of Miami was considering joining the police force, he started using parkour videos as a physical training tool and decided instead to become a professional freerunner. In 2010, Gonzalez opened the Miami Freerunning and Parkour Academy, where five coaches train over 300 students. “We get young, rambunctious kids who are active and energetic,” said Gonzalez. “Here they find a home where that kind of energy is embraced. And the games they do, which involve running, jumping and climbing, and which they’re often told not to do, can be done safely and enjoyed here at the academy.”
Gonzalez and Taylor also teach adults, typically young professionals looking for a different approach to fitness. “When you’re adult, you get set in your ways,” said Taylor. “For example, a ‘Kong’ is a vault that we do. It requires dedication and commitment. You can’t half-ass a Kong, or you’re going to wipe out. Adults are usually afraid of doing things out of their comfort zone, so I have to break them out of the fear and say, ‘Don’t slow down. You need to speed up to do this.’ ”
“We’re such robots in terms of the way we move through our environment,” added Bevine. “We’re told to use the sidewalk, use the stairs. Parkour for adults is about getting back to a sense of play and looking at your environment in a creative way.”
The WFPF has high hopes for the future of parkour. It is putting together a teacher certification program, and would like to see the activity eventually become an Olympic sport, one where the elite athletes get the recognition and sponsorships they deserve.
“Kids are going nuts for this,” said Taylor. “I’d really like to see cities and governments build parks for us. They do it for skateboarders and BMX bikers. But parkour is everywhere now. I’d really like to see the cities step up and give us something to climb on.”
RELATED ARTICLE
PARKOUR 101: A new form of movement includes its own language
PHOTO: Fabio Cuttica/Redux
A practitioner of parkour makes his moves on the outskirts of Rome.
