Parkour: the sport that defies gravity
When I first heard of this sport I thought it was dangerous and down right foolish, but the more I learned about it the more I fell in love with it! Okay you may not have a clue what this is so I will explain. . .
The History
the concept of the sport you can say is still fairly new, it was created in France by a group of young men in the 1980's. It's first name was Art du Deplacement. In English it means "Art of Displacement." That name summons up what its all about; getting from one place to another using only your body. Now there are many other names for it too, like freerunning, the Art of Movement and so on but let me tell you about the two men who have helped this idea come into the light of the public. They are Yann Hnautra and David Belle. These men in the 1980's lived in a little town south of Paris. These young men formed a group called 'Yamakasi' a Lingala word meaning, Strong man, strong spirit.
These two men were not the only ones in this group, the others in the group were Sebastian Foucan, Stephane Vigroux, Yahn Hnautra, David Malgogne, Chau Belle-Dinh and Frederic Hnautra.
David Belle's Father Raymond Belle really helped the idea of Parkour to move along in his son's life and his friends. He showed the boys Georges Hebert's Military training methods which was pretty popular during that time in the French Military.
When they became teenagers they began to do the big jumps that Parkour is known for. With the big jumps people started to see what these young men were doing and people wanted to join in and some wanted to film it.
Roll Film
With the uprising of interest came Besson's 2001 film Yamakasi: Les samourais des temps mondernes. Then some people in the group such as David Belle decided to take another path in Parkour.
Through out the years more movies were made and even more people joined this growing group but with that some people were killed doing 'copycat' moves from the movies or the men, not truly understanding the practice and skill it takes to do certain moves.
The idea
It is said Parkour helps free your body for more movement and it's not for people who are looking for 'the next rush' but for people who want to get stronger and more fluent in their movements and to over come fears.
Wrap it up!
If you are interested, here are some good websites to check out:
If you want a better understanding of the history of this art form, buy clothing and look at classes and just learn more about it you can go to parkourgenerations.com
Another place to check out is take flight. A company dedicated to providing clothing that is comfortable and stylish while doing Parkour! takeflightappearl.com.
Or if you want to sit back and chill from a computer, a book you can read is The Parkour and Freerunning handbook by Dan Edwardes
If you want to watch Parkour in action check out Jesse La Flair, who battled his way through the TV series America Ninja Warrior this year. Here you can check out his encouraging video for starters and another video of him showing off his awesome moves!
I hope you all enjoyed reading this article and that you have a little better understanding of this unique sport. Remember; when trying Parkour be careful and learn from the experts because they know what they are doing.
Tell next time!
May Adventure take you by the hand and lead you,
Brittany
