PARKOUR

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Parkour is a training discipline using movement that developed from military obstacle course training.  Practitioners aim to get from one point to another in a complex environment, without assistive equipment and in the fastest and most efficient way possible. Parkour includes running, climbing, swinging, vaulting, jumping, rolling, quadrupedal movement, and other movements as deemed most suitable for the situation.  Parkour's development from military training gives it some aspects of a non-combative martial art.

Parkour is an activity that can be practiced alone or with others and is usually—but not exclusively—carried out in urban spaces.  Parkour involves seeing one's environment in a new way, and imagining the potential for navigating it by movement around, across, through, over and under its features.

Philosophy

Academic research on parkour has tended to describe how parkour provides a novel way of interacting with the urban environment that challenges the use and meaning of urban space, metropolitan life, and embodiment.

A newer convention of parkour philosophy has been the idea of "human reclamation". Andy Tran of Urban Evolution clarifies it as "a means of reclaiming what it means to be a human being. It teaches us to move using the natural methods that we should have learned from infancy. It teaches us to touch the world and interact with it, instead of being sheltered by it." Another traceur writes, "It is as much as a part of truly learning the physical art as well as being able to master the movements, it gives you the ability to overcome your fears and pains and reapply this to life as you must be able to control your mind in order to master the art of parkour."

Movement

While there is no official list of "moves" in parkour, the style in which practitioners move often sets them apart from others, and there are a number of movements considered fundamental. Some examples of common movements are:

• Vaulting over obstacles.

• Jumping and landing accurately with the feet on small or narrow obstacles.

• Jumping and landing feet-first on a vertical surface, catching the horizontal top with the hands.

• Using a rolling motion to help absorb impacts from larger drops.

• Running towards a high wall and then jumping and pushing off the wall with a foot to reach the top of the wall.

• Moving from a position hanging from a wall-top or ledge to standing on the top or over to the other side.

 

Military training

Although parkour itself grew out of military obstacle-course training, it has become a separate discipline. After the attention that parkour received following the 2006 film Casino Royale, military forces around the world began looking for ways to incorporate elements from parkour into military training. A physical trainer with the Royal Army Corps trained with parkour practitioners with hopes of teaching some techniques to Corps soldiers. Colorado Parkour began a project to introduce elements from parkour into the U.S. military and one San Diego staff sergeant trained US marines in parkour.