Maclean's magazine in digital format gets emailed to me every week- I don't always read them, mostly I just skim the headlines and look at the pretty pictures. Today i hit the jackpot- and I'm talking a dollar machine max bet jackpot. I was skimming along, about to close the ezine and move to something less Macleansy when i realized i had landed on something that might actually be readable. The headline wasn't very catchy "getting a jump on things", even the picture wasn't THAT cool, but something had piqued my interest so i decided to read anyways. The sub heading read "hopping from rooftops, scaling walls and fences- it's all part of the ever growing popularity of parkour". When i got to the part where the article mentioned that parkour is a global phenomenon with practitioners in every major Canadian City I abandoned the article and hit up google. My search for "Vancouver Parkour" produced this video:
So obviously I'm now totally sold on the idea of parkour. I imagine you are too. Maybe not, maybe you think it's stupid, but that would be wrong and you should probably jump on the bandwagon. I don't think it's necessarily an activity meant for me personally, but the idea of being a fan of parkour appeals to me. Let's see what wikipedia has to say:
Parkour (sometimes abbreviated to PK) is a utilitarian discipline based upon the successful, swift and energy-efficient traversing of one's surrounding environment via the practical application of techniques, based around the concept of self-preservation and the ability to help others. It is a non-competitive, physical discipline of French origin in which participants run along a route, attempting to negotiate obstacles in the most efficient way possible, using only their bodies. Skills such as jumping, climbing, vaulting, rolling, swinging and wall scaling are employed. Parkour can be practiced anywhere, but areas dense with obstacles are preferable, and it is most commonly practiced in urban areas. The usage and employment of flips into the named route does not constitute parkour.
A practitioner of parkour is called a traceur, which is most likely derived from Parisian slang tracer which means "to hurry" or "to move quickly".
Two primary characteristics of parkour are efficiency and speed. Traceurs take the most direct path through an obstacle as rapidly as that route can be traversed safely. Developing one's level of spatial awareness is often used to aid development in these areas. Also, efficiency involves avoiding injuries, both short and long term. This idea embodying parkour's unofficial motto is être et durer ("to be and to last").
Still not sold yet? I guess i gotta bring out the big guns. Let me share my most awesome PK research find, a clip from The Office:
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