Matrix Code - Le Parkour: "Freerunning"

OK well I'll add a link to a very famous Pk site called urban freeflow.

[URL=http://www.urbanfreeflow.com[/URL]

History: The Birth of (a) Movement
By Dan Edwardes

Trying to pinpoint the exact moment of the birth of Parkour is no easy task. In fact, it may actually prove to be an impossibility. Something as nebulous and indefinable as this thing we practise tends to defy classification. Already it boasts several names, in more than one language: Le Parkour, the Art of Movement, Freerunning, L’Art du Deplacement, to name but a few. And even if you do settle on a name, there is then the tricky little problem of what that name refers to – Is it a sport? Or an art? Or a philosophy perhaps? Or maybe it is better termed a discipline?

Truth is, there is no consensus on this. And, which really hefts a giant spanner into the works, you can’t just go and ask the founding father because this great movement is pretty damn far from being a nuclear family, 2.4 kids and all the rest. No. This child has had a whole host of surrogate step-parents influencing its development down through the years, the centuries, indeed even through the millenia. It has drawn on many sources, supped on inspiration from all over, and drunk from a hundred different cups as it has evolved – and by no means is this process over. The arrival of Freestyle Parkour makes it powerfully evident that this is one mutant gene whose mutating has yet to run its course.

So where do we start in an attempt to get a grip on all this? Not at the beginning, because the gods only know where that was. Not at the end, because that isn’t even in sight. Seems the best we can do is to start somewhere in the middle, and give credit where it’s due to a certain little town in France.

The French Connection

To the south of Paris rests the sleepy, suburban town of Lisses, a place no different from any other of the hundreds of satellites orbiting the French capital, save for one small fact: Lisses was home to one David Belle, the man who is widely acknowledged as having crystallized a number of influences to create Parkour in its modern guise, sometime in the 1980s.

One of those influences that inspired David to explore the urban-rural environment in entirely new ways throughout his childhood was his father, Raymond Belle. In fact, the term ‘Parkour’ is perhaps indirectly attributable to Raymond Belle, who introduced his son to the military training methods of Georges Hebert, a man who had a powerful influence on the development of physical education in France, particularly in military circles, by creating the parcours du combattant; the obstacle course. From parcours, meaning ‘course’, came the altered Parkour, for which David acknowledges his friend Hubert Kounde as having coined.

The senior Belle had trained using Hebert's methode naturelle whilst in the French military. Hebert’s methods were inspired by the natural, physical conditioning of indigenous peoples from Africa in particular, and this is still noticeable in the practise of modern parkour; many practitioners talk of the importance of freeing one’s natural instincts, of stripping away conditioning and returning to an innate, effortless way of moving that utilises the entire body as a whole rather than consciously employing isolated muscle groups. The elusive ‘flow state’.

The influence of David's father was more than just an introduction to Hebertism however; he also instilled in his son the roots of what would go on to become the philosophy of Parkour. Sebastien Foucan - who trained with David Belle during the critical birthing period of Parkour and who also affected the art’s development – speaks of how Raymond Belle encouraged them both to better themselves, stating that with dedication they could reach their dreams.

'He spoke like you don't have limits...it's very important for me, this kind of vision', Sebastien has said. He goes on to detail how Raymond Belle encouraged them to develop themselves and constantly improve. ‘He tried to explain to us, “You can do what you want if you train seriously, if you have a good discipline, if you have time, if you have moderation, if you have determination.”’

It is important to recognize that Foucan and Belle, though central to its ongoing development, were not the only practitioners of the art even at this early stage. Parkour was nurtured into being by a larger group of individuals, including Yahn Hnautra, David Malgogne and Frederic Hnautra among others, all of whom contributed to the art in its embryonic stage.

It was when they learnt to take their childhood games seriously and develop their skills that this group began to outline what would become, within two decades, a global movement. From children playing in order to alleviate their boredom they developed into teenagers with a goal in mind, a sense of purpose and inspiration taken from many sources, including the philosophy of Taoism via the works of Bruce Lee, the acrobatic antics found in Jackie Chan movies, and perhaps even the urban shamanism of the wild man of Paris, Don Jean Haberey. But at its core, Parkour was essentially a childhood game that simply grew to maturity alongside its creators.

According to Foucan, the start of the ‘big jumps’ came at around age fifteen. They began to develop and refine a fundamental set of movements: vaults, jumps, climbs, rolls. They taught themselves to be athletes, moving through their environment in a way never before seen in an urban setting. Obviously it is these ‘big jumps’ that have grabbed the attention of the world’s media and mainstream consciousness, though all experienced practitioners are quick to play down the significance of the more spectacular aspects of Parkour.

Parkour is by nature, however, a visually stunning activity, especially when displayed by those of the skill and power of Belle, Vigroux and Foucan. Outside interest was inevitable. As the reputation of the original practitioners spread, more came to join them and to learn, and beyond these – also predictably – came those who saw the potential Parkour possessed, as a money making machine.

Showtime…

Ultimately it was this swell in interest that was to cause the first splits in Parkour: between those that embraced opportunity – Besson’s 2001 film Yamakasi: Les samouraïs des temps modernes, for example, starring the group of the same name (and originally a group formed by Belle and Foucan), is a famous reference point in the split – and those that spurned this sudden interest, most prominently David Belle himself, perhaps out of a desire not to engage in what they saw as prostitution of the art.

The interest after Luc Besson’s film was less than perfect: two deaths were attributed to copycat behaviour, and much of the growing interest was less than true to the art proper. Sebastien Foucan describes the attitude of much of the post-film interest: ‘After Yamakasi it’s another kind of people, it’s just “I jump I jump I jump, just like the movie, I’m on the roof, just like the movie”.’

Following the split, the originators coined the term traceur to refer to themselves: Traceur means ‘bullet’ and was chosen because of the emphasis Belle and Foucan put on achieving direct, efficient and fast movement over any terrain. Understandably, they developed a somewhat sceptical view of many of the newcomers to the discipline; those who displayed a genuine interest they continued to welcome of course, but not those who were drawn to the spectacle, looking only for the next adrenaline rush.

But whatever negative repercussions came about as a result of Yamakasi, the movie also catapulted the movements of Parkour into the public consciousness. The art was introduced to the British public first by a BBC advert of the same year, dubbed ‘Rush Hour’ and starring David Belle as an innovative commuter who chooses to find an alternate route home via the rooftops of London in order to avoid the crush of people on the streets below.

Parkour had stepped onto the global stage, and business was about to pick up.

Jump!

Though Parkour had been displayed in the media, still it had not been explained. In some parts of the world, people even wrongly referred to the discipline itself as ‘Yamakasi’! Misunderstanding was rife. But an undercurrent of excitement had developed, a desire to see more of the dynamism and joie de vivre that Parkour exhibits, and small groups of people quietly took up the practise of the art from the little they had seen of it. One such group was the London-based Urban Freeflow, who would have their own impact upon the world of Parkour in due course.

However, it was not until 2003 that an accurate insight into the depths of the art was released for public consumption when the UK’s Channel 4 produced a groundbreaking and award-winning documentary entitled Jump London, featuring Foucan and two colleagues unleashing their skills upon an unsuspecting London cityscape. This was the tipping-point, as Foucan conveyed the philosophical aspects of Parkour side-by-side with the physical brilliance, at last providing the wider public with a handle on the fast-emerging discipline.

The response was telling. Groups of practitioners, also known as ‘clans’ or ‘crews’, sprang up everywhere and the term ‘freerunning’ seeped into the mainstream vocabulary. Due in no small part to being the title-location for Jump London, the UK’s capital city fast became a hotbed of activity and a focal point for the nascent Freerunning community. At the centre of this activity stood Urban Freeflow, a small group of dedicated practitioners that had come together in early 2003 to train and to spread the word. The internet forum they established on February 10th of that year has gone on to become the world’s largest community for the art, boasting over eleven thousand members and acting as a major powerhouse driving the movement ever onwards.

As the skills of the central members of Urban Freeflow, who in 2004 chose the name Seidojin (a Japanese term meaning ‘People of the Way of Silence’), developed so another milestone was reached when they united with Foucan and Jerome Ben-Aoues to star in the hugely successful documentary sequel, Jump Britain. First aired in January 2005, this was the dam-breaker for Parkour, cementing its position as a recognized and valid sport/art for the modern age. Through the Jump series, Parkour had quite literally leapt into the spotlight. Yet there was one more giant stride still to come.

Freestyle Parkour: The Re-Birth of (a) Movement

Parkour, as we have seen, is not something easily categorized. Perhaps inevitably however, as the community grew and numbers swelled, attempts to define and classify became commonplace. By nature an art that encourages freedom of movement and individual expression, it is difficult – if not impossible – to formalise a structured system that contains it whilst at the same time allowing for the subjective approaches of its practitioners. Matters were further complicated by the simple fact that David Belle – acknowledged as the guru of Parkour – chose at first not to release any succinct and clear definition for others to refer to, and so the debates raged and schisms between the different perspectives ensued.

As a result of the ongoing ambiguity and the back-and-forth arguments as to what one could or could not do in the practice of Parkour (To Flip or Not To Flip, that was the question…), Urban Freeflow in the Spring of 2005 decided to take a rather radical step. Fed up with the politics, the restrictions, and the meaningless theoretical disputes, they searched for a way to put the ‘free’ back into ‘free-running’; to recapture the liberating, vitalising energy they had first been attracted to in the early footage of Belle, Foucan et al.

The solution they found was dubbed Freestyle Parkour – an art that promotes absolute freedom of movement, putting the emphasis back on the individual and underscoring the truth that uniform systems create uniform people and stifle creativity. If acrobatics and somersaults midway through a run float your boat, fire away. If you simply crave balancing and precarious precision jumps, dive in. If vault variations set your pulse racing, feel free to experiment. Freestyle Parkour, they say, is what happens when the unlimited individual meets the limitless possibilities found in free-running.

For many budding free-runners, the vehicle of Freestyle Parkour was exactly what they were looking for in their search for unrestricted movement. However, Seidojin’s own personal training – and always the core of their practice – is still based around the fundamental principles of Parkour as passed on by David Belle, Stephane Vigroux, Sebastien Foucan, etc. Now Urban Freeflow views Freestyle Parkour as the performance element of the discipline they practise, as the visually stunning acrobatics and aerial movements that can be incorporated into the fluidity of Parkour have an aesthetic appeal which cannot be denied.

Urban Freeflow are keen to impress upon people that while Freestyle Parkour was a term intended to liberate and open up the scene for everyone to enjoy in whatever way they please, it is just a term. Their view is that communication requires the use of some accepted terminology – but what is actually being communicated is far more important than the vehicle.

Moving swiftly on…

So what does the future hold? Who knows?! And that’s the beauty of it.

The movement is still relatively young (or as old as sin, depending on how you look at it!), and where it goes from here is very much in the hands of the people who live and breathe it – the practising community and its spokespeople. Urban Freeflow has a number of projects on the go, constantly breaking new ground for Parkour; David Belle has recently established the Parkour Worldwide Association (PAWA) and is currently planning a world tour to help spread the art even further; and active and growing communities of freerunners have appeared all over the world, from Brazil to Japan, from Finland to Australia, from Russia to Canada.

In its fairly short public lifespan to date there has been enormous interest from a host of large corporations, both media and commercial, and this will only continue as the art gets more airtime (or should that be hangtime..?). Movies, ads, sponsors, public events, shows, workshops, academies, Parkour parks, training centres, even (shock horror!) competitions – all these are either out there already or are currently being planned.

In short, Parkour is here to stay: it isn’t going anywhere.

Or rather, it’s going everywhere.