The Alibi of Strengthening, the who, what, when, where, why, and hows of Conditioning.

Who?
Everybody of course! If you are an avid traceur that trains with the intent of continuing to progress for any duration of time, then you should be undergoing some sort of strength and conditioning regimen.

What?
My definition of conditioning is any movement that can be repeated to the point of some type of muscular fatigue without causing short or long term damage to the anatomy (excluding muscular fatigue of course).

Therefore, what movements are considered conditioning will be different for each traceur. One practitioner may be able to repeat a climb-up 15 times, but another may not be able to match that with out feeling pain and discomfort in the wrists and elbows. One practitioner may be able to make repetitions of a 48 inch box-jump followed by a 48 inch drop, but a less able-bodied man or woman may not be able to for risk of acquiring overuse injuries in the ankle and knee.

The key here is to find where you stand in terms of strength, be honest, be smart, and to progress at your own rate.

When?
I see there are two different ways go about when to condition.

Most traceurs set aside a period of time for conditioning, otherwise known as a “conditioning session”. Often times this is the most economic use of our time because we can allot our full attention to strengthening, but I suggest this be done at the end of the training for the simple fact that: fatigue can lead to loss of focus which more likely than not will lead to injury. So condition in this way only when you are feeling funky fresh and 100% focused.

The alternative would be an almost MovNat, or Methode Naturelle inspired style training, where the skill training and strength training are done simultaneously. Often, it is challenging to train this way without a very solid back ground of conditioning. The idea is that the skill work is done simultaneously along side the strength work by way of over loading the muscles through more skill oriented movements in a very safe and controlled manner.

What better way to become stronger at wall runs, than to drill wall runs? What better way to improve muscle ups, than to drill muscle ups? Perhaps, a great way to progress, but a common issue as I have stated before, is that without a very solid base of strength and conditioning there is little room for error, and I’ve gathered that most practioners have a very hard time gauging their boundaries. Therefore, overuse injuries could be commonplace under those circumstances.

Where?
Often, people say to me “O noz i havs no wheres 2 train el oh el X(” and I always retort “If you have an environment, then you can train ways to move through it”. Well, the same goes for strengthening. If you have an environment, then you can find ways to condition yourself with it.

No pull up bar? Use a tree branch or scaffolding. No dumbbells? Use rocks, logs, or hell, even a small child if you obtain their consent(trust me, it‘s not implied). Parallettes? Use protruding parallel roots growing from beneath a tree. Even if all you have is an empty room, you can still use the ground and the walls to perform countless push-up variations.

The point is: be creative. With a little imagination anywhere can have potential for a full body workout.

Why?
As stated before, if you are an avid traceur that plans to continue to progress for any duration of time, then you should be undergoing some sort of strength and conditioning regime. The stress parkour, and related activities such as free running, MovNat/ Methode Naturelle, tricking, ect., will put on your anatomy is great and without a strong body, you will inevitably be injured many times.

I don’t know how many overuse injuries I could name that could have been avoided with proper strength and conditioning. Various forms of tendonitis in the ankle, hip, knee, shoulders, elbow, or wrist could almost 99% of the time be prevented with proper strength and conditioning. Shin splints and stress fractures could have been dealt with in the same manner.

How?
How you strength train should be dependant on your fitness goals. While I do believe you should engage is some GPP (general physical preparedness; think junior high PE class) training, though in my opinion majority of your work should be goal based.

Fortunately, a great guy down at APK has allowed me to link articles from his blog in order to spare myself the hassle of writing a thesis paper on goal-based training and to spare you the hassle of trying to make heads or tails of it.

So, without further ado, lets give a big thanks to Mr. Chris Salvato for making our lives a hell of a lot easier!
http://www.chrissalvato.com/2009/05/fitness-goals-with-high-translation-to-parkour-and-life/

Another article Mr. Salvato has so kindly provided us discusses the importance of intelligent goal setting.
http://www.chrissalvato.com/2009/05/10-common-mistakes-in-acheiving-fitnessperformance-goals/

Well boys and girls, these are my opinions, ideas, and thoughts of the wonderful world of strength and conditioning. I sincerely hope you enjoyed the read:)

Reunions

Gone for a year and what have you to prove? Progression truly shows when you haven’t trained with a group of traceurs in over a year. Strength, technique, object-awareness, and over all open-mindedness. As traceurs our goal is to constantly progress to better ourselves for whatever reason we train. Whether it be fun, to become more efficient, to protect, or a mixture of the three, I think we can all agree that our primary goal is to progress. I would like you reading this piece to put yourself back a year, or a significant amount of time and ask yourself, “Have I progressed?” If you can honestly answer yes than also ask yourself, “How much?”

I recently met up with a group of traceurs I have not had the chance to train with in over a year, at first I remembered how difficult some of their training spots were to me because I was still new to Parkour and had not built up the strength for some of their favorite areas. I was recently able to meet up with these guys a year after our previous session. We had an amazing day of training, but I noticed we had steered down different paths of movement. I watched some stunning acrobatics over flights of stairs and railings, while I was swinging through trees and pulling huge precisions. I felt flattered when a number of the guys were making comments on my stunning progression in a years’ time and asking how I did it. I posed an answer to their questions stating how dedicated I was to my movement and that I hoped it has payed off.

Progression comes with dedication, not only through technique but also through strength training. (Shae and I have an interesting, differing theory that we’re interested in testing but I will talk about in another post.) So what does it meant for someone to stop progressing? Have they given up on something they once loved, or could it be that they are not putting enough effort, and dedication to get to a further stage in their level of movement than before. Progression comes from dedication, and with that idea in mind I once again I pose the question to you,” Have you progressed and what are you doing to further progress?”

-Rand Jordan

Respek...

In my humble opinion, respect is the single most important characteristic a competent traceur should strive to set upon himself. Respecting others is critical to our survival not only as a practitioner of parkour, but as a person. We must respect our fellow man, not necessarily agree with him, or even understand him, but at least have compassion for him and be able to empathize with who he is and what he stands for.

Respecting your law and your law enforcement..

Majority of us, myself included, have trespassed from time to time in order to train, and while I am absolutely not condoning this type of behavior (personally, I believe trespassers are miscreants that deserve to be punished with the full extent of the law, i.e. with bear tazers), but if you happen to be training under these terrible conditions, and you happen to be caught in the act, please, for the sake of all that is parkour, do not run. You are not doing yourself, or the parkour community, any good if you flee the scene.

-You will most likely be pursued.

-You will most likely be caught. No matter how fast you think you are, you are not faster than a police radio. And once you have been caught, the repercussions will be exponentially fiercer than if you were to stay and at least attempt to talk yourself out of the predicament.

Basically you will be tarnishing the good name of parkour many of us have fought tooth and nail to preserve. We’re relatively new here, and we don’t need to be associated with vandals and “runners”. Our discipline may be heavily influenced by the thrill of the chase, but not at the expense of our reputation. First impressions are hard to break, especially bad ones. So if you just respect the law and the men and women in blue who enforce those laws you will be doing yourself and the parkour community a big favor.

Also note that I am using the term trespassing as training somewhere we may not be wanted. Most times common sense could be exercised to avoid potential problems.

Respect your fellow traceur.

The second we stop to examine ourselves and come to the conclusion that as a human being we are “good enough”, then we will cease to progress, we will cease to grow. I believe that everyone in this world has something they can learn from everyone regardless of experience, age, or gender. So don’t let your ego stand in the way of the opportunity to be nourished with the knowledge of those around you and to be inspired by their experiences.

Respect your environment.

I like to think that we are allowed to train by our community. The park benches, stairs, and railings we handle on a regular basis are not designed to be jumped from, crawled upon, or shimmied across- especially under the repetitive stress our discipline may call for. I can understand the community looking down on our practice, so that means the 90% of the time when passersby do not scold us for hopping to and fro, thay should be allotted our utmost respect by leaving our places of play cleaner than when we found them or even just a simple "hello" and a smile when a parkour muggle meanders by.

Respect yourself.

One of the biggest incivilities I have seen many wayward traceurs commit to their person is falling under the influence of peer pressure. The desire to impress those around us can set us off of our path. When we show off, we do not have our body's best interest in mind, instead we feel that we must please the crowd with death-defying leaps that can be traumatic for our anatomy.

Before we can respect others, we must come to terms with our own person. If we can’t understand our innermost feelings and motivations, and we can’t have concern for our own well being, then how can we expect to empathize with our fellow man’s feelings, motivations, and well being? This intrapersonal respect needs to encompass both our physical and mental self.

I hope you can be enlightened by my thoughts about the quality of respect and the importance it could, and should play in our roles as a traceur and as a person.