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About a year ago I started my journey through parkour. To be honest, the only reason I really embraced it was because I thought it looked cool and I wanted to be able to bust out some flips when the chicks were around, but boy! My appreciations and feelings have greatly changed. Throughout my progression, I started to notice a change my in philosophy, as soon as I joined some forums. Hearing others speak about parkour not only as a movement but as a way of life. This idea changes my entire perspective. Parkour is about your journey, your individual progression as a traceur. As I stated above the ideals of parkour as a life style were posed by members of various communities, I did not wait to hear they're exact views on parkour, but I did incorporate the idea as a whole. It is extremely important as a practitioner to find your own path through movement, it is your body and you are in control. Hopefully, you are not shutting out all the possible constructive criticism from other traceurs, but don't follow someones lead blindly. I would also like this article to explain how I feel about the arguing amongst traceurs about the definitions of Parkour, Freerunning, and all of the hybrids of the two. When I see threads on forums or hear conversations between traceurs, on which discipline is better. It sincerely aggravates me, because these disciplines we practice all include they're similar and separate philosophies, studies of movement and ways finding to finding the true capability of the human body when it is pushed to its highest capacity or furthest limit. I ask you to look at young children, many people compare they freedom of movement we enjoyed as kids to what we practice and train every day as grown or growing men and women. Children have not defined they're movement, they don't argue about what is the better thing to do, besides the occasional fight about who is "it" first in hide'n'seek. Why is there a need by adults to define and isolate what it is that strive to get better at? Some people just down write love controversy, I know plenty of people who will get in an argument just for the sake of arguing, and in my eyes that is not what parkour is about. These two disciplines of movement are still young, there is still a wave of media attention that will come and with that swarm of attention comes misconceptions that these disciplines will struggle to grow through unless united as one group of practitioners, rather than fractured groups with grudges against each other. Which is why, we should grow as one in the same. In parkour and freerunning we train together through movement, we both are a part of a physical discipline that requires constant attention and progression. So when needed, we traceurs are capable of pushing ourselves above and beyond the nature call of duty.

Salutations!

Hey! I'm Rand. I have been training Parkour for about almost a year, Coming up the first of May. I am considered a "Purist" because I leave flips and acrobatics out of my training routine (I'm sure as I blog more you will hear what my philosophies are more in-depth).

I train out of Dallas, Texas. I am 16 years old, I am a member of texasparkour.com and that website holds some truly great information for beginners and experts alike. I love parkour, and the nessecary conditioning that goes hand-in-hand with it. I hope this blog will show our true feelings and beliefs about parkour to the reader and maybe even open some eyes to new ideals.

~Rand

I am Shae.

My name is Shae, but you can call me Shae. I am interested in human movement. Whether it be efficient of for fun, I like it all, and I give it a blanket name of Parkour.

I have been practicing the discipline of Parkour for a little over 2 years now, the whole time striving to better myself. I work to strengthen my body as well as my mind.

This blog has been created by Randall and myself to share training ideas, philosophies, and our opinions surrounding the discipline of Parkour.