Parkour

Parkour (French: [paʁkuʁ]) is a self-led movement practice where practitioners use only the abilities of their bodies to interact with obstacles in any given environment. With roots in military obstacle course training and martial arts, parkour includes flipping, running, climbing, swinging, vaulting, jumping, plyometrics, rolling, and whatever is suitable for a given situation. Parkour is an activity that can be practiced alone or with others, and is usually carried out in urban spaces, though it can be done anywhere. It involves seeing one's environment in a new way, and envisioning the potential for navigating it by movement around, across, through, over and under its features. Historically, flips and other acrobatic movements were not considered essential to the discipline of parkour, and the term freerunning was applied to parkour-like movement that emphasized artistry rather than efficiency. However, as the parkour culture evolved, its distinction from freerunning became increasingly blurred. Parkour athletes now broadly agree that flips are unambiguously part of parkour. The practice of similar movements had existed in communities around the world for centuries, notably in Africa and China, the latter tradition (qinggong) popularized by Hong Kong action cinema (notably Jackie Chan) during the 1970s to 1980s. The label of Parkour in reference to this kind of movement was established by David Belle when he and others founded the Yamakasi in the 1990s. The discipline was popularised in the 1990s and 2000s through films, documentaries, video games, and advertisements. Competitive parkour began to grow in popularity during the mid-2000s, and today, several disjoint organizations produce competitions under the title of Parkour World Championships.