- Plyometric Push-Ups – Assume the standard push-up position. Lower your body to the ground. With explosive force, push off the ground so your hands leave the floor. If you can, try to clap your hands mid-air.
- Calf Raises – In parkour, the ankles suffer from serious impact. Strengthen the muscles around your ankles to stave off serious injury. Stand on a step with your heels hanging in mid-air. Rise onto your toes, hold for two seconds, then lower to the starting position.
- Squat Hops – Beginning at the bottom of a set of stairs, stand with your feet shoulder-width apart. Drop into a full squat, then jump, landing on the first step ahead of you. Continue this pattern up the stairs.
Is it Parkour or Free Running? Free running is almost identical to parkour, except free runners employ acrobatics, flips, and spins when they’re navigating obstacles. While parkour is often defined by the efficiency of movement, free running is more often seen as a form of expression. As each discipline evolves, the line between parkour and free running grows thinner.
Parkour Here Parkour is an urban-based discipline designed to be adaptable to any streetscape, so in theory, you can practice parkour just about anywhere. But there’s been a movement in recent years to build parkour-specific parks with features designed specifically for practicing jumps, vaults, landings, and wall runs. Parks are rumored to be in the works in Texas and Seattle, and Kyle Brannon, a 19-year-old college student living west of Atlanta, is working diligently to build the first parkour-specific park in the Southeast. Brannon has managed to navigate the red tape of county politics and is now seeking funds to build the park, which will be located in Deer Lick Park in Douglasville. The park will have a range of modular obstacles like balance beams, vault boxes, and scaffold bars.
“It’s going to replicate the urban environment while having the ability to be rearranged for any sort of maneuver,” Brannon says.
Meanwhile, D.C. has emerged as the hub of parkour on the East Coast, especially Gateway Park and Meridian Hill. And virtually all college campuses are ideal for parkour, says Mederos. “Anywhere you can find an abundance of railings, walls, ramps, and stairs makes for a good training spot, and colleges are jam-packed.”
When Zombies Attack Survive Alexandria is a massive game of zombie tag staged by Salil Maniktahla where a large pool of runners move from one station to the next. At each station, you get your hand stamped. Meanwhile, a smaller pool of “zombies” are chasing you down. If you get tagged by a zombie, you become a zombie yourself.
