Yea just today I was working on my kong vaults at Sears ((was there for three hours...)) on one of their park benches. The first time I did it, I missed miserably. A couple people giggled. I looked at my knee and saw I busted it up, so I decided it was best to pretend I wasn't in pain XD. Anyhow I did it succesfully the next time and I got an applaud from one of the workers! I laughed, said thanks and went about my business. So I succeeded in getting my first parkour injury and I did my first kong at Sears!!!

This topic did help thank you kindly!

There's no kiddie parks? There's a park right around the corner from me. So it's a two minute jog with tons of stuff to practice on. Search for those. I usually go during the hottest part of the day, because I know no one is going to be there to crowd it up and sit on my konging bench. Luckily it's well shaded!

That's the spirit...I guess...be careful.

Hmm. I certainly understand feeling awkward about training, or, even worse, conditioning by yourself in public (You practice your QM, and everyone is thinking 'Why is this moron walking on all fours?'). The most obvious way to conquer this problem is to be with a group; 5 people vaulting over picnic tables looks (or at least feels) a LOT less stuipid than 1 person vaulting over picnic tables. And, having just returned from the national jam in Denver, I can tell you that being one of a hundred people vaulting and jumping all over the place doesn't feel awkward or embarrassing in the least.

If you're just out practicing by yourself, inexperience will be your biggest problem. I bet you'd feel a lot more embarrassed by people staring at you while you tentatively practice a few monkey vaults over a low fence, than if people were staring at you while you double-konged a picnic table, or nailed a very difficult precision jump / cat leap.

I've found group training to be a starkly different from solo training.  Seems for me, group training focuses more on creativity, finding new paths, and such.  In addition, because I tend to be the drill sergeant of the group, I condition a lot harder in a group, and I end up teaching more than training at my own level as well.  When I train solo, it's more about honing a single technique over and over until I get it.  This is why I feel training in a group and by myself are both important.

I've actually learned to enjoy the double takes and devious stares from people when I condition/train in public.

Oddly enough, you'll notice they do things and have the mentality we do. It's pretty awesome. I saw a kid (no more than 2 years, probably hasn't been walking too long) at Starbucks who would only step on the brown colored tiles, but not the tan ones. So he had to move in different ways and jump from one set to the next. It was cool, and reminded me of myself

i have completely gotten over the embarrassment of training in public places... now im just embarrassed to train with my friend in a public place because he just looks funny doing the stuff