American Parkour

I think I found a way of improving my precision jump landings.  I really push my butt backwards just prior to landing, kind of like I am trying to knock over someone standing right behind me with my butt.  It really takes the pressure off of my patellar tendons.

This movement doesn't feel natural for me.  But if I don't concentrate on my landings, I naturally land with my weight too far forward, which makes my patellar tendons hurt.

I've never heard anyone describe doing it this way, so I want to confirm this is a good idea.  Any opinions?

Tuesday, 27 July 2010, the regular 6:30 PM Tuesday Night Parkour Jam of DC Metro Parkour will be held at Gateway Park, Rosslyn, VA: http://bit.ly/dcpkgateway.

Pictures and videos will be linked here afterwards.

Reply if you plan to be there!

If you're keeping a training log and your a DC Metro area traceur/traceuse, reply here with a link to your training log.  We can follow each others' progress.

Here is mine:
http://www.americanparkour.com/smf/index.php/topic,18502.0.html

Date of Injury: 8 July 2010
Time of injury: 18:30
Your DOB and age: June 1964 - 46 y/o
Name: Timothy Chen Allen
City, State: Washington, DC
# years practicing Parkour / Freerunning: 13 months
Hours of training per week: 5 hours/week
Other exercise / fitness experience: Ultramarathoning (currently training for 46 miler)
Location where injury occurred: Guy Mason Playground, Glover Park, Washington, DC
Conditions of location: Very hot, humid, but ground was dry
What you were doing / trying to do when injury occurred?: Speed vault repetitions
Were any other people involved?: No
Part of body  - description of injury, rating of severity 1-10: (I believe severity was 2 out of 10) I caught the bench I was speed vaulting with my left foot.  I was wearing FiveFingers.  It hurt like a stubbed toe, and the pain subsided quickly.  I walked home. On removing the shoe, the toe, which normally angles inward, was angled outward.  It didn't hurt, except on the interior part that had impacted the bench.  The toe could move in normal angles with no pain, except everything was swollen and that impeded movement some.
Did you see a doctor for diagnosis? My wife, who is a former nurse, taped it to the next toe.  This morning when we took off the tape, the toe had straightened out.  It still hurts where I hit the bench.
Did you get X-rays or MRI's? No
Picture of the injury (photo modified to show bruised area and pain squiggles)

Could you / how could you have avoided the injury? I was tired and already making mistakes. I should have stopped sooner.
Date / type / severity of your last injury? Previously ran knee into wall doing kongs. Similarly, I was tired and making mistakes.
Notes on the experience? I'm an old guy and should know better than to keep training when I'm tired.

Hey Fellow Old Farts (I'm 46 so I get to say that),

Let's post our training logs here so we can follow each other and encourage each others' efforts.  Here's mine:
http://www.americanparkour.com/smf/index.php/topic,18502.0.html

Enjoy.

Just something I'm curious about: I've noticed that every profile on APK has a "Position", like "patas", "Guenons", "Oryctolagus cuniculus", "Hirundo rustica"... what is that?  Does it change?  Does it mean anything at all?

I turn 46 tomorrow!  It's been almost exactly a year since I started parkour training.  It's going pretty well-- the main thing I've learned is that consistency is king.  In this year, I have had some months when I really worked a lot, and it really showed.  And then some months where I didn't train at all-- and that really showed.

My commitment this year is to train regularly.  I have been going out for thirty minute sessions almost every day this month.  I'm finding that once I get started, it's easy to think to continue.

(This related to http://www.americanparkour.com/smf/index.php?topic=9919.0.  I tried to find something like this but couldn't)

We just had a small side conversation on this in http://www.americanparkour.com/smf/index.php?topic=19922.0.  The idea of using the term "to trace" came up.  I like it, and here's why: 

• It's efficient; it's a nice way to get from point A to point B.
• It honors the term "Traceur".
• It doesn't sound awful like "to parkour" (urgh).
• And it's a pre-made English verb that we already know how to use.

Current	Proposed
I was practicing parkour the other day...	I was tracing the other day...
Would you have done that had you been practicing parkour?	Would you have done that had you been tracing?
I ask that he not practice parkour here.	I ask that he not trace here.

Discussion?

Location: Oyster School playground
Duration: 30 minutes
I mostly was trying to figure out what I could do in this space.

• I started out with some backwards and forwards QM.
• Then I tried some rail QMs, which mainly worked out to be me putting both hands and one foot on the rail and one in the air and trying to hold steady for as long as I could.
• I also did some sideways squat walking.  THIGHS-O-FLAMES!
• I tried a couple of lazy vaults on the same rail, but it didn't work out very well.
• After that I did precision jumps up and down a flight of stairs.  I did about five or six flights.
• I moved over to a wall and did cat traverses on the wall for a while.  These killed me.  Very hard.
• I did rolls whenever I could.  I think I've figured out how to do a decent roll, because these have stopped hurting my back as much.
• I tried doing some wall runs.  They have a wall that decreases in height.  I got my hand to the top of the lowest part of the wall.
• I did some mule kicks to hop to the top of a wall.  These went better than last time.
• I did some top ups from a cat hang.  These were awful.  We hates them forever!  

A lovely workout, life-affirming, really.