Train Hard - Stay Humble

All Blog Posts (154)

Anterior knee pain syndrome and "Chondromalacia Patellae"

I was looking forward to my first blog post being something REALLY inspirational, or retrospective, or biographical, but I guess -as ironical as it is, given my screen name- it's going to be about a minor, yet bothering injury; and about it's assessment, treatment and prevention...

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A recent blow to my left knee, which also caused a short, deep cut (treated with… Continue

Added by SafeNSure on November 16, 2008 at 12:00am — 13 Comments

passes not vaults, and center of gravity t-shirts

The idea that kongs (and most other vaults, but especially kongs) are actually quadrupedal movement has been knocking around in my head for the last few weeks. I've been meaning to write something more stodgy and authoritative sounding, but since I've been too busy to do so I'm just going to throw it out there. The idea occurred to me when I was working on double kongs because the way I gained confidence in my arms was to bend forward and fall or jump onto them and feel how they supported my… Continue

Added by Seng on November 12, 2008 at 2:00am — 16 Comments

I do all my own stunts.

So I've been seeing these shirts around school, and suddenly inspiration hit me. We do do our own stunts; those guys have nothing on us. And we're probably safer doing it too. :D

I came back home and made this design; I think it'd look cool on a tshirt. (image may take some time to load, the full size is pretty big)…

Continue

Added by Fyrel on October 31, 2008 at 5:30pm — 45 Comments

Safe to work out while sore?

Yeah, so I'm experiencing that whole sore-all-over-my-body thing going on. I had this to a lesser degree during my first meet-up with some of the South Bay'ers the previous weekend, and to a much greater extent this weekend. The thing that worries me isn't that I'm injuring myself so much as the feeling that I shouldn't work out or run much until I'm recovered, leading to a slow and somewhat painful conditioning routine week in and week out. I'm worried that I'm not conditioning progressively… Continue

Added by BrodyB on October 27, 2008 at 5:01pm — 7 Comments

GREAT SUCCESS - Finally Kong Vaulted a Picnic Table

FINALLY, i managed to kong vault a picnic table width-wise. I am pretty happy about this accomplishment (konging a picnic table is commonly known as the beginning steps to a true kong) so i just thought i would sorta brag :) . I also want to reiterate a very important point in parkour, progression. It took me around a full hour of just planting my feet at the edge of the table and jumping off before i was confident in my abilities to clear the table. progressing from landing and jumping off to… Continue

Added by kingtheking on October 20, 2008 at 9:42pm — 9 Comments

NY Times Feature about Women and Parkour

here's a little something you guys, or ladies more particularly, could find interesting ^^

VIDEO

Added by Frenchie on October 12, 2008 at 12:00pm — No Comments

Burning Man Parkour

After years of people telling me I should go, I finally went to Burning Man this year. Now that I'm back, I can safely say that it was one of the most incredible experiences of my life.

For those unfamiliar with the event, it's basically a place where human ingenuity and creativity go to flourish in the desert for a week, then fade back into dust until next year. This massive amalgamation of people (almost 50,000 this year) is called Black Rock City. The most… Continue

Added by Bio on September 9, 2008 at 2:02am — 13 Comments

Schools cracking down? lol

Junior year is starting for me. It is getting harder and harder to find time to train and progress. I worked hard over the weekend so i could take a day off of summer homework and do some training. I went down to the school down my hill and was working on a kong vault by practicing over a picnic table. after a couple of minutes i was just bouncing off the end of the table. i went back to my starting position totally ready to clear the table when i hear a loud and angry "HEY!". Right before i… Continue

Added by kingtheking on August 18, 2008 at 9:26pm — 8 Comments

LCHS Conditioning 6 (upper body especially back)

August 12

I arrived late so I just jumped in to the pull ups they were doing. After a painful spasm in a shoulder muscle during the wide-arm pull ups I realized I'd forgotten to stretch. ALWAYS stretch. Always. With the different pull ups I did what I could, still not able to go from a dead hang yet. But I followed the reps. It all works towards building it up... That's probably what I learned most this summer: do what you can even if it's pretty pathetic, because over time that's… Continue

Added by orem on August 16, 2008 at 10:30pm — 7 Comments

Tutorial & Conditioning Videos

Found a great set of conditioning and tutorial videos.

Added by technique on August 13, 2008 at 3:02pm — 1 Comment

UCLA 9

August 9

Good news: I've surely improved. Bad news: not hit my goal yet. At least in this certain obstacle :P

Basically I can grip the top of the med center wall every single time now, but when I try to hold on all that happens is I lose skin. I even hung there for a second once. But inside my hand little bites of flesh were disappearing and I finally quit for the day so I'd have energy to do other things and hands that weren't too sore. This means I only have one more… Continue

Added by orem on August 12, 2008 at 4:30pm — 3 Comments

Vancouver Parkour

Just finished my third and final day of parkour with the Vancouver parkour group. As with the SF group, I get completely schooled.

Every session starts with an hour of conditioning. Parkour conditioning is broken down into its fundamentals - running, climbing, jumping, and quads (crawling). Typical workouts start with some group form of stretches, pushups, jump (tucks, or box), a long duck walk (400m), or crawl, and balance training. Then it's off to the different… Continue

Added by technique on August 10, 2008 at 9:25pm — 4 Comments

Gym time (welcome home)

August 7

Thursday, gym day, into August already..... I'll be back in two weeks or so....

I didn't really do much over my vacation, so I was looking forward to having my butt kicked. Rickroll and I were at the mercy of Cliff and Kerris this time. Ten burpies to start, then Kerris led us in something new.

"Jog in place. High knees right now let's go. Good. No, higher. Alright, now on my count, when I say, 'ONE' you guys are gonna drop to the ground and do one push up… Continue

Added by orem on August 8, 2008 at 3:00am — 3 Comments

Eh

July 26

UCLA, but nothing to note of this one :P Did a few conditioning courses in the beginning with King, but besides that, I kind just hung around. Maybe it was because my upper body was sore from Thursday or because we were skipping most of my favorite spots, but I wasn't feeling very parkoury. Between Huntington Beach, LCHS, and the gym, I didn't feel guilty for taking a light day on Saturday. Worked on running precisions and enjoyed the atmosphere.

In other… Continue

Added by orem on August 1, 2008 at 9:54pm — No Comments

And you may ask yourself, "Well, how did I get here?"

I've forgotten what and when exactly my first exposure to parkour was, but it was years ago. I have a faint memory of seeing it on TV; it might have been a small document on CNN, or a special feature in some movie or other that featured parkour stunts. What I remember is a small group of traceurs moving from Point A to Point B in a parking garage, vaulting, but in a very chill and deliberate fashion.

There might have been the occasional brush of awareness after that, but the next big… Continue

Added by Scop on August 1, 2008 at 9:30pm — 2 Comments

Knees

I must be doing something wrong. My knees hurt just a twinge when landing today, on a couple practice precisions. Hope it's better by Sunday. Any recommendations? Ice, calcium, glucosamine, softer landings?

Added by technique on July 31, 2008 at 4:43pm — 4 Comments

Changed name...

From Jason to technique. To reflect my lack of. Technique, that is, not Jason.

Added by technique on July 27, 2008 at 5:00pm — 1 Comment

First Week (and a half)!

Started with the Wednesday Acrosports Parkour Group on the 16th, and hurt with soreness about 5 days after that - trained on Sunday at GWHS, Tuesday at Sloat and Wednesday at Acrosports again. If I can get running in 3-4 days a week, and parkour 3 days a week (those are the only training sessions, right?), I'll progress fairly nicely.

I want to get a powershot for before (now), while I'm still hilariously clumsy and after ( six - 12 months of training) vids.

Starting at… Continue

Added by technique on July 27, 2008 at 8:00am — 1 Comment

Guinea pig

July 24

Thursday. Gym day. It'd been a few weeks, and I missed dropping by. Cliff said tonight would be a short, intense workout, and I was looking forward to it since I hadn't gotten sore at all from last night's session, so I figured I'd be good to go.

I got there just as the class was cooling down, and afterwards one of the guys from the class (Jason? Jordan?) wanted to do the workout too. So then Cliff pulls out an actual list....

Five burpies to warm up.… Continue

Added by orem on July 25, 2008 at 4:30am — 3 Comments

LCHS Conditioning 5 (stealth)

July 23

Taylor is a dirty liar. Hardly a complaint, just a statement. The newbies we were training with may think otherwise though..

"Not vigorous my butt! I thought today was supposed to be easy."

Taylor shrugged and continued watching us.

"Okay, now when you get over here, sprint to the other stairs and cat crawl down those," he told me before leaving to do so himself. "Right..." I exhaled. I took a minute to catch my breath and watched Roy and Alan doing the… Continue

Added by orem on July 24, 2008 at 2:53pm — No Comments