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| Blue
Devil |
I look
up at Paul - or 'Blue Devil' as a lot of people know him - as he
stands with his back to me on top of the 8 foot wall in the middle
of St Chad's Circus. "You ready?" he asks. Looking up
at him through the lens of my camera, I check that everything is
in focus and give him the go ahead.
Paul
crouches briefly before nailing a 180 backflip onto the concrete
below. "Nice, mate, very nice. That's gonna look sweet,"
I tell him. Paul grins and we grab our bags and wander round the
corner to some rails to drill some vaults.
Birmingham's
Traceurs
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| Sticky |
'Le
parkour' has been growing at a rapid rate in the UK over the course
of the last year and as the summer kicks in, it's set to go huge.
Birmingham is experiencing the growth first-hand, with the largest
collection of 'traceurs' - those who practice parkour - in any city
outside of London.
If
you're not familiar with the Channel 4 documentary 'Jump London',
parkour is considered by a lot of us to be an art, more than an
urban extreme sport. Moving from A to B with style and fluidity
using everything around you probably describes it best, drawing
on martial arts, gymnastics, skate boarding, inline skating and
break dancing.
Deedi
is a regular in Birmingham city centre. Hailing from Wolverhampton,
he likes to hit a few of the traceurs' favourite Birmingham spots
for a bit of variety.
Parkour
crews
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| Deedi |
At
6'5 and an ex-high jumper and basketball player, he has a natural
ability and, like most of the Birmingham crew, discovered parkour
through www.urbanfreeflow.com, and turned up at one of the jams
organized by its members through the site. "I used to enjoy
the high jump but it wasn't enough," he tells me. "Jumping
over a bar isn't creative and parkour challenges me to do something
different every time."
Around
15 years ago in a little-known suburb of Paris, a few schoolboys
used to challenge themselves to do tricks around the local architecture.
Through websites, a couple of television adverts the scene in the
UK was progressing steadily and then exploded with the showing of
Channel 4's 'Jump London'.
Following
this documentary on France's leading traceurs displaying their skills
around some of London's most iconic architecture, Urban Freeflow
saw its membership on its message board soar from 250 members to
over a thousand in the space of a few weeks.
Parkour
has always been mindful of safety and the potential for people to
try and emulate some of the moves and cause themselves injury has
had an influence on the way in which it has developed. The organization
of four indoor training days by Urban Freeflow - partly to compensate
for the British winter weather and partly to provide a safe training
environment - has had huge success.
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| 'Sticky'
perfects his aerials in an indoor training session |
For
the first one, I drove a minibus rammed full with 15 budding traceurs
- all hailing from Birmingham's suburbs - down to Kent to take part.
"Training indoors gives me a real opportunity to try stuff
I wouldn't even dream of doing otherwise," explains Joni 'Sticky
Fingers' Budden, a 17 year old parkour enthusiast from Nottingham.
"I can now do somersaults, baranis, aerials and backflips with
confidence and Birmingham is a great place to come and train."
Picturing
Parkour
When
I first met up with the guys from Urban Freeflow, it was simply
to take photographs but the temptation to join in was too much and
it turns out that it's pretty damn addictive. Partly due to the
French influence, there is a philosophy that surrounds parkour -
the re-appropriation of urban spaces, the continual journey towards
self-improvement and various other parts drawn from Eastern mythology
and youthful anarchy.
Whatever
your take on it, all you need is a decent pair of trainers and a
positive attitude. Oh, and a wall to throw yourself off.
To
see some of Andy's amazing pictures of traceurs click below.
All
pictures are courtesy of Andy Day and are not to be reproduced without
the photographers permission.
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