Urban Ninjas Return To Roosevelt Island For Parkour & Free Running Training

They're back. This earlier post introduced Roosevelt Island residents to the sport of Parkour or Free Running:

... Doing handstands down stairs, walking on the sides of walls, leaping over obstructions in a single bound! Have some form of Urban Ninjas or Navy Seals established a training camp here on Roosevelt Island? Maybe an audition for latest James Bond movie chase scene?

No, but the relatively new sport of Parkour has come to Roosevelt Island. What is Parkour?...

As explained by You Tube Video from bullettrun:

Urban Vanguard and Ryan Doyle train together in NYC on a cold, winter January afternoon at Roosevelt Island. Includes interviews and training footage from that day, and other occasions in NYC. Sha Mualimm-Ak and Ryan Doyle discuss their attitudes towards Parkour and training together.

According to American Parkour:

Parkour is the physical discipline of training to overcome any obstacle within one's path by adapting one's movements to the environment.

and:

The main difference then between Parkour and Free Running is that Parkour is defined by purpose "get somewhere quickly and efficiently using the human body", and Free Running is defined by the activity or art of moving through your environment however you want, moving your way, following your own path.

Whatever it's called, it looks really cool.

Urban Ninjas, Navy Seals Or Twisted Traceurs On Roosevelt Island?

You Tube Video of Twisted Traceurs Practicing On Roosevelt Island

What the heck is going on in this video?

Doing handstands down stairs, walking on the sides of walls, leaping over obstructions in a single bound! Have some form of Urban Ninjas or Navy Seals established a training camp here on Roosevelt Island? Maybe an audition for latest James Bond movie chase scene?

No, but the relatively new sport of Parkour has come to Roosevelt Island. What is Parkour? According to American Parkour:

... Parkour is an art of movement in which you train the body and mind to overcome obstacles. A parkour practitioner, called a traceur (male) or traceuse (female), uses their surroundings to improve their ability to move in space. By interacting with obstacles, be they urban architecture or the natural environment, the practitioner becomes more comfortable controlling his body and navigating any terrain.

The meat of parkour is the discipline of daily training, physical and technical, to heighten the body’s natural movement elements such as strength, speed, balance, coordination, precision, power, and endurance...

According to the NY Times, Parkour began in France during the early 1990's:

... The idea was to travel across the urban landscape as gracefully, intelligently and dynamically as possible. The practitioners - "traceurs," from the French verb "tracer," meaning to trail - were supposed to adapt to their environment in order to manipulate it in creative ways. Sixteen years on, they can be seen pulling off anything from gutsy leaps from roof tops to sublime balancing acts on metal railings....

and found a home in New York City and Roosevelt Island.