Parkour is a truly impressive sport. The top athletes seem super-human. They appear to defy gravity as they jump from rooftop to rooftop, climb walls, navigate rails, and flip over obstacles.
Getting to this level takes time, effort, athleticism, and dedication,
While it may take you a while to get to a point where you can hang (or jump) with the best of them, there are things you can do to improve your parkour game. We want to help you succeed in this mesmerizing sport. Keep reading of the top 10 tips and parkour gear you can use to take your skillset to the next level.
1. Build up Your Endurance
Parkour athletes are typically lean, strong, endurance athletes. Though it takes a certain level of strength and explosive power to perform jumps, flips, wall climbs, and other parkour tricks, you need to be able to maintain a constant flow of movement. This is where endurance training comes in.
We recommend focusing on both endurance training and high-intensity intervals. The endurance will help you stay active longer. The high-intensity intervals will help you handle the explosive bursts of energy needed for parkour with ease.
2. Invest in the Right Shoes
Perhaps the most important items in your parkour gear list are your shoes. You need to find the right balance between mobility and cushion.
Too much cushion can make the shoes immobile and make it easier to roll an ankle. Too little cushion can be incredibly hard on your feet, especially during big jumps and hard landings.
Furthermore, your shoes need to be lightweight and breathable to keep your feet dry, fast, and mobile. If your shoes are too heavy, you’ll lose a significant amount of speed and power. Finally, and perhaps most obviously, your parkour shoes need to have a durable sole with fantastic grip.
3. Build Explosive Power in Your Legs
One of the most essential parkour tips is to train your legs for strength and explosive power. The stronger and more explosive your legs are, the farther and higher you can jump.
This is important for clearing big gaps and generating enough power to perform flips, clear obstacles, and more. Just as importantly, the stronger your legs are, the better they’ll be at handling hard landings. Lean muscle mass will protect your bones, joints, ligaments, and tendons.
You may also want to consider investing in parkour gear designed to improve your jumping potential, like the best jumping stilts, resistance jumping bands, ankle weights, and more.
4. Maximize Your Upper-Body Strength
Most parkour routes involve a lot of pull-ups, muscle-ups, and other upper-body dependent maneuvers. If you don’t have the upper-body strength to pull yourself up, you’re going to be pretty limited on what you can accomplish.
We recommend doing body-weight strength training to improve your parkour game. You can find parkour gear like pullup bars and free-weights you can use in your home or garage. There is more acrobatic gear, such as rings, ropes, and TRX bands that are worth looking into for your training.
5. Increase Your Grip Strength
Just as important as upper-body strength is grip strength. Climbing buildings, mounting ledges, scaling walls, and maneuver over rails requires a significant amount of gripping power. This includes grip strength endurance.
Focus on both your total grip strength and finger-tip strength. When climbing over a wall, you’ll most likely only be able to get your fingers over the ledge. Your fingers alone must be able to hold up your entire body weight.
6. Invest in the Best Parkour Gear
We’ve already talked about your shoes and some training equipment, but what other parkour gear do you need?
Some athletes new to the game consider buying gloves to protect their hands. This is a BIG no-no. Gloves can tear, rip, and be unreliable.
Furthermore, while they protect your hands from some damage, they can also lead to slips and falls. You need to train your hands to handle the demands of parkour. It’s no different than a guitarist building up calluses on their fingers from holding down the strings.
Next, you’ll need stretchy, mobile pants that will allow a full range of motion through your legs. Finally, choose clothes that are appropriate for the temperature. Your muscles will be stiff if you’re too cold and your hands will be sweaty and slippery if you’re too hot.
7. Stay Flexible and Mobile
Strength and power are important in parkour. However, you should never sacrifice flexibility and mobility for strength. We recommend doing regular stretching or yoga, as well as incorporating mobility drills into your training regiment.
A lack of flexibility can lead to injuries like pulled muscles and strains. Furthermore, mobility is required for many of the demands of parkour.
8. Practice New Movements in a Safe Environment
Regardless of how good your parkour gear is or how strong you are, the sport is inherently dangerous. Fortunately, there are things you can do to minimize injuries.
For example, practice new moves like flips and jumps in a safe environment. There are parkour training arenas in countless cities across the country complete with foam pits, trampolines, safety nets, and everything else you need to practice parkour.
9. Perfect Your Balance
Okay, we’ve covered parkour gear, strength, power, mobility, and endurance. But what about balance?
You see a ton of parkour athletes traversing narrow ledges or balancing gracefully on railings. This requires a tremendous amount of balance.
Practice balancing on unstable surfaces (with one leg and both legs). Practice standing, jumping, and crouching positions. If you plan to incorporate handstands and walking on your hands in your parkour, you need to perfect your balance while inverted as well.
10. Get Comfortable With Heights
Finally, understand that parkour is about living on the edge, quite literally. Many parkour routes and tricks are done from short, medium, and tall heights. The more uncomfortable you are with heights, the harder it will be to perform.
We recommend building up your comfort and confidence with heights. However, if you’re completely against doing anything that involves heights, there are plenty of parkour movements, tricks, and routes that stay low to the ground.
Looking for More Advice?
Parkour is as adventurous as it is exhilarating. It’s one of the few sports that are just as amazing to watch as it is to perform. We have a tremendous amount of respect for anyone looking to enter the parkour arena.
Now that you know what parkour gear you need and how to train for this larger than life sport, what else can we help you with? Take a look through some of our other articles for more advice on health, fitness, business, and more. Our blog was created to help people learn everything they can about the many facets of life.
