PATH Four Year Anniversary Reflections
Parkour Theory turns four years old today!
I remember waiting until exactly midnight eastern time to launch the website with my finger on the enter key. I hadn’t told anyone what I was working on and didn’t organize a launch party. I did, however, invite one friend last minute to see an early preview before midnight. After seven months straight of waking up at 7 AM and going to sleep at 1 AM, coding the website, collecting the data, creating the database, designing the logo, brand, and interface, Parkour Theory launched on December 13, 2014 — the last consecutive date of our lifetime.
While developing the concept, I thought about every detail of what Parkour meant to me and the community. How could I give back to the community which opened my mind to a new way of looking at life? This influenced the minimalist design and color choice. Some may think it’s bland, but the motivation was to remain neutral, open, simple, and intuitive.
The symbolism and wording were intentional. The ring around the Dame du Lac represents unity and the world community that collectively created our culture. It merges to the right into the rest of the logo to create imagery of a tidal wave symbolic of the fluid nature of the art and community. The center remains colorless to represent openness — that Parkour is a common language that unites us regardless of where you come from. The color black and bold face of the logo represent the strength of the community, self-awareness, and balance when contrasted against a blank background.
I also considered how to best connect ideas in the community, to break down language and cultural barriers so that the art could continue to grow. With the help of some friends, I settled on a naming convention: quantifier, set, execution, landing so that moves can be understood directly by name. No matter what language, anyone can enter into any conversation to share ideas. But I also listed aliases so individual communities could share their local terminology.
Over the last four years, I saw Parkour grow from an art into a science. Before PATH, not many had the vocabulary to identify individual moves, understand how many moves actually existed at the time, or intentionally and effectively create new concepts or traverse the space of possible moves.
Why is a Gaet Pimp different from a Sitting Gaet Pimp and why are those different from a Turn Gaet Pimp? Why is a Palm Gainer different from a One-hand Palm Flip? How does one move relate to another move?
Equipped with language, I observed that the community started to develop moves at a faster rate than before. However, there are some things I do regret that I didn’t have time to implement that I think would have furthered the goal of accelerating the field*.
As a final thought, although PATH is not a prominent voice in the community — and that was never a goal to begin with (refer to the current dialogue in the community about the social media nonsense) — I feel that PATH at least has a duty to the community and to the art. PATH’s duty is to update the database and continue innovating so it can further democratize knowledge, and to help spread constructive ideas throughout the community so that the limit of what is possible continues to expand.
Regrettably, I’ve been preoccupied. One day, I hope to bring back some of what I have been learning to improve PATH. Although I cannot actively participate in the community for now, I will always feel indebted to the open-minded, self-aware, and adventurous spirit of the Parkour community.
*I chose the word field because Parkour is more than just jumps and flips. It is a discipline that should both be studied academically along with being practiced physically
