Like every city, Chattanooga is a man-made patchwork of steel, cement, asphalt, and glass. This exoskeletal structure of roads, walkways, buildings, and bridges gives shape to the Tennessee Aquarium, the Walnut Street Bridge, the Riverwalk, Coolidge Park, and the hodgepodge of shops that line Frazier Avenue. As most people navigate the city, they move along the pathways its builders provided. But not 28-year-old Ethan Young. A mechanical engineering student at Chattanooga State, he sees more than streets, sidewalks, and handicap ramps when he looks at the city; he sees a multitude of destinations, and infinite paths between them.
Young is standing outside a church downtown. He looks both ways along the street that runs in front of the church and, seeing it’s safe to cross, bolts toward a cement column supporting a bi-level parking structure. He doesn’t stop when he comes to the column, but runs up the vertical structure, grabs the edge of a steel girder, hoists himself to the metal railing bordering the second level, and hops over. His movements are graceful and smooth, and look effortless.
Young is one of a handful of local parkour practitioners. Developed in France in the late ‘80s by Raymond Belle, David Belle, and Sébastien Foucan, parkour has evolved from military obstacle course training into a globally known, non-competitive activity involving skillful movement through urban space. The goal of its practitioners is to travel from point A to point B in the most efficient manner possible. Using only their bodies and their surroundings to propel themselves, they run, jump, climb, swing, vault, and roll across terrain an untrained person could not cross.
“One of the founders, David Belle, believes parkour should be functional,” he says. “You should be able to find yourself in any situation, and on any terrain, and know you can overcome it.”
Young’s interest in parkour was sparked during a summer climbing trip in 2007. When he returned home, he researched the activity and began training. He easily picked up the basics, and in time, became one of the first parkour practitioners in North America to become a certified coach through the international A.D.A.P.T. (Art du Deplacement and Parkour Teaching) program.
Young was drawn to the functional nature of parkour. A seasoned climber, he was accustomed to being in situations that required a technical solution. But Parkour’s mental component also attracted him. “Parkour demands focus. You have to know what you’re capable, and not capable, of doing.”
Lean but tone, and of average height, Young’s body appears to be well suited for parkour. But as impressive as his wall climb was, he’s always trying to push his skills to the next level. “Repetition dials in the movements and helps you to become smoother and more efficient,” he says. “You want to be able to not just do it, but do it well.”
While Young was introduced to parkour through climbing, the average person’s initial exposure comes through movies or videos posted online. While he’s pleased with the interest people are showing in the activity, he’s concerned about safety – or rather the lack of it seen in “fail” videos online, in which male teens attempt to perform stunts beyond their abilities, and wind up face-first in concrete, straddling a railing, or worse.
“I wish those videos didn’t exist,” Young says. “Parkour is not a thrill-seeking, daredevil sport; it’s a highly calculated discipline. You have to take the necessary steps and enjoy the process of learning. A lot of kids want to be the next YouTube sensation, but you can’t dive headlong into the unknown.”
That said, Young believes anyone with the will to learn parkour can. “People might think they’re not in shape, or they’re too old, but that’s not the case,” he says. “All you have to do is set aside your ego and go out and learn.”
Young says training takes time, as does mastering parkour. Despite being certified, and able to perform an array of impressive moves, he says he has yet to master the activity. “You have to keep refining your movements and pushing past your mental blocks,” he says. “That’s what parkour is: moving past physical and mental barriers.”
For Young, parkour is about more than running, jumping, and climbing over obstacles; it’s also about sharing what he loves with the community. He’s launched a Facebook page titled “Chattanooga Parkour Freerunning” to provide a meeting place for local practitioners and for those interested in the activity to inquire about training. Also,he and a friend, Sam Parfitt, have co-founded OurParkour, an effort to introduce parkour to the general public through community days and demonstrations in local schools.
“We’ll be going into local schools and talking with the kids,” he says. “Maybe we’ll reach someone who’s not into traditional ball sports, but that will spark their interest.”
OurParkour will launch on Monday, May 5 at St. Peter’s Episcopal School, where ten Chattanooga area schools will be participating in a track and field event.
While Young is excited about these opportunities to share his passion, he isn’t interested in quickly growing the local parkour community. Rather, he and Parfitt are planning on taking carefully considered steps in the hopes of finding the few who will aim to “break the jump,” a parkour phrase derived from the idea that fear is a wall, and one must break through it to complete the jump.
“We want to give back to the community and to help others through parkour,” he says, “but we don’t want to just get a bunch of people involved; we want to get the right people involved.”
For more information about parkour, email Young at chattanoogaparkour@gmail.com.