Take Flight

Hailing from the east coast of the United States, Tyler Incontrera is the Take Flight Fan of the Week! From South Amboy, New Jersey, Tyler trains his freerunning in his K-Swiss Tubes. Take Flight has received multiple photos of Tyler, but for some reason in all his shots he is upside down. His huge flips are featured on the Take Flight facebook profile this week in his Take Flight Jump, Fly, Dream Tee. Tyler’s favorite athlete is Daniel Ilabaca and we can’t wait to see the improvements he makes to become more like Daniel. Thanks for all the flip photos Tyler, you’re our #1 fan this week!

Take Flight is featuring the Red Bull Art of Motion competition on the TF facebook page. It was held this March and marked one of the latest in many freerunning competitions that are springing up all over the world. The first Red Bull Art of Motion was back in May of 2009, and it drew huge crowds and international competitors. The events have even drawn enough attention to warrant an article by Time Magazine. There was also the TV show Jump City Seattle featuring international pro freerunning. But these international professional level competitions are just the tip of the iceberg.

Around the same time as the most recent Art of Motion event, there was the Nivea fo Men Freerunning Championships in Thailand (seen here).

These pro events are greatly outnumbered by the small amateur events that don’t get any publicity. For every pro event there are dozens of lower level competitions, but just because the event is smaller doesn’t mean the tricks are. In May of 2011, there was a freerunning event in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho held at a local gym. Some of the athletes were throwing big tricks, and it really showed how fast freerunning is growing. freerunning competitions have even found their way into backyards. We recently saw video of a competition that was set up as part of a birthday party! We’re not saying this is common be any means, but we are sure freerunning birthday parties will become more popular as time goes on.

We, at Take Flight, have noticed a lot of books about Parkour and Freerunning coming out lately. This is a great sign that Parkour is becoming ever more legitimate in the eyes of the general public. Parkour books are a great way to continue learning about movement even when you cannot get out and actually practice it yourself. The books offer a range of information from great training tips, techniques, and diagrams, to general fitness information and Parkour philosophies.

Remember, Parkour requires knowing your body and experiencingmovement, so make sure you are continuing your learning by training correctly.

Some of the books out now are very good and contain excellent insight for Traceurs of all skill levels, but as Parkour and Freerunning grows so to will the collection of educational books so keep you eye out for new releases all the time.

All over the Take Flight Facebook page is talk about Brink; the latest video game to feature movement inspired by Parkour. Brink is one of the first video games to be advertised with a well known Traceur, in this case Daniel Ilabaca on the Brink Tour. The game Brink, is just the latest addition to what has become a stream of video games that include Parkour based character movements. In recent years, gamers have come to expect a level of freedom in character movement that has driven game designers to research, model, and even directly copy movements from Traceurs.

Click to Enlarge (Brink)

Click to Enlarge

Some games advertise the freedom of movement as a cornerstone of the gameplay, to name a few:
Mirror’s Edge – Assassin’s Creed (series) – The Saboteur – Prince of Persia (series) – Brink – Devil’s Third (not yet released)

Click to Enlarge (Assassin's Creed)

Click to Enlarge (Mirror's Edge)

However many games that don’t say it out right, still researched Traceur’s movements to include in their game, like:
The Grand Theft Auto (series) – Infamous – True Crime (series) – Enslaved

We cannot wait to see what the future holds with the increase in technology. Maybe a Parkour based game on the wii or Xbox kinect. Currently there are very few games that are primarily focused on Parkour or freerunning and those games are produced independently. There are a couple of free cell phone games on the android market, but the only production game we know of is “Free Running” the game (seen below).

The newest addition to Take Flight partners is Parkour Foundations! They were organized in 2010 in the United Kingdom in the city of Portsmouth. Parkour Foundations reports that their training and workshops are going really well at the moment.  They are a group of Traceurs that aims to teach, train, promote and perform Parkour & Free Running throughout the UK.

The vision of Parkour Foundations is “to create opportunities within the Parkour/Free Running community to develop projects such as an Indoor Parkour Facility in Portsmouth, professional and affordable Parkour performance services, regular coaching sessions and to upstart various training academies throughout the UK.”

They hope to achieve these goals with the cooperation and support from their sponsors and partners, and Take Flight is glad to join them.

Parkour Foundations Website

Parkour Foundations Youtube Channel

Parkour Foundations Twitter

Take Flight is excited to announce Stephen “Viking” Laster as our newest sponsored athlete and member of the Take Flight Street Team! Stephen has a few loves in life: heavy music,cooking, and teaching/learning Parkour. He has been training since November 2008, and through Parkour he has lost 80 pounds.

He also credits Parkour with helping him find a way to make it though his probation, and learn self-control in many parts of his life. His biggest passion in Parkour is teaching, says Stephen, “I love being able to spread the knowledge of Parkour to people and am always willing to travel up to an hour to teach a private lesson and I consistently drive from Denton to Austin in order to help lead a state-wide workshop.”

Stephen’s dedication to changing his own life, and now spreading Parkour in order to improve the lives of others, has gained him local and national recognition. We are proud to include him in our list of sponsored athletes.

Back in 2008 Take Flight posted an interview with David Belle that included a portion about how he and Sébastien Foucan had grown apart over the years. Well just a few months ago David Belle was interviewed by Sébastien Foucan and we knew all the fans would be interested.

It is incredible to see the founder of Parkour joined with another original member of the Yamakasi across from “Le Dame du Lac”, one of the most iconic structures in all of Parkour. In the interview David discusses what Parkour was for him in the past, and what it has become today. Truly a “must see” interview for any and all Traceurs. Whether you have been training and following the growth of Parkour since its beginning or just starting out, the words shared in this interview will educate and inspire you.

The 2 part interview has been translated into multiple languages, so if you prefer different subtitles or would like to see the original videos you can find them at:  http://www.youtube.com/user/FreerunningTVDotCom

David and Sébastien cover topics ranging from the original inspiration of Parkour from David Belle’s father to social media today and how that, and the rapid growth in popularity, have changed the way Parkour is viewed and practiced by many people. Below we have both parts of this interview, so sit back and enjoy learning the history and truth of Parkour from David Belle himself.

Take Flight sponsored athlete Thomas Dolan, just recently finished his winter video and in our humble opinion, it is awesome! Thomas has produced a handful of great videos that can be found on his youtube channel:

http://www.youtube.com/user/thomasdolan08

This video follows suit with the others in his collection; by combining unique music and editing with amazing Parkour and movement he creates an incredible experience. Speaking of editing, did we mention Thomas edits all his own videos as well as starring in them? We are proud to show off Thomas as one of our sponsored athletes, and we are excited to see what great productions he will have in the future. Now here it is: Thomas Dolan’s Winter Training Video!

The mission statement of Parkour Uruguay (PKUY) is “Inspirar y enseñar el camino del Parkour.” In English it means, “To inspire and to teach the way of Parkour”. A mission to which you could devote your entire life and, for some, it would be a dream come true.

Parkour Uruguay is the most recent addition to Take Flight Partners, and it was established in 2007. They have worked with a range of professional Traceurs and you can see their video with 3Run on the PKUY partner page. Just a few days ago they were honored with a national news feature on a show called Supersport.

However, they prefer to focus on others instead of themselves. Parkour Uruguay organizes jam around Monte Video by posting times and locations on their website complete with google map directions. So anyone interested in working with them may join in at any point. They also offer classes to further the education of beginning Traceurs and help spread the knowledge of Parkour.

Take Flight is proud to have Parkour Uruguay as the newest partner.

This week’s Take Flight Fan of the week is none other than Daniel Robinson!

Daniel was the perfect candidate for Take Flight’s Fan of the Week. His love of Parkour is only matched by his love of Take Flight. Says Daniel:

I can rock Take Flight Clothing better than anyone else on the planet. I ALWAYS wear a Take Flight shirt whenever out training Parkour.

Daniel is part of Temecula Parkour based in California, and he shares his solo videos on Vimeo.

Says Daniel: “Take Flight is my favorite Parkour clothing brand because you connect with the ‘little traceurs’. I am Take Flight’s #1 fan!” Nothing could be truer. And that’s why Daniel is our #1 fan this week.