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News from November 2009
This week on the 30th November and 2nd December we are again running workshops for the Wetsminster Borough Pupil Referral Unit. Held at Moberly Sports Centre these workshops serve to engage young people in the inner city who have been excluded from other school activities and need an opportunity to express themselves and gain some new skills and new confidence. The workshops for the Pupil Referral Units across London have been a big hit and we look forward to continuing them into 2010. For a description of what PRUs do, click the link above. Monday 30th of November 2009 
Tomorrow Forrest and Andy will be at St Leonard's School in Padiham where they will be delivering training for a new parkour facility that has been installed for the school and community use. Sky TV will be there covering the day, which will be the first of many. The facility is designed by Parkour Generations, and is just one of a whole range of training facilities being installed at schools across the country. More details on this to follow shortly... Sunday 29th of November 2009 
The team has just returned from shooting a new TV commercial in Istanbul, Turkey, in conjunction with the acclaimed director of Jump London - Mike Christie of Carbon Media. The action was provided by Thomas, with several shots filmed on a state-of-the-art and brand new high definition POV camera, and the choreography was provided by Johann - the shoot has now wrapped and the results should be something pretty special. More updates to follow. Sunday 29th of November 2009 
Next week from the 1st December several of the Yamakasi founders from our friends and partners Majestic Force will be in London to attend some courses with us in preparation for the official UK launch of the ADAPT qualification in January 2010. While our schedule will be quite tight, we will of course try to find some time to have them appear as guest instructors at some of the classes... and we recommend getting in on as many of those classes as possible, for a chance to learn from the most experienced practitioners in the world. Saturday 28th of November 2009 
Monday next week sees the final planning meeting on site before construction can begin on London's first parkour park, which will be built at the Westminster Academy Sports Centre on the Harrow Road. Entirely designed by the most experienced practitioners and design team from Parkour Generations, this park will set the standard for purpose-built training facilities and will provide a great space for large seminars, classes, and events. Should be finished and open to the public early next year - keep checking back for updates... Saturday 28th of November 2009 
Today saw the official opening and launch event of Westminster Borough's brand new Litte Venice Sports Centre. The day included a showcase of a great many sports and clubs that will utilise the centre, and of course we were on hand giving workshops and taster sessions as part of the launch - the new centre is a fantastic facility, and we may just end up adding another class there to our weekly schedule... Saturday 28th of November 2009 
The latest issue of the extreme sports mag Spiked Magazine contains a 6-page spread on the work of Parkour Generations, featuring interviews with Thomas and Alli and some cracking good shots. Well worth picking up a copy from the website or in a good retailer now ;) Friday 27th of November 2009 
Earlier in the month Stephane was interviewed by hotcourses.com for an exclusive magazine article. We've been given a copy of the article for you to view and download here. It's in PDF format and features some insight into Stephane's introduction into Parkour and his current training mindset. Click the link and have a read! Monday 23rd of November 2009 
This Sunday the 'Off the Wall' open jam will be held at Elephant and Castle from 12.30pm. We meet outside the Elephant and Castle tube station (shopping centre exit) and then move on to the local estate. For all those who are unfamiliar with our event, the last Sunday of the month always hosts a completely free and open get-together of all traceurs and traceuses to train, have fun and share tips. Everyone is welcome, regardless of whether you are an absolute beginner or highly trained global veteran superstar... Some of the Parkour Generations team will also be on hand to help anyone that wants it. See you Sunday! Monday 23rd of November 2009 
Dan and Stephane have just returned from teaching a few days of seminars in St Petersburg, Russia, and the events went very well with great attendance from the burgeoning Russian traceur community. The last day was spent working with teenage inmates of a Russian prison, who live in fairly harsh conditions yet threw themselves into the training despite the cold and wet conditions! We would like to thank the St Petersburg parkour community for organising the seminars, and especially Evgenii, Gen and all the team for making us feel so welcome. Great to see familiar faces as well as to meet some new ones, and we look forward to further strengthening the ties between the Russian and European parkour commnuities! Monday 23rd of November 2009 
Unlike the image of Paddington recreation ground attached to this news article, the weather was less than desirable today as some of you can attest. A big well done to Eric, Nicky, Marta, Leon, James, Luke, Dan, Chris and Nadine for sticking with today's training through the rain, thunder, lightning and purely miserable day. Everyone kept a great attitude and plowed through the training with smiles on their faces regardless of the situation. Great work guys and gals, see you all next week at the weekend wake-up class! Sunday 22nd of November 2009 
The Christmas season is nearly upon us and the rabid shoppers have started to come out in full force. If you need some gift ideas, have a look in our online store for some great presents to give to any traceur or traceuse. We have Julie Angel's DVD 'Once is Never', Dan Edwardes' book, 'The Parkour and Freerunning Handbook', clothing for the traceurs and also clothing for traceuses. Oh, and don't forget that if that special someone is a regular to our classes, you can also buy class block-bookings for one, two, three and six months! Saturday 21st of November 2009 
Dom has just posted a new blog post about some interesting psychological questions regarding the discipline. Click HERE to read more. Friday 20th of November 2009 
Our online forum has been steadily growing since last July and features some very knowledgeable and approachable community members happy to talk about many areas of the discipline. If you have any queries or questions about anything to do with training, nutrition, fitness or a myriad of other topics then this is the place to ask. Even though we don't claim a ridiculous number of users (We don't fudge the statistics), we do have many interesting threads which are a great resource for any inquiring practitioners! If you haven't already, head over to the forum and register today. Friday 20th of November 2009 
Starting from next month, the weekend wake-up class will be changing its Bethnal Green location to Latimer Road instead. For more information and map locations regarding the weekend class, please head on over to our classes page HERE. Thursday 19th of November 2009 
Attendance at our daily Academy Classes in London is now soaring, with 60-80 people attending the Indoor Classes each night..! We have had to add another Outdoor Class on Sunday mornings to manage the numbers, and will likely be expanding the Academy Classes again soon to other parts of London. The new Sutton Academy classes on Wednesday evenings are also taking off extremely well, and are open to the public and run from 4-7pm at Carshalton Boys College. Get bitten and come join in! Wednesday 18th of November 2009 
This week sees another London school joining our Parkour for Schools Programme. The John Roan School in Greenwich begins regular weekly classes on Tuesday afternoons and will have two Parkour Generations coaches in to run the sessions. We look forward to bringing the discipline to yet another community, and especially to a school that has been serving its community for over 300 years. Monday 16th of November 2009 
Well, it's been non-stop rain here in London for the past week or so - but don't let that hinder your training! An important part of parkour practice is to get out there no matter the weather and challenge yourself in new ways. All our outdoor classes are running as usual, including Sunday morning's 'wake-up' class at Earlsfield which promises to be a lot of fun with the storms this weekend..! For inspiration, see this great film by Julie Angel entitled Rain, and have a look at this useful article by Dan on wet-weather practice. No excuses people - don't be just a fair-weather traceur... Saturday 14th of November 2009 
The week of November 23rd will see a team from Parkour Generations in Istanbul to shoot a television commercial in conjunction with director Mike Christie of Carbon Media. Following on from our recent shoot with Mike for the St Trinian's movie, this project marks the start of much bigger things to come with Carbon... More details to follow soon. Friday 13th of November 2009 
From 19-22 November, Dan and Stephane will be running seminars in the ancient city of St Petersburg, Russia. Dan was there last year and both the city and the parkour community were very welcoming and traceurs came from all over Russia to take part, showing great training spirit and physical abilities. This year should prove to be just as good, with Stephane also available to attend for his first trip to Russia. The event is organised by Russia's PKCITY, and if your Russian is any good you can find more details about the seminars by clicking that link! Friday 13th of November 2009 
Julie (aka Slamcamspam) has just uploaded her latest film which follows a class of international traceurs led by Thomas Couetdic at one of our outdoor academy classes. The film is called "On any..." and you can watch it via our YouTube channel HERE. Wednesday 11th of November 2009 
Tomorrow we begin rehearsals for the upcoming live display we are putting on for the launch of LG's latest innovation, the 'borderless' LED television. Very fancy bit of kit. The product launch will be held at the end of this week, with a four-man team performing what promises to be a high-octane show at the event. The team for this one consists of Blane, Thomas, Johann and Williams Belle, and choreography will be put together by Stephane. We'll be getting some behind-the-scenes footage which will no doubt find its way online at some stage.. ;) Monday 09th of November 2009 
Women's Jam: Sunday 8th November Today, Sunday 8th November, there will be the women's open gathering in central London - meeting at Latimer Road tube station for midday and going on for as long as everyone has energy! The women's jams are open to all women no matter the level of experience or ability and a re a great way to meet other practitioner,s share training tips and generally have a great day of practice. Be warned that Latimer Road tube station is actually closed today so please make alternate travel arrangements if coming down. For more details, email Tracey(at)parkourgenerations.com Sunday 08th of November 2009 
New Video! One Giant Leap Worldwide... A new video by our very own Julie Angel, collating loads of footage sent in from all over the world capturing the One Giant Leap global jam against climate change that we held on September 26th, has now gone online and can be seen on the website of our official partners for the event, Sandbag. The video does a great job of conveying just how international this event was and shows the true scope and impact it had across the world. Click here to watch the video now. Thursday 05th of November 2009 
A brand new website to help you discover and share global parkour hotspots, photos and videos has just made its debut on the internet. Thursday 05th of November 2009 
A new blog post by Dan entitled 'The Spaces Between' has just gone up on the Team Blog, a great place to get an insight into the thinking and activites of the whole Parkour Generations collective. Check it out at the link above. Thursday 05th of November 2009 
A new film, Dumar: the Rising directed by and featuring some of our London Academy students now has a trailer online. A real veteran of our Academy classes, having been attending since the start many years ago, Karen Palmer is becoming an accomplished film-maker and often utilises parkour as a device within her work, this time choosing to have the action for the new movie provided by two other Academy students, Joe Boyle and Lauri Auronen. Congratulations to all three and we look forward to seeing the finished film soon! The trailer can be seen here. Wednesday 04th of November 2009 
This week we are running introductory sessions for two new schools in the Hammersmith and Fulham borough of London, the Phoenix School on Wednesday and Sacred Heart on Friday. These are part of taster sessions for 5 Hammersmith schools that are looking to join our Parkour for Schools Programme with regular classes. Tuesday 03rd of November 2009 
We are very pleased to be able to say that injured Japanese traceur Naoki Ishiyama is now out of hospital completely following his spinal operation, and is on a long programme of rehabilitation. Naoki would like to express his huge thanks to everyone who has supported him through this difficult time, especially those who gave generously towards the fund to help his family cover the extensive costs of his repatriation and treatment. You can keep up to date with Naoki on the official Facebook Page, or through us now that Naoki is part of our Developing Athletes Programme. Ganbatte Naoki! Monday 02nd of November 2009 
With half-term over in the UK, our parkour classes in schools kick off again this week all over London and beyond. For details on most of our upcoming workshops in November, see our Events Calendar. Monday 02nd of November 2009 
'Master Your Movement' T-Shirt The new 'Master Your Movement' t-shirt on our Online Store has been flying off the shelf - you can view the tee here along with a load of other goodies now available to buy. With Christmas approaching we are set to have a few little extras on offer soon... Sunday 01st of November 2009 
French TV Features Academy Class Last week French TV channel France O came to film at one of our Indoor Academy classes and will be running a piece next month on national TV over there. With the Academies continuing to expand rapidly, we are receiving even more media interest in the developments so to all students please try not to land on any camera people during training.. ;) Sunday 01st of November 2009 |
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