The YouTube Live event in San Francisco last week turned out to be a lot of fun, with the usual interesting backstage group of individuals that YouTube gathers together, including the 'Will it Blend?' guys and Chad Vader himself, and talents like singer-songwriter Katy Perry, Esmee Denters and Akon.

The live show for the main event was by far the shortest piece we have ever been involved in, with only a few seconds to get on stage and set up Ray 'The Punisher' Stevenson's introduction of the parkour international action compilation put together by the ever-productive Miss Julie Angel. Short and sweet maybe, but the live audience - and the millions watching the live stream around the world - loved it, and in fact the event that night went on to become the largest live-viewed event on the internet ever, even beating the Olympics. And hey, Ray Stevenson turned out to be a damn nice guy too - let's hope the new Punisher movie is as good as he assured us it would be..!

However, by far the best part of the trip was hooking up with the San Francisco parkour community to train and talk. The parkour practitioners around the world always prove to be incredibly welcoming and hospitable people, with a real desire to train and a hunger for knowledge, methods of practice and self-improvement. And SF was no exception: great people, great weather, good training spots... what more could one ask for!

Great to see Mr Tyson Cecka in the area for a few days as well, always a pleasure to train with - and a man who particularly likes the mental challenges... ;)

So this post is just to say thanks to all the people who made the trip such a good experience, particularly Brian, Jeff, Brandon, Austin, Albert, Tyson and of course lovely Lauren who made sure I found my way around the picturesque city, despite my best efforts to get on the wrong buses! And big thanks to everyone who came out for the jam on Sunday morning - good to see such spirit and enthusiasm for the art thriving on the West Coast. That is what it's ALL about.

Labels: Event Coverage

Around one month ago, on a Sunday afternoon, I was standing at one of the team's regular spots doing a little bit of "un-structured training". You know what I’m talking about, it was one of those days where I didn't have a lot of focus and concentration and was just doing movement that I was already comfortable with.


Sensing that I needed a little motivation (and a smack upside the head), Dan declared a simple challenge for me to accomplish in the following month. Something for me to channel my attention on. It was a simple task; successfully break a ten foot precision with a one step run-up off a wall and land on a 3 inch wide flowerbed edge.

I know I don't particularly have the biggest of jumps, but a few intensive training days and I'm sure to crack the leap. Ah, but here's the catch... The forfeit for failing to do it would be two hundred muscle-ups in one day. Something that I really didn't want to do because the last time myself and Dan had a muscle-up session it ended at around 75 and one very sore chest and arms. So, on with the Jump!

This is the point where I'd probably talk about my training and the battle with the challenge and how I managed to complete it. Instead I'm going to skip to the end and tell you that I failed to do the jump. Yes, for one reason or another I didn't manage to do it and yesterday turned out to be one crazy, long, muscle-up day.

Dan agreed to actually do the forfeit with me, so we set to meet at a scaffolding spot we use to train and plan our method of attack. Being a lot better, and more dynamic, at muscle-ups than I Dan went for sets of five at a time where as I went the 'tortoise' route of a single rep. We'd do the first one hundred in the morning, have lunch and then finish off the rest.

"the jump is still there... taunting me"

Honestly, I initially didn't think I'd be able to do the whole two hundred, but was determined to put this fear to one side, look at the challenge logically and just take it one step at a time. Surprisingly, after the first twenty or thirty, both of us settled into a nice rhythm and quickly realised that it might take a while but was definitely achievable.

After three and a half hours (plus a lunch break in the middle) of both of us doing the same movement over and over I learnt two things: Firstly, placing a forfeit into challenges is a real good way of pushing the perceived boundary of what your body can do... You complete the challenge; you've pushed yourself to overcome that task. You forfeit and you see how far you can push your body in a completely different way. In the end, you win no matter what the outcome because it's all about discovering (and pushing) your limits. Try it yourselves, challenge each other, create a hard but realistic forfeit and see where it leads.

The second thing is that the jump is still there... taunting me. So now I have three weeks to do the same challenge but with a new forfeit (30 sets of 10 Double-taps!). This time, however, I understand that my body is capable of a lot more than I think it is and just needs a little more focus and concentration... The very two things that I was lacking one month ago.

Thanks to Dan for proposing and doing the forfeit with me. So, is there any other team member up for the challenge of being part of the 200?

Labels: Challenges