Parkour

Parkour

An athlete performing parkour
Also known as	PK[1][2][3]
Focus	Obstacle passing
Country of origin	France
Date of formation	1995–1996
Creator	David Belle Yamakasi
Ancestor arts	Asian martial arts athletics, gymnastics obstacle courses
Olympic sport	Not currently; IOC discussions underway[4]

Parkour (French: [paʁkuʁ]) is an athletic training discipline or sport in which practitioners (called traceurs) attempt to get from one point to another in the fastest and most efficient way possible, without assisting equipment and often while performing feats of acrobatics.^[5] With roots in military obstacle course training and martial arts, parkour includes flipping, running, climbing, swinging, vaulting, jumping, plyometrics, rolling, and quadrupedal movement—whatever is suitable for a given situation.^[6][7] Parkour is an activity that can be practiced alone or with others, and is usually carried out in urban spaces, though it can be done anywhere.^[8][9] It involves seeing one's environment in a new way, and envisioning the potential for navigating it by movement around, across, through, over and under its features.^[10][11]

Although a traceur may perform a flip as well as other aesthetic acrobatic movements, these are not essential to the discipline.^[12] Rather, they are central to freerunning, a discipline derived from parkour but emphasising artistry rather than efficiency.

The practice of similar movements had existed in communities around the world for centuries,^[13] notably in Africa^[14] and China,^[15] the latter tradition (qinggong) popularized by Hong Kong action cinema (notably Jackie Chan) during the 1970s to 1980s.^[15][16][17] Parkour as a type of movement was later established by David Belle when he and others founded the Yamakasi in the 1990s and initially called it l'art du déplacement.^[18][19] The discipline was popularised in the 1990s and 2000s through films, documentaries, video games, and advertisements.^[13][20][21]