This post contains the second half of the ‘Most Important Youtube Parkour Videos’ rundown. Remember these are what I personally believe are the most influential videos, and of course each practitioner will have things that they will find more important than others. These are the videos that have shaped the way Parkour is trained and in turn the way I have approached capturing it aswell.
Russian Climbing
This video featuring Oleg Vorslav, supposedly filmed when he was only fifteen, was one of the first videos to go truly viral in terms of Parkour. Even by today’s standards, there are movements in this video which are truly mind-blowing and in many ways it was truly ahead of its time. The levels of creativity and innovation shown here is unlike anything that had been seen before it. The later video ‘Out of Time’ which is a more recent film with Oleg is also worth mentioning.
Storm Freerun Volume One
The much anticipated video from team Storm is widely regarded as a turning point in respect to what’s possible with a Parkour video. This video displays what can be done with the right blend of time, effort and athletes. A custom mixed soundtrack from the Glitch Mob combined with the production of Mr Voicu captures the movements and that Storm display in the video in a slick and cinematic manner which had rarely been touched upon before.
Cambridge Joy
Cambridge is renowned around the world as one of ‘the’ places to visit for Parkour. Back when Parkour first grew in popularity, Owen Covill and Julian Donovan, along with some other Traceurs formed the ‘TCT’. These practitioners were forerunners in the Parkour community, and as such Cambridge has had a deep history of Parkour practice. Daniel Ilabaca & friends, Sin Clan and NextGen visited with Chase Armitage and 3Run for a weekend in September 2007, and this video is what resulted.
Honourable Mention: TK17 Go
My Honourable Mention is a fairly little known video by Duncan ‘TK17’ Germain. Duncan is the kind of person who is very specific and philosophical in his training. This video is an example of that, where he has specifically chosen each part of the video to fit with the music, and structured a meta-narrative accordingly. This is not just a personal sampler, movements to music, Go displays that despite unconventional appearances, Parkour movement ability can be achieved by anyone and a video like this shows Duncans views and journey of Parkour.
