This video is titled La Releve and it was one of the first Parkour videos ever made. La Releve is a classic in its own right not only because of its historical significance but also because it monumentally influenced the spread of Parkour around the world. Filmed in Lisses and Evry before Parkour had spread beyond the borders of
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6jWs1TC5eGw
Here is a recent nationally published Parkour article written by Sarah Skidmore of the associated press. The article is as accurate as it is simple which is good in both cases given its comparison to the flashy-Parkour-descriptive and often inaccurate pieces that still (in some way or another) dominate the majority of written and filmed media Parkour pieces. In this case the accurateness and overall message of the article has overcome the editorial simplicity, and the result is a piece that has resonated with news organizations across the
Parkour may require vaulting a wall, jumping off a ledge or leaping over a railing, but devotees say there is more to it than being a daredevil.
“We don’t want people to see parkour as something crazy,” said Adam Dunlap, a 21-year-old in
Parkour has its roots in
“I think it’s just humans moving the way humans were meant to move,” said Mark Toorock, a leader in the
Traceurs are often self-taught or gather in groups to “jam” in parks, college campuses, or anywhere they are inspired by the constructs of an urban landscape.
As parkour has grown in popularity, so have the opportunities to learn the discipline. Parkour-inspired classes are sprouting up in gyms, online forums are growing and Toorock wants to take it to the level of a professional sport.
“It’s not that parkour is this new fresh thing,” he said. “It’s kind of human rehabilitation, which is getting back to what we are meant to do.”
Some participants say parkour resembles martial arts in the mental and physical discipline it requires.
It tends to draw the younger, male, daredevil sector. But in the parkour-related classes Dunlap teaches, he has everyone from young children and 30-something women to middle-aged men.
Parkour has caught on in popular culture, as well. The movie “Casino Royale” featured a parkour chase scene. K-Swiss and Nike have had ads showcasing traceurs doing their thing in company shoes.
And Toorock, founder of American Parkour and a member of a group called the “tribe” that dominates the American Parkour scene, says he gets a phone call a week from people wanting to make reality shows about people jumping off buildings.
He always says no.
To him and others dedicated to parkour, it’s not about jumping off things. Although many will admit that was part of the initial appeal.
“It’s very serious,” he said. “It’s about increasing your own capacity to eliminate risks.”
We used to think that only David Belle had attained the level necessary to jump the Man Power Gap safely and repetitively. However after seeing multiple videos, including this one featuring Kazuma, we have now been able to confirm that multiple Tracers have reached such a level of athletic ability. More than anything this reinforces the saying of many experienced Tracers “There are no secrets to improving your skill in Parkour, other than hard training” because it shows that these abilities are not innate but rather acquired through hard work. Even David (as he made known in his appearance at the New Yorker Festival in October 2007) was amazed at the level of many young Tracers confirming the belief that in the future there may continue to be athletes that newly acquire the ability to perform jumps of such feats.
This video shows Kazuma jumping the ever daunting Man Power Gap in
http://www.dailymotion.com/kazuma-vidz/video/x1rdt5
This video is nothing short of an incredible find and a must see for any aspiring Tracer! It is a home video which features Stephane Vigroux speaking candidly about Parkour while eating lunch at a Wendy’s restaurant. This footage provides an extremely rare look into the beginnings of Parkour as Stephane briefly explains how the movements in the discipline progressed and how the training mindset in aspiring Tracers has also changed. Stephane also references David Belle’s progression.
In only a little over a minute this video packs a powerful message about proper training and progression, as well as providing an eye-opening view into the beginnings of Parkour. Some of the background noise is disturbing in multiple ways, but you’ll probably want to watch this video more than once to comprehend the depth of Stephane’s words. Big thanks to Jessica from
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kf3LY0ncsak
This is the closet thing to a Sébastien Foucan demo tape that currently exists. We saw this video a couple years ago, but it has taken us about four months (literally) to track down a copy so we could post it on the website. You will recognize clips in the edit from Sébastien’s Scion commercial, his Nike Presto Angry Chicken ad, and the Jump London documentary. Enjoy Sébastien’s flawless transitions and raw athletic talent.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AbFur61PCmU&hl=en
We have come to the end of our Top 10 Parkour Commercial Countdown. The series lasted two weeks, and was comprised 15 videos including the top 10 Parkour-featuring commercials of all time, the Banlieue 13 Trailer, Le Chat Effravant (Scary Cat) – Behind the Scenes, and the BBC-Coca-Cola commercial combo. Because the series was spread over such a long period of time we have decided to run back through the top 10 commercials in this succinct recap.
#10 Commercial: Two very similar K-Swiss ads shared the #10 spot. Race to Center Court featuring Levi Meeuwenberg and Even Playing Field featuring Tyson Cecka, Victor Lopez, were filled with great action, and the excellent production and the prominent
#9 Commercial: The BONT commercial featuring David Belle with production by Airmout was a quality edit that featured the best in the world performing in the world’s most famous Parkour training ground. Whether it was ever an official commercial or not, the production, location, and presence of David all contributed to this commercial coming in at #9.
#8 Commercial: The Coca-Cola commercial featuring Kazuma, Romain Moutault, and Dominique Lexilus came in at #8. As one of the first Parkour-featuring commercials ever made, this ad introduced Parkour to people around the world and established an advertising precedent for pure Parkour.
#7 Commercial: The first of three Nike Presto commercials in the countdown, Premier Amour (Young Love) featuring David Belle started with a highly creative concept and was carried through with a flawless performance by David. The presence of only a couple moves and the awkward comical ending kept this commercial from making it higher in the countdown.
#6 Commercial: Scion was the brand behind the great commercial that came in at #6. With a great performance from Sébastien Foucan and Jérome Ben Aoues, excellent production value, and a touch of creativity this Scion commercial was a high quality production that left the viewer remembering the product.
#5 Commercial: David Belle broke the top 5 with the Korean Canon commercial. The non-stop, fast-paced, incredible action, coupled with outstanding production utilization made this ad one that remains exhilarating no matter how many times it has been watched.
#4 Commercial: Nissan teamed up with David for the #4 best Parkour commercial ever created. Conceptually similar to Premier Amour (Young Love) David again scales a building and jumps from balcony to balcony in an attempt to win the affection of a girl. Great production value and product utilization made this Nissan commercial better than Nike’s, and an ending that leaves the viewer with a smile made this well deserving of the #4 spot.
#3 Commercial: Nike Presto and Wieden+Kennedy produced another Parkour classic with Le Chat Effravant (Scary Cat). Featuring David, Sébastien, and a slew of other great Tracers this commercial was the most talent packed in the countdown. Its inherent comedy and genuine filming location in
#2 Commercial: One of the first Parkour-featuring ads ever made, David Belle threw in an eye-popping performance that to this day mesmerizes viewers in the 2001 BBC commercial. Featuring one of the most famous Parkour jumps of all time, this ad is unforgettable and contributed greatly to the exposure and growth of Parkour around the world.
#1 Commercial: Barely edging out the BBC commercial for the #1 spot was Le Poulet de Colere (The Angry Chicken). Well deserving to be called the greatest Parkour commercial of all time, this ad demonstrated everything anyone could ever expect, want, or hope for in a Parkour ad. An iconic Tracer in Sébastien, incredible Parkour throughout, great production, and a unique and comical plot makes this commercial vastly enjoyable no matter how many times it is watched.
Will this top 10 Parkour commercial list ever change? Probably only slightly. Even though potential for Parkour utilization in commercial spots has only just started being tapped in the last few years, because of the influence and exceptionalness of these top 10 we doubt that anything will be created that could replace anything other than last few of the current top 10. With that said barring an extremely prominent ad that exposes millions of people to Parkour (e.g. a Super Bowl commercial), we also doubt that any commercial NOT featuring David or Sébastien will ever enter into the top spots. Think about these numbers: Of the top 10 Parkour-featuring commercials ever made David is featured in 6 of them (5 by himself) and Sébastien Foucan was featured in 3 (2 of them independent of David). With 8 of the 10 best Parkour commercials ever made featuring David and Sébastien the only way that we can see for this countdown to ever noticeably change is if those two continue to be involved in even more incredible and impressionable ads.
We have revealed the top 10 Parkour commercials of all time, but there are still years of advertising to come. Only time will tell the future for Parkour in the television advertising realm. Will Parkour based advertising ever widely extend beyond the cliché running, jumping and chasing themes or will companies follow Nike’s lead and continue to think of original concepts? And will iconic Tracers like David continue to perform for company’s commercial spots and if not will other Tracers become iconic figures in the Parkour world and being also making impressionable ads? These are just a few of the obstacles that the future of Parkour commercials will face, but from what we have seen so far we can’t wait to, literally, watch the outcome.
Without any further ado we are revealing our pick for the greatest Parkour commercial of all time. Barely edging out the 2001 BBC commercial, this 2000 Nike Presto ad features Sébastien Foucan, is titled Le Poulet en Colere (The Angry Chicken), and takes the top spot in our Top 10 Parkour Commercial Countdown.
The best of the three Parkour-showcasing Nike Presto commercials made in 2000, Le Poulet en Colere (The Angry Chicken) has just about everything anyone could ever want, expect, or hope for in a Parkour commercial. This ad features one of the worlds most iconic Tracers Sébastien Foucan, the Parkour he performs is impressive in magnitude, smooth, fluid and nothing short of spectacular, the uniqueness of the plot line and the conceptual development is so great that to this day it remains rivaled only by the two other Parkour-featuring Nike Presto commercials, and the inherent comedy in the commercial coupled with the French scenery and the French and English orators brings all the aspects of the production together brilliantly. A true work of advertising genius by Wieden+Kennedy, Le Poulet en Colere (The Angry Chicken) was able to fully utilize the marketing potential of Parkour without exploiting the art. The commercial is also praiseworthy for demonstrating true Parkour while at the same time providing a unique purpose to the discipline that to this day continues to captivate viewers from its beginning to end.
Le Poulet en Colere (The Angry Chicken) is a commercial masterpiece. Creative, funny, and true to Parkour, this ad was prominently featured on televisions across the
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6571575392378784144
The number #8 commercial in our Top 10 Parkour Commercial Countdown was the Coca-Cola ad featuring Kazuma, Romain Moutault, and Dominique Lexilus. The #2 commercial in the countdown was the 2001 BBC ad featuring David Belle. In spite of the singular brilliance of these commercials as individual productions, an even more stunning (and just so happens more famous) video was created when footage from these two productions were combined. A hybrid edit of the footage from the BBC ad and the Coca-Cola commercial generated this action packed and influential edit that we have deemed as an honorable mention in our Parkour commercial countdown.
To this day we have not been able to corroborate the claim that this video was ever used as an official commercial or commercial production. This confusion is widespread and some claim this was a music video while others claim it was the BBC commercial edit for the
As one of the first Parkour videos ever posted on YouTube, this video is also responsible for being a prevalent influence that shaped much of the Parkour culture that exists today. For nothing more than being one of the first Parkour videos on the internet, this edit has prodded countless Tracers’ into the discipline. The influence of this video also extends to the music and clothing world of Parkour. With its inclusion of the musical composition 1980 from the French artist Diam’s’ 2003 album Brut de Femme, this Parkour video was one of the first of its kind to feature rap music. With no effort at all anyone can now view the overwhelmingly dominant use of the rap music genre in personal and professional Parkour edits and demo across the internet. Also, the clothing worn in this video, most notably the pants worn by all four participatory Tracers, and the shirtless style sported by David, has also greatly contributed to the clothing styles that we see today in Parkour training around the world.
Whether or not this video was ever a true commercial production, its cannot be understated. Including footage from the 2001 BBC commercial and extended footage from the Parkour-featuring Coca-Cola ad we have designated this video as an honorable mention in the top Parkour commercials of all time. With the athletic talents of David Belle, Kazuma, Romain Moutault, and Dominique Lexilus the richness of the Parkour exhibited speaks for itself. And just as noteworthy is the nearly unrivaled genuine and pure Parkour that is displayed for the audience. With the rap musical precedent provided by Diam’s, and the influence this video had on Parkour clothing style, this video is more than deserving of not only a mention in our commercial countdown but also a prominent place in Parkour history.
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x38ety
The best two Parkour-featuring commercials of all time are left in our Top 10 Parkour Commercial Countdown. Both of the final two ads are so good that it was almost painful to have to decide between them. Fortunately for us our criteria did the tough job or rating them, and we now have the pleasure of revealing the seconds greatest Parkour commercial ever made.
We can not say enough about the #2 commercial so we are going to keep it simple. As one of the first Parkour-featuring commercials ever produced this ad was also one of the most culturally influential. Filmed in
The magnitude of this commercial in influence and sheer athletic performance may never be matched again, and that is why it is so highly ranked in our countdown. Enjoy the close runner up to the greatest Parkour-featuring commercial of all time, this 2001 BBC ad featuring David Belle comes in at #2.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7827611100816947689
With only the top two commercials left in our Top 10 Parkour Commercial Countdown we have decided to take a short break and post some exclusive behind the scenes footage from the Nike Presto ads.
As we mentioned yesterday in the featuring of Le Chat Effravant (Scary Cat), the commercial that came in at #3 or our Top 10 Parkour Commercial Countdown, in spite of the commercial’s unsurpassed creativity and humor, the one drawback to the ad was the brevity of the finished product. With only a 30 second final commercial it was difficult, if not impossible, for any viewer to fully appreciate the true athleticism that was required of David Belle, Sébastien Foucan, Stephane Vigroux and the other Tracers involved in the production.*
Luckily we were able to locate some exclusive behind the scenes footage from the Nike Presto shoot which we have embedded below. This edit, with a wider variety of footage, wide angle shots, and movements such as those at :53, 1:00, and 1:05, reveals an incredible level of athleticism that was not developed in the shortened Le Chat Effravant (Scary Cat) commercial.
*Example: The jump performed by David at :05 in Le Effravant Chat (Scary Cat) is the same jump featured at 1:00 in this video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V9inly-ZfcY