This summer could mark Parkour history.  The non-profit organization Parkour Visions, based in Seattle, Washington, will be hosting a Parkour summit in early August.  A summit, in the sporting world, is a multi-day event consisting of seminars and conferences where esteemed coaches, researchers, scientists, etc. in the community share their findings, their ideas, and their approaches.  Tyson Cecka and Rafe Kelley have done an amazing job of pooling together some of the greatest minds in the Parkour community, with the speaking roster being:

• Rafe Kelley – Parkour Visions lead instructor – presenting on how to program parkour training, both for a teaching and personal practice.
• Dan Iaboni (AKA PKdanno) – owner of the Monkey Vault – presenting on the most effective ways he has found to program strength training for Parkour.
• Steven Low – EatMoveImprove.com founder – presenting on bodyweight strength progressions for Parkour.
• Jesse Danger – leader of the PKNY (New York, NY) scene – discussing “Working with Parks and Recreation” and “How to get your own parkour park.”
• Stephan Guyenet – PhD. and well known ancestral nutrition blogger – presenting on nutrition for Parkour wholehealthsource.blogspot.com

(Parkour Virginia's first official statewide jam in Fall 2008.) 

This year has been an amazing one for Parkour Virginia.  We've only had the website up for about a year and a half now, and yet we're one of the oldest Parkour communities in the country.  It's been a long and hard road to develop a cohesive community and to keep things running amidst everyone's busy schedules.  And in the past year, we've had numerous statewide jams, held several seminars and workshops, watched the Richmond community fade away and rise again from the ashes (great job, guys!) and saw steady growth in VA Beach/Norfolk.  Some of these seminars brought in people from West Virginia, upper Maryland, Delaware, and even Pennsylvania!  Some people drove 4 or 5 hours just for the chance to learn from us, and that's utterly amazing!  And, most importantly, we now have a training facility at Primal Fitness we can call our home.  It centralizes us and also legitimizes what we do in the eyes of many businesses, parents, on-lookers, etc.

As more than half the administration of PKVA is now a Primal employee, and the remaining third already a Tribe member, there may not be as much time to regularly run outside training.  The best we might be able to offer is weekend jams (and expect those to be HUGE!), but there's one thing I want all of you to remember:  this community is NOTHING without you.  It was your interest, your passion, your dedication that built the gym.  It was your passion that kept this community alive.

Parkour Virginia is not a business.  It is not an organization.  I use the word "administration" because that's what we do: we administer the community.  We answer emails, try to keep things organized, answer questions.  I want this to be clear, though: we do not RUN Parkour Virginia, you do.  And we might get older, busier and busier, but it is you that will keep this going.  This has, and always will be, a community website and nothing more.

I want each of you to reflect on your past year of training.  For anyone new reading this, you'll get to experience it soon, so let me share with all of you what to look forward to, what to smile back on, what it is that makes this community so great.  Don't just look at your actual training.  Think about new friends you've made.  Think about all the people from other communities, other states, even other countries sometimes that you've met and shared something really special with.  Think about the inside jokes that came out of the statewide jams.  Think about the nights you spent with your "Parkour friends" NOT training, but doing things like playing video games all night, going out for a drink, or any number of other things.  THAT is what makes this community so great.  Never forget that.

I write all of this because some of you might think and worry that Primal's existence will change things.  And I agree, it might.  We might just end up much busier than we ever anticipated.  But we are a community first and we are independent of the gym.  And we (Leon, Knox, and Animus) are not Parkour Virginia, you are.  No matter how busy we get, YOU are the community.  You are the ones who made this community, who built it up from a bunch of teenagers jumping around on stuff six years ago.  Take a look up at the picture above and the video below from the most recent VT jam.  We've made huge huge strides, and that is all you.  So thank you thank you thank you!! for making this one of the best communities in the country!