00 | Introduction

Parkour Leadership Development and Education 00 | Introduction

A Quick Note

I want the Parkour LEADs to be a positive and purposeful influence for young parkour athletes. In late 2005, I stumbled upon parkour in my mid-teens and shortly started NCParkour, a community forum for parkour practitioners. NCParkour connected hundreds of parkour athletes and ignited dozens of athletic gatherings… but I was still left feeling more could be done. Where do I start? How do I measure my success? Over the years I have reflected on community impact and leadership. Through my experiences, I have pieced together this developmental program. It’s directly influenced by many practices, discussions, or exercises I’ve done over the years – whether personally or through teachers. There is no end goal as of yet. I do have in mind to push the program’s students towards a stewardship project whether that be volunteering at a local non-profit, organizing a call-to-action, building a drive, etc. You can help shape the future of LEADs by determining where it goes next.

More important to me – I learned it to be tough to admire great leadership and to replicate its traits unless we think, question, and talk about it. That is a space that I want to help foster and grow. I believe some of the keys to successful and happy people are information and communication – this is built for you.

ALAN TRAN

Introduction

Welcome to the Parkour LEADs Online Program Guide. This guide is designed to help you develop the responsibilities, knowledge, and experiences of an effective leader alongside the offline discussion we have in class. Throughout the guide you will find materials and exercises to help you learn and reinforce critical skills in guiding others. Utilizing this guide will have you reflecting on many of the leaders in your life, refining your values, improving upon tools, and more. There will be many challenges and obstacles in the coming weeks – we know you’ll overcome them. The Parkour LEADs program is perfect for the experienced athlete, young adult, or developing coach already familiar with parkour and its practices.

Any sport will admit the key to their success is effective leaders. They are a necessity in impacting the growth and significance of their respective practices and core values. Parkour specifically needs a respected leader who can hold their peers accountable and demonstrate its deep intrinsic nature.

The Parkour LEADs Program is developed by Alan Tran under Enso Movement. This program is designed for young adults ages 12+ that have some or more experience with parkour.

Guide Summary

10 Units
30+ Exercises and Discussions
Additional Resources

Course Objectives

This course aims to demonstrate and coach the essential knowledge, skills, tools, and communication of leading others – whether it’s parkour training sessions, classes, or your community. We will introduce to you some of the methods, principles, and concepts from parkour along with the experiences developed over many years by professional practitioners and coaches. This program will also pull some exercises directly from other guides and illustrations that have helped to strongly influence the Parkour LEADs program – those resources can be found at the end of this guide.

We will be asking many questions through out the course – feel free to use this guide to accumulate, record, and retain as much information as possible.

How to Use this Guide

The Parkour LEADs Program Guide is divided into ten unique lessons. Typically offline, we dedicate one class a week for each lesson. Each class is about seventy-five to ninety minutes in length and involve group discussion about key topics, parkour, and our personal experiences. As an online program, we have the following suggestions:

Dedicate Time and Space
Set aside an hour for each lesson. You’ll want to find a comfortable space to read, write, and think deeply.
Have Materials Ready
Pen and paper are necessary to write your answers. Dedicate a small notebook for your answers.
Take Time to Answer Every Question
Use this time to reflect – this program serves as a platform for your personal growth. We advise spacing lessons out to every 4-7 days – we’ve intentionally designed the program with time in mind. Open any blue, gold, or red toggles and perform the end-of-unit assignments.