Types of Parkour Competition

The definitions of Parkour and Free Running have been debated amongst the community since the earliest beginnings of the movement. Naturally this has also led to debates surrounding the way in which “Parkour competitions” should be judged, as the sport’s popularity continues to increase.

However, we could argue that this debate brings huge benefits for the sport, as this fluid definition of Parkour and Free Running presents a great opportunity for its interest to be maintained in the public eye.
Indeed, the flexibility of the definition means that athletes approach the Sport from different angles and often mix their movements with different disciplines such as Break Dancing, Tricking, Capoeira etc…
This has resulted in “Parkour competitions” of various types appearing across the world.

For example, Speed Competitions where competitors have to move from point A to point B in the fastest time possible, overcoming obstacles along the way.

Didi Alaoui at RedBull Art Of Motion

In contrast, other competitions focus more on the ‘freestyle’ aspect of Free Running; judging the difficulty of individual moves put together in a sequence performed within a certain area. – The recent RedBull Art Of Motion is a good example of this.

This variety encourages an abundance of creativity towards Parkour and its competitions, sparking new interest from people who may not have been initially drawn to the sport. This is reflected through the popularity of a new Show recently, where Parkour is mixed with the traditional childhood past time of ‘tag’.
World Chase Tag.
It’ll be interesting as the popularity of Parkour and Free Running continues to grow, how new ways to judge the competition emerge too.