Keeping Your Advantage: Terrain and You, Week VI [Monday, Period 4]

[atreideslioness]

When students arrived in the Danger Shop today, they'd see an obstacle course, modeled after rooftops and walls, about six-to-ten feet off the ground, foam mats all over the floor.

"Good afternoon," Ghanima said cheerily. "Today we're looking at remaining mobile in an unfamiliar urban environment. To this end, we are studying parkour, or l'art du déplacement."

"When lost or being pursued in an unfamiliar city, sticking to the streets is the equivalent of painting a target on your back," she continued. "A stranger will stick out like nothing else, and sometimes an alternative view of your surroundings can be unbelievably helpful."

"Parkour is an activity with the aim of moving from one point to another as smoothly, efficiently and quickly as possible, using principally the abilities of the human body. It is meant to help one overcome obstacles, which can be anything in the surrounding environment—from branches and rocks to rails and concrete walls—and can be practiced in both rural and urban areas. Parkour practitioners are referred to as traceurs, or traceuses for females."

"Now, parkour is a physical activity that is often categorized as a sport or an extreme sport; however, parkour has no set of rules. Most experienced traceurs think of parkour as a discipline closer to martial arts. It is often said that 'the physical aspect of parkour is getting over all the obstacles in your path as you would in an emergency. You want to move in such a way, with any movement, as to help you gain the most ground on someone or something, whether escaping from it or chasing toward it.'"

"The primary characteristic of parkour is efficiency. Practitioners move not only as rapidly as they can, but also in the most direct and efficient way possible. This characteristic distinguishes it from the similar practice of freerunning, which places more emphasis on freedom of movement and creativity. Efficiency also involves avoiding injuries, both short and long term, part of why parkour's unofficial motto is être et durer - to be and to last. Those who are skilled at this activity normally have an extremely keen spatial awareness."

"So, today, you'll be trying it out on a smaller scale," she said, going over some of the basic moments with the students. "For those of you that manage this course, I'll switch the Danger Shop over to an actual urban environment, and you can feel free to take a run at a slightly more realistic scenario."

[OCD up!]

Comments

Sign-In #6

[atreideslioness]

Jump to it!

Re: Sign-In #6

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

Dinah Lance

During the Lecture

[atreideslioness]

Listen to Ghanima, look at the obstacle course, chat with your friends.

Re: During the Lecture

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

There is no joy like the joy of a New Gothamite turned loose on a city course. Dinah was nearly bouncing out of her skin in anticipation. "I didn't know there was a name for this." She grinned widely, wondering if anyone had told Helena.

Re: During the Lecture

[weetuskenraider]

Tahiri hadn't realized people made a sport out of this. Of course, cities still weren't familiar terrain for her, but the whole concept of parkour sounded like fun. Astral.

. . . the founder of parkour said bare feet were the best shoes. Ha, she totally felt vindicated.

Re: During the Lecture

[walks-two-paths.livejournal.com]

Okay, Savannah thought she might hvae just found one more hobby to add to her list. This sounded neat.

Re: During the Lecture

[future_sandworm]

No water today! Leto was relieved. And while he hadn't quite been exploring Arrakeen in this way, cities weren't completely strange to him. Being allowed to move in them with this kind of freedom was new to him though.

Re: During the Lecture

[momslilassassin]

Ben looked way too excited about today's lesson.

Re: During the Lecture

[saikyou-no.livejournal.com]

Now this was more like it. Cities were Kenshin's home turf, and since any hitokiri who couldn't move quickly and efficiently through them was all but asking to die...

He wasn't grinning, or even smiling.

Not on the outside.

Re: During the Lecture

[puppy_fair]

Bouncing! Lots of bouncing! This was awesome!

This was part of what Zack did for a living! And darn it, he missed bouncing around Midgar already.

Re: During the Lecture

[cutsthestrings.livejournal.com]

This was a new kind of activity and Fiona thought it looked very useful.

Run the Practice Course!

[atreideslioness]

Play tag, do a solo run, have some fun with it!

Re: Run the Practice Course!

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

After a solo run like she'd usually do with Helena, rushing through the course and bouncing off walls, over barriers, and down stairs, Dinah took a break at the start of the course, and looked around for someone to have a game of tag with.

Re: Run the Practice Course!

[endsthegame]

Ender wasn't that used to doing this in this particular gravity. The movements were also unfamiliar, and the first go-through was mostly experimental along the way. But his learning curve had kicked in, and he was changing his angles slightly, making different jumps, and by the third his practiced muscles got him through it with a few inventive flourishes of his own.

Re: Run the Practice Course!

[weetuskenraider]

Tahiri did a run-through of the course by herself -- in concept not too different from some of her childhood escapades on Yavin 4 although the movements were much more precise; she'd learned variants on almost all of the basic moves, but without as much focus on efficiency of movement. It took a second run-through to get the hang of that, by the end of which she was throwing in a few little Force tricks. This was fun.

Re: Run the Practice Course!

[future_sandworm]

Leto was content to do this on his own. There was a playfulness and a freedom to this, and he couldn't help just enjoying himself.

Re: Run the Practice Course!

[saikyou-no.livejournal.com]

Kenshin started with a solo run - this was easy for him, and he made it look easy, as he took fifteen foot leaps, and vaulted clean over obstacles, never breaking his stride, or losing his pace.

Re: Run the Practice Course!

[puppy_fair]

The practise course was awesome for warming up!

... And possibly for showing off a little. But just a little. Oop, standing backflip! Whee!

Re: Run the Practice Course!

[cutsthestrings.livejournal.com]

It wasn't quite natural for Fiona, since she kept wanting to try and cut through things but she was getting the hang of it.

At least she couldn't bruise.

Re: Run the Practice Course!

[likethestore.livejournal.com]

You know, K-Mart was insanely used to this. It was kind of weird what you got used to when fleeing from zombies, but it was kinda nice having that stuff to fall back on.

Which was why the practice course came ridiculously easy to her.

être et durer!

[atreideslioness]

Ghanima changed the Danger Shop to handwavey American city. Try to make it from one end of the city to the other in a half hour!

Re: être et durer!

[endsthegame]

Ender checked his shoes for wear and whether they were tied well before anything else. A few stretches, too. This could be useful, although he hoped he'd never actually have to race through a city like this.

He forced his mind to reorient, to make it so stairs weren't just stairs, they were planes, that walls weren't walls but jump-off points, that any incline could be used to push off or twist.

He wondered how far he could go considering Earth's gravity.

Talk to the TAs

[atreideslioness]

If you can catch them!

Re: Talk to the TAs

[weetuskenraider]

Tahiri was around and available for speaking to! You know, when she wasn't sticking herself to a wall or something on the course somewhere.

Or maybe even when she was.

Talk to Ghanima

[atreideslioness]

She's around, if you need her.

Re: Talk to Ghanima

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

"Hi, Professor Atreides." Dinah walked up flushed and smiling. "Loved today's exercise. Um, do you have time to talk today? Or can I stop by your next office hours soon? I have a couple new things to show you and talk about."

OOC

[atreideslioness]

I am not opposed to ending the world today.

Re: OOC

[weetuskenraider]

Eeeeeeeeeeee I love you for doing this for class this week. :D