ABOUT POWERHOUSE PARKOUR
Stacey
Director of Powerhouse Parkour
I am so proud to have officially launched Powerhouse Parkour in 2023. Our Parkour offering has developed over 8 years and has had a positive impact on the young people who come to our gym. Powerhouse Parkour is inclusive, understanding, allows choice of movement, creative decisions and promotes athletes unleashing their own inner power. Powerhouse Parkour enables us to take our Parkour offering to a whole new level and I am so excited for its future.
Parkour and I have been on a journey. I was first introduced to the sport by two great friends, brilliant athletes and coaches of mine, Lawrence and Bam. Originally trained as a Women’s Artistic Coach, Parkour initially terrified me and took a while for me to understand that what I saw as ‘messy gymnastics’ initially, were in fact brilliant skills and new ways of moving! I have loved seeing what our parkour athletes can do and the innovative ways of moving around different pieces of equipment both inside and outside of the gym and I am thrilled to have created a safe space for our athletes to learn new skills. I’m so grateful to not only Lawrence and Bam but the entire Parkour community who have helped take me on this journey.
The other thing that I love about Powerhouse is it has created a space for 100’s of young people in our classes that have felt that other sports weren’t for them, not only have I seen this first hand, I regularly have parents contact me to say that Powerhouse has given their children a passion but most importantly a sense of belonging which is what the Parkour community and Star-Tastic group is all about.
One of the key things I learned from our parent survey was that people really loved our Parkour classes but wanted to see more classes, more options, further progression, badges and competitions within Parkour. With this in mind, I decided that Parkour needed to stand out from the Star-Tastic group with its own leadership team, bespoke branding and completely refreshed approach so that my team and I could really focus on parkour as its own entity. It is a very different sport from gymnastics and deserves its own recognition.
As a Member Organisation we have worked with Parkour UK, the governing body for Parkour, to refresh our classes, introduce a new development path for all of our athletes and further the development of our coaching team both inside and outside the gym. We have also launched a new range of Powerhouse merchandise and accessories as part of this too!
I am delighted to welcome you to Powerhouse Parkour and am excited to see the progress the athletes make in this new programme and to see confidence grow, new friendships develop and establish Powerhouse as a key part of the wider Parkour community.
Nyesha
Head of Powerhouse Parkour
Parkour is something I grew up around, I spent a lot of my time hanging around with friends who used to flip and jump around
with such freedom and diversity within their movement. As a gymnast, I was always taught to point my toes and present before and after every skill, but my friends taught me it was okay for it to not always look perfect or presented. Moving forwards to now, this is something that I love about Parkour, there is no real right or wrong answer, there are so many ways to move and express yourself and I don’t believe any other sport offers that. Parkour is such a unique thing to every individual and everyone has a different journey with it which speaks volumes for what we are able to teach our athletes.
WHAT IS PARKOUR
Starting in France back in the 1980s, Parkour is a sport that encourages self-improvement on all levels, revealing one’s physical and mental limits while simultaneously offering ways to overcome them. It is a method of training one’s body and mind in order to be as completely functional, effective and liberated as possible in any environment.
The sport aims to build confidence, determination, self-discipline, self-reliance, and responsibility for one’s actions. It encourages humility, respect for others and for one’s environment, self-expression, community spirit, and the importance of play, discovery and safety at all times.
*The above definition is taken from the Parkour UK website*
Parkour made its way over to the UK back in 2003 from the small French town of Lisses, following the popular Channel 4 documentary “Jump London”.
In the last 20 years, parkour has grown and developed with classes, facilities, brands, videos, competitions, and community organised events all becoming an integral part of the sport.
MEET THE TEAM
CLASSES
SCHEDULE
MINI PARKOUR
MINI PARKOUR
MINI PARKOUR
HOW TO FIND US
Rosebery School, White Horse Drive, Epsom KT18 7NQ