Training Parkour and Avoiding Injuries
I’ve been training parkour hardcore in the last 2 years and in this period of time I’ve learned about injuries in the hard way. Now I have back pain and weakened ligaments as a result of twisting my ankles repeatedly for 5 or 6 times in few months.
Why did this happen?
When I think about it, much of what happened was really not necessary and could be avoided if I had done few things differently, and not only would I have been injury free, but I would be in better physical shape along with having better skills in parkour.
Firstly, I didn’t have any instructors that stressed the importance of warming up, we were a big group of stupid people, for some reason, nobody did proper warmups. Parkour is a really risky discipline and warmups are CRITICAL, if people that train basketball or tennis can do proper warmups before their training then we as tracers MUST, especially when you compare the risks of injury from parkour those of tennis or basketball.
Secondly, I didn’t care much about my landings. For some reason, I found it easier to land without doing rolls or without caring too much about absorbing the shocks of my landing.
The third reason was that I didn’t think much about my parkour shoes. Basically, my parkour shoes were my everyday walking shoes, without any cushioning, sensitivity and stability.
Low shock absorption = back pain problems
Low sensitivity and stability = Twisting my ankles and weakened ligaments
So in only 2 years I managed to completely screw up my body, however… the last 3-4 months I’ve been training with new parkour shoes, FOCUSED on developing proper landing techniques instead of learning to do flashy FLIPS and the results are amazing…
However I wish I started doing this before I got my injuries because I would have progressed faster, got stronger and would have been healthier right now, instead there is a high chance that I will have problems with my back trough the rest of my life, the weakened ligaments problem is not that bad and I can control it by using more stable shoes that won’t tip over.
Every lesson comes with a price, I hope that this article will help you get it at a discount!
Conclusion:
10 – 20 minute warmups before you start training, and slowly progress towards the more challenging things the end of your training session.
Focus on creating perfect landing techniques, that is the most important aspect of your parkour training.
Get the shoes for parkour
