Parkour is a French term and a survival discipline that has its roots in France. The concept was made during World War 1 by George Hebert to escape from enemies in the quickest way possible.
The phenomenon by George Hebert was later adopted by Raymond Belle in his Fire fighting tactics. He later taught this discipline to two of his disciples including his own son David Belle (founder of Parkour) and Sebastian Foucan (founder of free running).
In the last few years Parkour discipline has got quite some media hype. Even in Pakistan many new Parkour groups are emerging that train in different areas. But due to shortage of proper equipment and facilities, we are making a list of places that you can find in Karachi to train your Parkour skills.
So, these are the list of some of the places. If you live in Karachi do not forget to visit them.
Safari park:
Who doesn’t know safari park, which is if you live in Karachi. Safari Park is the best place to train in any discipline, may it be martial arts, gymnastics or escape tactics like Parkour.
There are tons of obstacles available from vaults, precisions to advance tricks like 12 foot wall climbs, mountain running, cat leaps and more. Just go and explore it up.
Do not forget the timings for individuals are 6am – 8 am every morning.
KMC complex:
Many do not know about KMC complex. KMC complex is situated at Kashmir Road. The place is free and is best if you go there in weekdays. As on Sundays there is a lot of crowd in the complex.
You can do warm-up exercises anywhere in the complex. But for tougher exercises, the most suitable place for you will be the tennis court. Last time when we headed there, we did precisions from one cabin to another in tennis court and tried to wall run on the inner tennis court walls but failed. As the wall is 12 foot high.
Aziz Bhatti Park – Nipa:
Aziz Bhatti Park is an ordinary park like other parks in Karachi. But the addition of dozen of monkey bars makes it prominent for Parkour. The park is small and has a pond just besides it (avoid that pond). You can do some muscle up movements and train your upper body through monkey bars, hand to bar precisions and jumps and rolls. Though be careful not to cut your hands by sharp sprinters on monkey bars (wear safety gloves). Moreover do try Kong jumps and dive rolls on stairs and sand on farther side of the park.
Frere hall:
We do not train there but one of the pioneers Neil Uchong does. He has some videos of frère hall where he is shown training. So, for the record you can train there, if you live near high court or Marriot.
All obstacles are available and you can create some of your own just do not forget to take permission from guards or try to avoid them.
You can do prince of Persia, king vaults, precisions climbs and much more.
Bin Qasim park:
Some of our friends went there for training and they told us that these places are quite rich in obstacles. So, if you live somewhere near Park towers or in Clifton head to Bin Qasim Park and start your training there.
The park is spread in a large area so you can train in sprinting, wall climbs, vaults and obviously precision and jumps.
Clifton Beach:
Let’s not forget the Karachi beach. If you can find some empty spots you can train there in flips, precision (precision in sand can increase your jumps a lot) and many more obstacles. But as beaches do not have urban environment so keep that in mind. Many martial art practitioners in Karachi head to the beach every weekend.
So, these are the list of some of the places where you can do Parkour in Karachi. If you live in Karachi do not forget to visit them.
And remember, Parkour is shortest distance between two points. So, if you are afraid that you do not know some tricks like doing flips, jumps or precisions, don’t do them. Try harder and you will learn them soon. Inshallah!
[…] face it Parkour was originally developed to bring an instinct of survival not madness that leads to disaster but […]