First of all, it has been a couple of weeks and a bit since my back went and the injury is still bad enough to stop most forms of training. Things which include weights or quick movements I generally can't do so that doesn't leave me with a lot. Bodyweight conditioning you say? Nah, even that puts too much strain on my back... I may do the odd 50 press ups and try a couple of handstands etc but repetition of this leads to aggravation and will be like this for another couple of weeks at least I recon. So this sucks big time and I have to say it is the worst place to get an injury as it effects both upper and lower body movement. I have been racking my brain to try and come up with a solution of how to get something good out of my time...
I have spent the last few jams almost entirely teaching and although I enjoy this and I enjoy seeing the advancements others make (they are like brothers to me :P) it is still no fun doing this all day. I have been spending a lot of time with 'the noobs' over the last couple of weeks pushing them into better training and parkour. It has been good fun socialising with different guys for a change and their improvements were quite outstanding. I will definately be spending more time with them when my back is better and I can actually show them how to do something rather than try to just explain it - or do it badly and hurt my back in the process.
I met with those guys along with Liam on Thursday as I had feck all esle to do and Liam invited me on MSN. Turned out to be a fun productive day. I managed a few vaults on the red rails at the art gallery and even though there was nothing flashy or big I still got a "wow" from Sonic who was mearly impressed with my bodyform and technique when executing various lazy vaults. It was good to know I could still make such an impression on someone even when so hampered. Needless to say I spend the next bit of my life teaching him lazy techniques. I ended up doing crap loads of palmspins on rails as well as they didn't hurt my back and I was teaching another guy how to do them. Was good, and I gained a bit from doing it.
On my way home on the bus I decided to set myself a little challenge of crawling all the way home from the bus stop - a good half mile. I have been following Jin's blog (find the link on the right) and he keeps posting about his cat crawling training. I have never really done much and only really toyed with the idea but half knew it would be too bad on my back. Anyways I set off freezing my tits off and a bag on (didn't help at all) but soon warmed up due to the intenseness of the exercise. I could manage to do 100m slowly without stopping but any further or faster and it was very hard and very intense - I loved it. I got all the way home after 25 minutes but stoped a few times - not for longer than 30s (as I wasn't out of breath) but enough to give my shoulders and thighs the slight rest they needed.
It is definately something I will be doing a lot more of.
That along with barefoot training... On Saturday morning I decided I would not put any footwear on at all and to 'train' barefoot the whole day. The only reason being my back was (is) still bad enough to stop me training and I thought this to be a great way of getting something out of the day. I set off from home (with some wierd looks from my parents) only wearing a pair of trackies and a necklace feeling fecking great. I had such a sense of freedom. Needless to say I got more funny looks on the bus and even more walking through town
But when I arrived at the art gallery everyone there also gave me funny looks... they were laughing at the fact I was topless already but couldn't understand why I had no shoes on. It was only 'the noobs' there but I still expected a little more from them. Everytime someone asked me why I had no footwear on I simply asked them why they did have trainers on. Not one of them was actually intelegent enough to answer me so I answered my own question telling them it was to protect their feet - as opposed to "because everyone else does" which is the only answer I got from most - eee dear. I then went on to say that they only need to protact their feet because thats what their feet are used to and I am letting my feet get stronger so I don't have to rely on trainers.
As I have only really toyed with this before I soon discovered how beneficial it is to training as well. After reading Blanes latest post (IF YOU HAVEN'T ALREADY, READ IT NOW! - LINK ON THE RIGHT) I had a new view on training and barefoot training highlighted these views. Ed will know what I mean when I say this as he joined me at the art gallery and took his trainers off along with Deccers but I don't think he took it as serious. I was dissapointed to see so many people being so closed minded over the idea, even Alistair who apparently trains barefooted in his garden all the time refused to take his trainers off :\ Anyways - back to my point... I soon realised that even the simplest of landings were no where near taken for granted. Something as simple as vaulting a rail needed serious concentration whilst landing and through that good techniques are forced upon you and you pick up a hell of a lot of respect for what you put your body through when training. Like with the crawling this is something I will be doing more of.
I spent all day changing techniques for walking as after a good few hours my feet were getting rather sore. It didn't help when we ventured to a new area which meant lots of walking along rough tarmaced pathways at the end of the day when my feet were the most painful. The walk home from the bus stop (my feet were too sore to crawl) was also over rough tarmac and very gruelling. Today my feet were still quite bruised - especially on the balls, and part of me wishes I had taken a pair of trainers in my bag and put them on when my feet were getting bad but then it wouldn't have been a challenge at all so I am happy with what I acheived.
Some footage I got from Thursday + a couple of clips of Ed from last
Sat - Youtube has converted the widescreen into 4:3 and it looks a bit gay but you get the idea.
Wayne did this bail only a couple of minutes after I arrived on Thursday. After seeing a couple of sketchy gainers done by a couple of 'the noobs' Wayne said he had just done one as well and got up to show me another... this is what happened...
This has got to be one of the worse bails I have ever seen but actually looks worse on the video. Wayne, thankfully was okay and though he was pretty disorientated for a while only really suffered a sore neck and shoulders - he was pretty okay again by Sat.
I have quite a bit of footage from this sat - mainly of tricking (there was about 30 of us chilling out in a small park, tricking, socialising, enjoying the good weather for about an hour or so... was actually really good and I can't wait for more good weather like this). I will upload the footage as soon as I can be bothered :)
Peace
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If I'd've got there earlier (fecking replacement bus service) then I would've definatley joined in in the barefoot. As it was we already spent far less time at the Art Gallery than I would've liked, I didn't even get to see the library end all day. For me it came down to the distinction that I can train barefoot movements and toughen my feet up at home wheras I can't do the sort of movements avaialable to me at the Art Gallery at home. And yes I do do a fair bit at home, about 3-4 hours a week. In summer I'll definatley be trying much more barefoot in Leeds because I won't feel like every time in Leeds I'm a man on a mission with very little time to accomplish it. I was thinking, once we can survive a barefoot session on the moors, we'll know we're making progress!
The reason for going barefoot at the art gallery wasn't for toughening up your feet, it was for gaining a new respect for what you do to your body and in the process being forced into better landing techniques. Like you said you can't do the movements availiable at the gallery at home, that was why it was important that you went barefoot there.
As for the Moors, I would have definately been there at least twice these holls if it weren't for my back. I can't actually wait to get back there!
Peace
Hate to remind you Scott but it was me who was the first person to ever go barefoot at the Art Gallery back last summer. Hollie joined in and everoyne else was like "wtf are you doing" and then eventually they sort of got it. I fondly remember doing passe murailles and reveling at how surprisngly bad the grip of bare feet is. That was also when I ended up doing a precision off the Library wall barefoot and you accepting that maybe I had a point that my landings did work. You also all took the piss, and hid my shoes when I went barefoot at the undercover spot earlier on this year. Likewise I didn't see anyone join in when me and Hollie went barefoot at the church late last year, or whilst everyone else was tricking on the grass a few weeks ago when I did some parkour movements barefoot once I got bored of the tricking. So don't act all noble about it as if none of us have done any barefoot before in our lives, we don't all have to train exactly the same stuff as you at the same time as you, pfft. And I don't need all of the Art Gallery to work on landing barefoot, I have sufficient stuff to work with in my garden and along with toughening up the feet, that's the other primary aim of training barefoot for me.
The art gallery is, in my eyes, the best place for barefoot training (note: Not in the sense to toughen feet). The stone is hard but not too harsh - perfect for what I wanted to achieve. I doubt your garden has the same oppotunity for movement as the art gallery, along with different surfaces not as suited to this sort of training.
Why would the fact you went barefoot those times have anything to do with Saturday? Fact is I was trying to show you something about a mental state of parkour, and you outright refused to learn despite the fact you are always wanting me to help you with your parkour. Very uncool in my oppinion, like I said in the post.
What the fuck is with the mention of "accepting that maybe I had a point that my landings did work" - Not the place man, we discussed this in detail last night *raises a brow*
The fact I took the piss by hiding your trainers also bares no relavense to this, besides the fact I was hardly beiing serious, I didn't take the piss because you were barefoot - plainly just an easy oppotunity to have fun *smiles*
I'm perfectly aware of what it's like to move barefoot at the Art Gallery, having done so several times last summer. You just have this expectation that we will all follow you and train exactly like you all the time. Can you not accept that for me in the limited time I was there, I wanted to get that armjump done for the sake of proving to myself I was justified in thinking I could do it. I would've been up for barefoot afterwards but by that point everyone had moved on.
There's no real point in me arguing with you because you're obviously convinced as usual that you're right on this. I just don't appreciate your very thinly veiled diggs at me and why you talk about me in such a derisory tone because I didn't want to train how you were doing at that particular moment in time. And I have a pretty damn good appreciation about what you're talking about there and I've been advocating using barefoot training to improve landings and biomechanics for a lot longer than you have.
And I've been talking to Helena, she actually wants to start parkour but she was so put off by you taking the piss out of her constantly when Hollie was teaching her that she doesn't want to do anything on saturdays with everyone around anymore. Way to destroy someone's confidence before they've even barely begun. We're going to sort out some smaller teaching sessions so that she can learn in a more friendly enviroment. You really need to reconsider your attitude to other people, we're pretty thick skinned and used to your style of taking the piss out of everyone as a form of telling them how to improve. But that doesn't mean that's the right way of doing things and lately you just take things too far sometimes and come off as incredibly arrogant. I appreciate what you've done for me and my parkour but you need to accept that you can learn from other people just as much as they can learn from you and you need to be more constructive and less offensive.
If you've got more to say, let's take this to msn.
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