PARKOUR JAM @ Hyderabad

'An AMAZING and Exhilarating experience' is how one would describe the Jam that happened in the city recently.I am talking about 8th November, the day that saw one of the largest Parkour jams in the city of Hyderabad.There were a total of 21 people who turned up for the event. We had traceurs from all corners of the city and also from the other end of the country(NOS turned up for this jam from Mumbai). It was a cloudy and pleasant day - a perfect day for some action.
We had zeroed in on Golconda Fort as our venue. Now this place happens to be one of the archaeological landmarks of Hyderabad. It's a fort that was built in around the 16th century and has lots of well preserved walls, pillars, parapets and basically everything that made it worthy enough to be called a true 'Parkour Heaven'. So that day,from 9:00am until noon, the fort saw a bunch of around one and a half dozen energetic and super-charged guys jumping all over it.We had members of Team Karma in full attendance as well as members of Team Secret Fury, one man from team Nuts(Mumbai), and of course some like Kage,CJ and me were the ones who were there representing themselves and not any particular team. We all assembled at the venue and started our stretching and warm-ups as soon as we entered the premises of the fort.
We started first with a session of warm-ups that didn't last too long as most of the guys were very eager to start Parkour. A few wall-runs, leaps(minus the rolls), cat leaps, 360 cats, crane-jumps and more leaps(with rolls) were what made up our first stop session. Pretty soon, our acts started attracting a good crowd and they just watched in awe as we leapt, rolled and jumped from one spot to another. We continued further into the premises while practising some moves on the way.

Our second major stop was a place where there were huge lawns of soft green grass. The flipping-guys showed us how cool it looked when you flipped here. Many also tried leap and roll on the soft lawns as they leapt one after the other onto two rectangular patches of pretty wet grass (here, we had our first and a little worrisome injury as a traceur slipped on the grass and hit his head on the stone-border. He was dazed for a few minutes but then in the true spirit of PRKR...was back diving and jumping around).
Then it was the turn of the diving kong to challenge us. We found this really tempting place where only the brave tried their luck of getting the diving kong right. Many were initially unsuccessful but then with repeated attempts, most of them made the jump.
Moving on we came across a place where there was a high level wall(around 40 feet) which looked down onto a flat platform (which was the roof of a closed corridor). The guys climbed onto this high wall and made some daring jumps onto the lower level ...the move was spectacular but soon, the security guard started warning us of our safety.The boys however completed the jumps and proceeded over the lower level and finally hit ground level after a few more jumps. It was well choreographed and the moves were caught on tape from several different angles.
We finally ended up at a spot (in the photo) that had these various level pillars/supports (whatever you want to call them). It's a great place for PRKR and what we like to call 'PK heaven' spot. Here was a spot that had obstacles of all shapes, sizes and range. A beginner to a pro could practise out his moves here...and that's exactly what all of us did. We again attracted a fairly large crowd here. People were stopping and looking at us with those 'are these guys monkeys? or what?' look on their faces. And to a traceur, calling him a monkey can be a compliment. We practised for around forty-five minutes here before exhaustion finally caught up with us. Then it was time for the group-photo shoot and we shot some pretty decent photos that covered all the 21 people present at the jam.
It was then that the guys started feeling hungry. The clock had struck 12 and most of us hadn't had our breakfasts before coming here. So we finally wound up what I would like to call - our very-successful Jam session and headed out to grab a bite and head home.
The best thing about the jam was that people from all parts of the city came to know each other. We shared our experiences in PRKR and encouraged others to try out the daring moves. I was eager to meet other traceurs since the day I had stepped into this amazing and adrenaline-pumping world of PARKOUR, but so far had only managed to meet one or two other people who knew about PRKR. But now, post-jam, I had gotten to know so many new faces from my city itself, and it would be a shame not to say that most them are very talented. We practised together like a brotherhood, kept encouraging our fellow traceurs to try out different moves...all in all a big happy charged-up family.
peace!