Charles’ Parkour Training Blog

I have decided to use this wonderful opportunity to create a cost-benefit analysis for my 100 mile diet. In addition, I will be putting together simple posts such as this that will help outline certain products I buy and their relation to alternatives.

This article is about Yogurt: a wonderful major player in my new diet. After some browsing through the Abundance Co-op and Lori’s, we found this wonderful local dairy farm that not only makes raw milk cheese but amazing yogurt!

Now I’m sure most people know about Stonyfield yogurt. I’ll mention it briefly that Stonyfield does appear to be a decent alternative to most other forms of supermarket yogurt (gogurt?), but at what price? The ingredients sure sound nice:

Our Family Recipe: Cultured Pasteurized Organic Whole Milk, Pectin. Contains our Exclusive Blend of Six Live Active Cultures including L. Acidophilus, Bifidus, L. Casei and L. Reuteri.

However, doing some research, you’ll find that the Stonyfield family has forgone their farm and instead put up a huge factory. They buy organically produced powdered milk from other farms (There have been rumors of importing from New Zealand) and then ship it nationally. Is it organic? Sure. But they still emulate a good portion of the business model of industrial agriculture, harnessing the wonders of cheap oil. In addition, because of the role supermarkets play in Nutritionism and health food fads, finding a bucket of plain, whole milk yogurt is tough as stock is severely overshadowed by its nonfat alternative.

Stonyfield Plain Whole-milk Yogurt:  $3.69 + tax + damage to environment

Now let’s turn to a supermarket knock off: Wegman’s Super Yogurt!

This is a Wegman’s knock off of the Stonyfield product based on the same business model: organic ingredients, shipped from all over, low price. Wegman’s, although a “wholesome” family owned operation, is not innocent of buying into health fad marketing. This bottle is literally barfing with health claims:

43mg of EPA & DHA Omega 3 Fats!
Super Organics!
Powerful Nutrition!

Hell, the product name is “Super Yogurt.” Here is a list of ingredients:

If the picture is hard to read, it is as follows:

Cultured Pasteurized Grade A Organic Nonfat Milk, Organic Sugar, Organic Corn Starch, Organic Cream, Inulin (Dietary Fiber), Fish Oil (Anchovy, Sardine), Kosher Gelatin (Beef, Tilapia), Vitamin D3. Contains a Blend of Live and Active Cultures Including: L. Acidophilus, L. Bifidus, L. Casei, Probiotic Bifidobacterium Lactis.

This is a huge list. First off, the Wegman’s I live next to doesn’t sell a whole milk option. On the nutrition label, despite the 100 calorie serving size, and the label indicating only 10 calories from fat, 40 come from sugar alone. Add in the fiber and the small serving of fat and maybe you can slow absorption slightly. Yet, you cannot take away the fact that sugar is the second ingredient in this food product and as such, 40% of the calories come from sugar.

Apparently it’s a new fad to put fish oil into yogurt now. That way they can have that ad on the product label that takes up about 10% of the space. “43 mg of DHA and EPA.” Well what the heck are those? When I come out with my soon to be released Omega-3 article, you will know in better detail. For now though, EPA and DHA are readily available sources of omega-3 fatty acids. However, the label fails to tell us how much of what kind. To add to this, for those of you who don’t know, the least amount of recommended daily EPA and DHA intake is 650mg, however most other sources will tell you significantly higher values. 43 mg is barely enough to contribute.

Wegman’s “Super” Yogurt: $3.69 + tax + damage to environment

Meadow Creek Farms!

This is the yogurt we have been buying from both our local natural foods marts and our local farmer’s markets. I’ve tried Stonyfield and the Wegman’s alternative, and I will tell you nothing tastes better than this option. It has two simple ingredients:

Pasteurized Grade A Whole Jersey (cow) Milk, Cultures.

There’s not too much to say. They are a dairy farm about 60 miles away and have no interest in paying to become “certified organic.” Their cattle are Brown Jersey Cows that are raised free from antibiotics, artificial hormones, or pesticides. This is the plain option, however they also sell an incredibly delicious Maple yogurt which is made with local real maple syrup. With the plain, sometimes I’ll add a small spoon of local Summer blossom honey and it gives just the right amount of sweet taste.

This yogurt can be purchased at the Abundance Co-op or Lori’s for $3.75, or at the farmers market for $3.50. In addition, you get the benefits of helping out your local economy and putting your money into a system proud of its product and its operation.

Welcome Rochestarians!

Today Zac Cohn and I were invited by RNews’ Virginia Butler to do an interview regarding parkour. The piece was a great success and I want to thank Virginia for her welcoming and supportive attitude to our passion.

Sadly, most of the people I know don’t have a DVR nor do they watch TV so I had to settle for my D90. Apologies for the horrible quality!

RNews Interview – compress 2 from Charles Moreland on Vimeo.

For those that do not know:

Beginner’s Parkour Workshop in Rochester, NY – March 28th

Rochester Parkour is planning our second Beginner’s Parkour workshop. This is a free introduction, designed to inform and educate anyone interested in practicing Parkour. It’s targeted towards beginners, but we encourage more experienced members of the community to come as well.

We will be covering the basics of Parkour, including an introduction to proper conditioning, landings and precision jumps, quadrupedal movement, and basic vaulting. Rochester Parkour also emphasizes an importance on safety and slow, progressive training methodologies in all of our events and training sessions.

We encourage anyone interested in Parkour to attend. Whether it’s your first time out, or you’re already an experienced traceur, you’re sure to learn something – or at least have a good time!

Who can come: Anyone! Males or females of any age. Parents feel free to bring your kids. Kids, feel free to bring your parents!

Who is hosting: The event is being run by Zachary Cohn, one of the most experienced traceurs in the state. He is a member of the APK Alliance, a national group sponsored by American Parkour. He will be assisted by Charles Moreland and Jeff Whalley, two experienced and dedicated traceurs.

What: Workshop designed to teach beginners the fundamentals of Parkour training, while emphasizing safety and progression.

Where: The big field above the Ice Rink at Manhattan Square Park: 353 Court St. Rochester, New York, 14607.

When: March 28th, 2:30-4:00pm

Why: To learn about Parkour and to have a great time!

How much: This event is absolutely free! We will be selling Rochester Parkour T-shirts for $10 – all T-shirt sale proceeds will go toward building equipment (vaulting boxes, precision trainers) and our Spring trip to New York City (to be announced).

What you should bring: Bring comfortable clothing and layers. We can’t control the weather, and we will be outside! Bring comfortable but athletic shoes (sneakers, running shoes, skater shoes, etc). If you haven’t already filled out and turned in a waiver, please print out and fill out this waiver and bring it with you.

Most importantly, bring a positive attitude and the expectation of having a great time!!

For more information, email info@rochesterparkour.com.

Charles

As most of you know, aside from my time spent as a traceur and a fitness advocate, I am also an employed personal trainer at my university’s gym. Sometimes I enjoy my work, and other times I feel horrible that I am part of an industry that makes its billions by misleading the general community as to what it means to be “healthy” or “fit.” This is one of those cases.

After a slight scheduling error with a client of mine, I found myself with an hour of time and no idea how to spend it. After some lounging around, a few Oly lifts and some muscle ups, I ventured my way back to the desk to find this magazine lying on the counter:

Fitness Magazine appears to be one of the many well known magazines that run a campaign based on good deeds, up to date health and fitness, and hope for their subscribers. This particular magazine enticed me in as one of their headlining articles was “Fitness Magazine’s 3rd Annual Healthy Food Awards!” I know better, but given the wide popularity of my “Planet Fitness. Scam.” article, I would like to share my thoughts.

The article can be found here and to demonstrate my point I want to go through this list with you and help you realize a very important trend. 50 Foods, not a one of them is actually food. No, the Reduced fat “natural” peanut butter is not real food. No, sir. Neither is the sliced ham, black bean burger, fruit chunks, or the “nature” chocolate chip cookies.

All of these food products are all highly processed, highly manufactured imitations of what food actually is. Yet a wide majority of them advertise in their name the buzz-words: Nature, natural, fiber, whole wheat, organic, fresh (there’s nothing fresh about them), healthy, or 100 calorie!

There is nothing healthy about these products and their ingredients labels are literally cluttered with chemical compounds that I’m convinced most chemists cannot pronounce. And yet, these people know the right answers. In fact, only several issues ago, they interviewed Michael Pollan and asked him his stance on food and what it means to eat healthily, and yet, none of his knowledge can be found in this magazine. This is the explanation for this inconsistency:

Fitness magazines are not created to help you become more knowledgable or more fit.

It’s against their business model. They are there to make money and if you were to learn the awful truth that there is nothing to sell in the health and fitness industry, you would no longer buy. Fitness magazine is a magazine full of well placed ads for their sponsors. It’s not obvious, I know. Everyone who buys magazines knows to shut your brain off when those big full page ads for Edy’s Ice Cream pop up, but the articles?

The articles are advertisements and the articles are big business. A fitness magazine with a subscriber base such as Fitness has a lot of market potential and power. Put an ad in, and demand has a potential to increase. Get a positive article, and you’re sitting in advertisement gold. This entire list is an advertisement for industrialized companies that sell products based on health fads. Low-fat this. Low calorie that. *

Here is a link to the nutritional data for 1 cup of raw kale. 33 calories?! Highly anti-inflammatory? 684% of your daily Vitamin K? I dare you to eat another cup of this and not feel full. Why is it hard to find this in a nationwide publication? Because the person selling kale lives in a house, down the road, and tends his small farm. He/she grows it, probably organically, and trucks it off to your local farmer’s market every couple of days to sell to you. He has no corporate sponsor. Answers to no industry. He doesn’t have some huge office building and I guarantee you he doesn’t feel the need to pay for adveritsement in a fitness magazine.

Knowing this, however, let’s go back and explore the wording used by these very clever editors.

Only nationally available products qualified.

or

Healthiest packaged foods.

These words are meant to confuse you. We live in a nation of multiple climates and regions. Not one locally produced good will always be available in every region. Thus, they must settle for industrially produced processed goods that can be packaged and shipped across the United States. To ship products in this way is only accomplished through massive processing to remove the food from it’s nutrients in an attempt to lengthen shelf-life. These foods are calories and calories only. Not nutrients. This list proved nothing, told you nothing, so you learned nothing.

Every purchase you make to these magazine companies is just money spent on pretty pictures, advertisements, and wasted paper. Cancel your subscription and go give that money to one of your local farmers, who have been growing and selling “Low-Calorie!” and “Healthy!” produce for generations. It does not have long shelf-life. It rots when you leave it out too long. It takes time and care to prepare. But, it is the only fool-proof method to eat healthy.

*The opinions presented here are that of myself and myself alone. If you would like to prove me wrong with facts, please present them through email and I will be more than happy to re-word this article.

Since undertaking the Summer pledge, most meals I have been preparing have been pretty close to 100% local. This meal I am going to share with you is a simple meal and was my first true, local, meal.

It starts with a farmer’s market and on Saturdays Leah and I make our way to the busy market to find our friendly neighborhood good food growers. Each market visit, we usually spend a good deal of time at the Heiden Valley Farms table where our wonderful beef farmer sets up shop. The sale takes less than 30 seconds, and yet we seem to cause a huge back-up as our conversation takes no less than 5-10 minutes. This is where the difference starts: Upon shaking Jim’s hand, a secret and unspoken bond has formed between us. It is the close relationship of a grower to a consumer.

Small talk leads to talk, and each and every consecutive purchase leads to not only business, but friendship. My friendship with my wondful local beef farmer fosters a healthy environment that not only boosts satisfaction, but also food quality. Where would the farmer’s incentive to cut corners be if he personally knew and shook hands with the person/people he or she sells their products to?

Red leaf kale is something that grows abundantly in the Rochester area and you’ll be hard pressed not to find any form of kale at any market. Kale is a wonder plant I discovered several years ago and have been munching on ever since.

In my CSA box, I was given several different things this week, including an interesting beet like vegetable I’ve never seen before. Here is the CSA difference: surprise and creativity! By switching local, I have so far tested and tried 12 new species of plants that I have never tried before. Beets! Radishes! Turnips, spinach, broccoli, tiny-red-root-things-I-don’t-know-what-they-are! Spinach and broccoli may seem strange to some people, but what most don’t realize is that there are sometimes dozens or hundreds of different species of a single plant. A Super-Market finds it economical to only carry one species, but go to a normal market, and you’ll find several variations!

This was our meal:

A 1# Sirloin Steak (100% grass fed and pastured) covered in Beet dices and wrapped in leaves of Red Leaf Kale and baked. Green Peas and locally produced spices including black pepper, salt, cardamom, etc. with a “Very” Blueberry wine from the Finger Lakes.

The difference doesn’t just come from the taste. It comes in the security and the knowledge that you are also supporting your local economy.

It’s been a while since my last update and as always I apologize. My computer time has become very minimal compared to what it used to and probably won’t be changing anytime soon. Luckily, I’ve developed the habit of spending much of this time reading books and I’ve changed significantly as a person and a human being. (Look forward to my upcoming series: Books that Define Me!)

In my conquest to become a more and more well rounded individual, I have shifted my focus not only into nutrition, but also into sustainability. This knowledge has caused a huge change in maturity and has shifted my thinking.

Because of this, Leah and I are undergoing a Summer long challenge to only eat locally produced food. This means no mangoes, no bananas, no cereal, oats, rice, etc. We joined a local CSA which delivers produce every Friday. The rest of our food comes from farmers we find at the local farmer’s markets or local produce found at our close-by organic foods mart and Co-op.

In a follow up post I will have pictures and prices for the kinds of foods I am eating, but for now here is a mock up list:

Green Garlic – CSA
Radishes – CSA
Beets – CSA
Spinach – CSA and farmers market
Strawberries – CSA
Green lettuce – CSA
Rainbow Chard – CSA
Sweet peas – CSA
Kale (red/green curly) – CSA, Lori’s, Farmer’s market

Apples (many varieties) – Farmer’s Market
Blueberries (almost in season) – probably from the farmer’s market
Turnips – Lori’s
Red Romaine lettuce – Lori’s
Scallions – farmer’s market, Lori’s, Co-op

Whole Milk – Lori’s, Co-op
Raw milk cheddar cheese – Lori’s, Co-op, farmer’s market
Yogurt (many varieties) – Lori’s, Co-op, Farmer’s market

Eggs – Fresh brown eggs from a farmer right down the street
Wine – Farmer’s market

Meat -

Meat is going to be an entirely separate post. For now, I get my animal protein from a beef farmer from Heiden Farms. He always has ground beef, however, because his production is limited (as it should be), he doesn’t always have the same cuts every week. His meat is completely grass-fed and pastured.

Again, everything listed is locally produced and given most of the produce is bought from farmer’s markets, most of the money is going straight back to him.

So far I am extremely happy with the initial results and I will continue to update what kinds of foods I am buying/eating as well as bills and expenses.

EDIT – For some reason WordPress deleted this post so it is being re-posted. Apologies.

“You, uhh…have no squat racks…”

“We have Smith machines. They work just as good.”

“I noticed no pull up bars either…”

“Oh! Off to the right there you’ll see some Lat Pulldown machines. They’re designed better.”

“….right…uhm, what is that?”

“That’s the no judgement button! Here at Planet Fitness, we strive to maintain a positive exercising environment by…”

“Thanks…I think I’m gonna go…”

This was pretty much the conversation I had with the attendant working at Henrietta’s new Planet Fitness in SouthTown Plaza. I had decided to go visit after doing some research online for possible Summer jobs. This gym opened up just a couple of weeks ago, and I figured it might be okay to check out. My research brought me to their website first, where I found this:

I was in shock. No weight dropping, grunting, or chalk. How could this be? Now I totally understand the argument against it and I agree it can be obnoxious at times. But when you see the super tanned, beer bellied, “new haircut” pricks screaming their asses off from shoulder shrugs, you simply giggle to yourself and go on your merry way. Apparently this is intimidating to some.

I had to see this for myself. So yesterday I took the time to waltz my way over to their location to assure myself it wasn’t as bad as it seemed. Boy was I wrong…

Upon entering my ears were hit first by god-awful techno music that was roughly equivalent to the sound of nails scraping a chalk board. I took a glnce over to the workout area to my left, and immediately snapped my head back. I was going to leave, but the wonderfully perky attendant behind the counter had already spotted me. I’m going to refer to him as Tad.

I walked up slowly, introduced myself and stated my reason for being there. All I wanted to do was look around. He offered his “services” for a full tour and I quickly declined. Off I went to explore this crazy world of yellow and purple.

The first thing to catch my eye was what appeared to be an endless wall of cardio equipment: bikes, treadmills, ellipticals, everything you could want and plenty of them! I was in a cardio nightmare. The opposite wall literally barfed television and each machine had its own pair of headphones. Next was the weight machines. Literally, there was one machine for every single muscle in the body. Tricep push downs, tricep extensions! I kid you not, there was probably a weight machine designed specifically for the anterior deltoid, only. The further I walked, the worse it became. I rounded a corner only to come face to face with my arch-nemesis: The Smith Machine!!!

Only one of them was being used by a misguided, significantly overweight gentleman who was quarter squatting what seemed like 350+ pounds on his toes. I kept walking to find two…let me repeat…two benches and one set of dumbells. The dumbells stopped at 65 lbs and there were only a pair for each weight. I felt insulted. But this hit was immediately overshadowed by what I saw next:

I kid you not, they actually use this. When you grunt, drop weights, tap dumbells, or anything else that may draw attention to you, Tad will merrily make his way over to you, press that button and tell you to stop being a Lunk. I had to get out of here…

After my very brief follow up with Tad, I simply turned around and walked out the door. I still have no idea how something like “fitness” could become so misguided, and this experience was by far the worst example I have ever seen from a “globogym.” It left an awful taste in my mouth and the following day I went back to my gym and did a Fran where I huffed and puffed, grunted when the weight got hard, and encouraged others to do the same.

Sadly, those people who continue to fund Planet Fitness may never understand the continuum they are now trapped in. You simply cannot baby a person to better health or fitness and when society realizes that, well, the world might be a different and better place. From the words of Ronnie Coleman, “Everybody wanna be a bodybuilder, but nobody wanna lift no heavy ass weights!” As little desire as I have to be a bodybuilder, Ronnie’s statement remains true.

A short insight: The fitness industry continues to rake in billions and billions a year by exploiting this key character flaw amongst many in our society. Everybody wants to have a 6-pack and everybody wants to look like a model, but the drive to attain this goal is non-existant. So they keep up faith that there is a way to cheat and make it there without staring at that 300 pound barbell, getting under it, and squatting it. I urge you to be different.

Sleep - Only about 3.5 hours…I need to work on this

Warm up -

supersonic oasis

500m row 1:34

Work Out- (pressed for time)

Squats

• airsquat x 10
• 135# x 5
• 185# (High Bar Position) x5
• 255# (Low Bar) 3×5

OAC (right arm only)

• 3×3 3 finger assisted, slow negatives

No dips because the gym has yet to replace the weight belt…sigh…

Front Lever

• Adv Tuck 1 minute – 12-15 second holds

Deadlifts

• 135# x 5
• 185# x 5
• 225# x 5
• 275# x 5 (New PR)
• 295# x 5 (New PR)

 

I was pressed for time today so didn’t get too much in. The weight belt not being replaced is really starting to piss me off. I would love to get back on the road to my 2xbw dip. Squats didn’t feel too bad although still fairly light. I wish I could get back into my normal schedule and squat every other day, but work and school has been consuming my life.

I didn’t set out to PR today in the deadlift, but I was cutting in with another guy today, and after doing the set of 275# and realizing how easy it was I decided to push it further. The 295# was definitely heavy but not “hard.” I’m excited to see where this goes. 

I’ll update my equilibre practice tomorrow. Need to rest the right shoulder (supraspinatus). I’ve been pushing it kind of hard.

“You’re pretty thin for a weight lifter..” exclaimed the border patrol agent. I smiled and calmly replied, “I guess I’m deceiving, officer.” He gave me an interesting look, paused, and turned back, a smirk coming to his thin lips. “Show me your hands.” I chuckled to myself and did as I was directed…

 

 

“Yeah…you weight lift…” was his reply. “Go on through. I hope your friend is okay.”

 

Alright, so it wasn’t really a lie I gave to the fine young gentleman that protects our nation’s borders. I was, in fact, in Canada for the weekend to “exercise” and a parkour jam could, technically, be referred to as a “seminar.” I understood how strange it would be to not only have to explain parkour to an already suspicious-by-nature federal agent, but to also be driving a vehicle not registered in mine or any immediate relative’s name. But these are the twists I must deal with in my life and I never imagined the injuries my left hand sustained this weekend would make my explanation easier when crossing the border. Sometimes things just work out…

 

This past weekend’s turmoil took place at none other than The Monkey Vault, a unique parkour gym owned by Daniel Iaboni in Toronto, Ontario. Toronto is an easy three and a half hour drive across the border from Rochester and we figured it was time to take some of the RocPK kids for an adventure. We packed our bags and set out late Friday afternoon.

 

After dealing with the border patrol grilling us to find out more about what parkour was and why we were traveling to Canada for it, as well as several wrong turns, we finally arrived at our destination. The gym was nothing at all what I expected.

 

Danno’s gym is everything you could possibly dream about when you think of a hole in the wall “gymnasium” that does it right. Upon entering, you will be hit with the sight of gymnastics, bouldering, and parkour all coming together to make a wonderful training friendly environment. Much of the bottom floor is covered in expensive gymnastics style spring flooring accompanied by a medium sized foam pit (conveniently located under the second floor balcony!). In the back is a small bouldering area that wraps its way around much of the right wall. The rest is rather undeveloped still.

 

Upstairs you’ll find a quaint, but entirely functional barbell lifting area equipped with a squat rack, pull up/dip/leg raise machine, bench station, and a GHR (as well as assorted dumbells, kettlebells, and medicine balls). Also upstairs is a full bathroom with a shower that spews nothing but Canada’s finest freezing water. I forgot to get a shot of the upstairs, so here’s Zac sleeping!

 

When I arrived, the others were already waiting patiently in a circle, eager to start moving around. We started with a dynamic core workout which looked something like this:

 

3 Rounds 10-20-30 of:

 

Reclined explosive knee raises (I’ll explain this in a later article)

V-Ups

Toe touches

Candlestick raises (explain later as well)

 

V-Ups killed me and this is the first time I have experienced abdominal DOMS in a very long time. We moved onto the lower body and began doing box jump circuits which tranistioned into tic-tac rebound training where we had to tic-tac from one wall and double leg bound to the opposite wall in as little leaps as possible. After this, Danno placed a vaulting box in our path and instructed us to tic-tac and box jump onto the box utilizing only one jump.

 

It was late and we were all tired. One by one we fell asleep inside the gym.

 

Saturday came and we woke up to the disturbing sight of parking tickets. Jesse and I grabbed a shovel and hammer respectively and began smashing away at the wall of ice that was blocking the way to safe parking. Once the situation was handled we headed off into Toronto for some quick breakfast before bouldering.

 

We spent about two hours at the rock gym and I managed, as I usually do with bouldering, to give it my all until I physically cannot grab a hold. I have an issue with obessing over bouldering problems until I have them complete and this one was particularly frustrating. I was too short to make the reach presented below and each time was required to lose my footing and jump to the next hold with my left hand. I accomplished this several times. My final attempt at completing the problem seemed promising but my strength was gone. I fell to find that the final attempt had demolished my left hand and left several, large open wounds.

 

We were met back at the gym with some younger PKTO traceurs who were already practicing and training. I joined in with the others after tending to my wounds. This part of the session was very loose and open and involved much creativity. Instead of explaining I will simply post a series of photos taken during the session.

 

 

The session was fun and exciting, but not without consequence as one of our own, Sam Owen, would come to sustain a devasting broken ankle. I hold Sam in high regard and have nothing bad to say of him as I’m sure he has learned his lesson, however, I do feel a need to reach out and express to my readers that while flips, tumbling, and tricking are fun and exciting…they are dangerous and taxing to the body and need to be assessed as such. Your body requires a lot of time to adapt to the strain you place on it and as a beginning traceur you should always take the time to step back and make sure you are not progressing faster than your body can handle.

 

 

 

“That’s a bitch of a circuit,” the mastermind of that night’s upper body pain mumbled upon completing his final round. Saturday carried on that day’s emphasis on upper body annhialation with a circuit around the gymnastics floor. This next video is Danno’s final round. Don’t judge him; This round was completed after four previous rounds and was his first try at RTO (Rings turned out) Dips.

 

 

Danno’s Monster Arm-Annhialating Circuit from Charles Moreland on Vimeo.

 

 

Jesse and I ran off into the chill Toronto air to find a feast as others slowly passed into slumber. When we returned, Graham, our wonderful EMT-trained friend, informed us that Sam’s ankle was not getting better and was probably broken. Sam needed to get to a hospital. Graham took Sam back across the border that night and left the keys in my hands. “This should be interesting…” I sighed.

 

Sunday was a rather lazy day and the rest of RocPK, minus Zac, Jesse, and myself, took off early. Not before Adam, the new recruit to the crew, beat the gym’s current pull up record, completing a not-too-shabby 23 pull ups before falling. After the crew departed, Danno jumped in our (Sam’s) car and took us to Cloud Gardens to give us a horrible teaser as to what to expect from the big Toronto jam at the end of July. I felt like a kid in a toy store…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On the ride there, Danno showed us the major spots that Toronto housed, and by major spots, I mean entire blocks and entire streets of hot spots. Toronto is a traceur’s dream come true with hotspots in literally every direction you turn. It is no longer a wonder in my mind as to why this city has such a massive and thriving community.

 

 

 

With that, we said out goodbye’s and were on our way back to the parkour desert that is Rochester, NY. Toronto is simply a dream for me and the friendships made there during our short visit will surely be taken to heart. Danno’s attitude toward training is greatly inspiring and I cannot wait for July to roll around.

 

I want to extend my deepest gratitude to Danno and the PKTO traceurs we met along the way that made our adventure so exciting and beneficial. You have my greatest appreciation.

 

Charles

 

Small workout on rings last night in place of my usual morning workout:

Warm Up -

30 second upper straight arm support
10 normal dips
10 half BW pullups

Work Out -

3×5 RTO dips (these never seem to get easy…)
1 minute pseudo-adv tuck planche 12 reps
1 minute adv tuck front lever 5 reps 
3×3 false grip pull ups

OAHS practice – New progression! Finally made the jump from two finger assist to one finger. I’ll probably video this soon. My progress on the new program has been fast, but not without consequence. Experiencing some slight wrist soreness on my right hand. I’m going to have to wrap it and let it sit for a few days.

I was actually extremely impressed with my strength in the advanced tuck front lever position. My first hold was somewhere along the lines of 15 seconds. My pull into FL I can stop statically for about 2-3 seconds now and my straddle is only around 6-7 seconds. I’ll be training my adv tuck more often until my straddle or jackknife variant becomes stronger.

Video soon of my OAHS progress.

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