2012/2013 has been one of the most challenging years of my Parkour career to date. Anyone who knows me will know that I picked up a shoulder injury in Kickboxing at the end of September last year....

Movement is a lot like language: to be able to utilise it you must understand the alphabet, know how to organise letters into words and then how to combine those words using grammar and syntax to create sentences. The letters alone are useless, only sentences enable fluency and function; equally, ill-formed and incomplete sentences, poorly spelt and constructed, are clumsy, confusing and ineffective.

 The physical and mental benefits of Parkour are pretty evident to most. Coupling this with strength and conditioning regimes offers a great balance in physical fitness and health. But what about the food you eat after a hard day of training? What about the snacks munched mid-session to keep energy levels up? Is what we are eating contributing to good health or is our food weakening us and hampering our efforts.

This review came about because a few of us in the team like to play with Fat Gripz in our physical training. We saw they were launching a new fatter version (the Fat Gripz Extreme) and so approached them. In exchange for a trial of the new product this review came about.

So what are Fat Gripz (Extreme)?

I was on a course earlier this year to qualify as a personal trainer, and the guy taking the course was a gentleman named Greg Isaacs. I'm sure he'd be the first to admit that he was a bit of a character, and I learned a lot from him, not only about training but about your attitude to life and people as well. It was a good experience for me.

It's 2013 and I'm increasingly thinking about what we pass on in our training.

Thinking back to how I was introduced to Parkour- there were only a few videos online and all learning was a painstaking process of trial and error with one's self. This was many years before the birth of Youtube. Importantly, I never felt discouraged when watching these videos... quite the opposite actually. So where exactly am I going with this you may ask!

Nothing revolutionary here, just an observation.

The other day a few of us were out training, jumping about, doing our own thing, keeping an eye on the kids around us, making sure they didn't kill themselves whilst challenging us with 'can you do this?' whilst contorting themselves on a climbing frame or doing some sort of movement resembling a cartwheel. You know the scene.

So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.  -Mark Twain

I was joined by a few of the PKGen team exploring a new spot today and although we were limited on time we managed to break a few jumps and some other challenges. I thought I'd write about what happens when I'm out training as today was fairly typical.

I'd arrived at the spot first today and a large catpass precision caught my eye. I knew that as I'd seen it I would have to do it before going home but got the usual voices in my head giving me excuses not to. I went to meet the others at the station.