2014 Red Bull Parkour Competition Kicks Off – Chongqing Flash Mob Generates Buzz

    On March 29, the 2014 "Art in Motion" Red Bull Parkour Competition was launched in the mountain city of Chongqing. On a bustling commercial street filled with people, parkour athletes from across the country unveiled the start of the Red Bull Parkour "Hall of Fame" with an exciting and authentic flash mob. As the highest-level and most generously rewarded professional parkour competition in China, this year’s Red Bull Parkour Competition will begin in May, featuring seven stops nationwide: Chongqing, Ningbo, Shenzhen, Nanning, Changsha, Urumqi, and Beijing. The finals will be held in November.

    The creative concept and storyline of the flash mob were inspired by common chase scenes in films and TV shows. Three friends accidentally come into possession of a medallion that grants them entry to the legendary parkour "Hall of Fame" gathering, where they can have their names inscribed on the "Hall of Fame." But the medallion is accidentally exposed, attracting a posse of pursuers including Spider-Man, Superman, and Batman. Forced to use all their skills, the friends dash through streets, elevators, rooftops, and bridges before finally reaching the Hall of Fame venue, where they embed the medallion into the Hall of Fame plaque, officially launching the 2014 Red Bull Parkour Competition. The flash mob mainly took place around Jiefangbei and the Yangtze River Bridge. Due to the large number of participants and the extended duration, it drew many onlookers who stopped to watch and take photos, but it did not affect road traffic.

    Unlike traditional parkour, which emphasizes speed and practical techniques, the Red Bull Parkour Competition adopts the FREE RUNNING format — a freestyle parkour skills contest. Competitors can use buildings and artificial props to showcase various movement techniques. The scoring system places greater emphasis on originality, fluidity, movement style, and expressiveness. There are no set routes or “required moves,” aiming to highlight the free-spirited and artistic nature of parkour.

    The launch event for this year’s Red Bull Parkour Competition was held during the annual gathering of the parkour community, a long-standing tradition typically scheduled around the anniversaries of major clubs. Each March marks the anniversary of the Chongqing Yuefei Club. Months in advance, the Yuefei Club had issued open invitations online, receiving responses from club leaders across the country. Many traveled at their own expense with their members to Chongqing to exchange ideas with other clubs over the two-day event, including parkour enthusiasts who came from as far as Xinjiang and Hainan. On the day of the event, over 200 parkour fans were present.

    The “medallion” sought after by the various heroes in the flash mob is actually the medal for the stop competitions of the 2014 Red Bull Parkour Championship. This year’s competition has expanded in scale from a single-event format to a tour, with stop competitions to be held between May and October in seven cities: Chongqing, Ningbo, Shenzhen, Nanning, Changsha, Urumqi, and Beijing. The top three finishers at each stop, plus three national wild card spots, will earn a spot at the finals. Together with the top eight finishers from the previous year’s competition, a total of 32 athletes will compete in the national finals in November. Registration began on March 29, and each athlete may only compete in one stop and cannot register for multiple stops.

    According to the organizers, this year’s finals will be held at a film studio and will feature international top-tier parkour masters as judges. “Many people don’t understand parkour—it’s just that the concept isn’t familiar to them. In fact, in many of the action movies we know well, such as those starring Jackie Chan, parkour movements are widely used,” said Tu Fenghao, the 2013 Red Bull Parkour third-place winner and organizer of this year’s flash mob. “The combination of parkour and film culture will bring a stronger visual impact and more imaginative possibilities to the Red Bull Parkour Competition.”

    Aside from films clearly labeled as “parkour” like *District B13*, action movies such as *Bodyguards and Assassins*, *Swordsmen*, and *The Man from Nowhere 2* also feature extensive use of parkour moves. But what parkour athletes praise the most are Jackie Chan’s films. “Jackie Chan often performs high-risk stunts himself and comes up with a lot of creative fight choreography, which has been very inspiring to us. When audiences get tired of ordinary chase scenes, it’s these creative moves that really capture their attention,” said Pasha Petkuns, a 21-year-old Latvian parkour athlete and judge at the 2013 Red Bull Parkour Competition. “Movies by Jackie Chan and American actor Chuck Norris had a big influence on me. It was seeing parkour scenes in their films that made me realize what a cool sport this is and inspired me to take it up.”

    Parkour, also known as “urban running,” is characterized by performing creative and dazzling difficult moves using the surrounding environment. It is highly entertaining and skillful, and is considered one of the coolest and most eye-catching extreme sports in the world today. Although it may look like “leaping from rooftop to rooftop,” parkour doesn’t have clear sect divisions like martial arts. Being “one’s own school” is the biggest charm of parkour. This grand annual gathering is the best opportunity for parkour enthusiasts across the country to showcase their signature skills. The same parkour move can be interpreted differently depending on the performer’s understanding, personality, and style, and this diversity influences the direction Chinese parkour will take throughout the year.