My name is Kevin Francomme. I am 29, from Reunion Island in the Indian Ocean and living now in the UK since 2011. I have been practicing parkour since 2003 or 2004, so it’s been almost 15 years now.
How it was at the beginning of your parkour journey?
At the beginning we were just friends jumping around and having fun, trying to do something productive in our spare time. But the years pased and we started to be more serious on what we were doing and how we were training. It became a habit to meet and train, more and more often. We were not a big group, it was 3 of us most of the time but sometimes few guys would join our training. We liked exploring everything, from buildings to nature. That was a lot of fun.
What is your best and worst experience in parkour?
It’s a mix of best and worse experience! It is the moment I left everything, my job and my family to the unknown – London. I was not by myself so parkour helped me to go through everything. We were lucky to integrate in Parkour Generations not long after we arrived. But because we were not sure what will happen, it was hard to get what we wanted. This travel helped me a lot in my parkour discipline, discovering who I am and what I can really do. I got more comfortable and started to believe that I have some potential, and decided to push myself and prove that I earn a place in Parkour Generations, proving them that they didn’t do a bad choice when choosing me as their team member. As a non-English speaker, the first year was hard, but as time passed by I got more comfortable teaching and lot of people helped me to go through that.
PROGRESSION
I wanted to say to everyone that traveling is a good tool to progression – at the same time you meet so many awesome people. I met so many people around the world, and I have so many other places to discover and train. So if you have the opportunity, or try to create opportunity, travel!
PKGEN
Do you do something else beside parkour and what?
I do few other things besides parkour – I do some climbing and swimming. I like to try new things like yoga and would like to find some time to learn a bit of hip hop dance. I thing it’s important to have diversity in your training, you don’t want to get stuck in something. Learning new skills will help to develop yourself and might help you achieve some goals you have.
What advice would you give to people who are starting to train on their own way?
I think you need to start with the basics, and especially understand what you are doing and how, understand your body, knowing exactly where your weaknesses are and where is your strength. Building a strong body will help you overcome the obstacles. The goal of progress is to not be stuck in your comfort zone. You always need to push yourself, but that doesn’t mean throwing yourself in a 20 foot jump! It can be little things you change that can push you mentally or physically. But that takes some time, so don’t rush, step by step you will get there.
Can you tell us your point of view on indoor/outdoor training? (from your personal experience)
Indoor training can be a good tool to learn and progress but you don’t want to get stuck in an indoor training. When you go outside you are scared of everything. I think it complements each other. You need to adapt yourself to your environment so I don’t think it’s bad to train indoor. You just need to be aware that things can be easier indoor because you can set up your own routes/obstacles and usually you make them in a way where you have progressions, and a bit easier than outdoor, like moving this box a bit closer, just for start, trying to replicate the same jump but making it closer, that is the thing training indoor. Outdoor you will have everything already set up, you can’t move that wall closer, or do this jump closer to the ground first because the one you want to do is at hight.
Big thank to Kevin Francomme from Parkour Generations
Performer / Coach / choreographer
Parkour Generations Ltd
www.skochypstiks.com
Kevin Francomme
Coach
