This piece is based on my personal experience, as a practitioner and active community member for well over a decade.
In my time, I’ve seen a lot of people move through this sport. Whether an athlete sticks with the practice or not years later is not what matters most. It’s rather the lessons, perspectives and experiences they got from parkour which shape who they become.
It seems a large percentage of athletes will be drawn to one of the following general categories of professional pursuits: Media, Health, The Built Environment and Service
Let’s dive into each general category.
Media
Parkour and media have a special relationship. Parkour is the first sport to spread worldwide through social media. Today the web is filled with video content of high level parkour athletes doing incredible movement. Parkour athletes of all levels are inspired to film themselves to share their accomplishments and creative vision. As a teen, nearly all my parkour friends had videos on Youtube.
Often this activity which began as the intrinsically enjoyable act of training and documenting the process, leads to careers down the line.
Professional Athlete: The internet loves parkour! It’s not an easy road, but being a career parkour athlete is becoming more common. Athletes or groups can become well known for sensational content and then monetize the viewership in various ways such as sponsorships, ad revenue and brand deals.
In the future it is likely that we will see competition circuits which pay well enough for athletes to simply be competitors and not wear other professional hats, but we are not there yet as a sport. FIG, a controversial organization has the infrastructure to make this happen but that’s another story… check out the this blog post if you want to know more (https://www.sethinmotion.com/blog-posts/parkour-may-be-in-the-2028-olympics).
Stunt work: This is a logical next step for many athletes as they realize their skills can be used on set! Stunt work encompasses a wide world from performing in commercials, to the circus, testing products and movie production. A word of warning about this path, hours on set can be grueling and the producers may not care if you need rest. I’ve seen people lean too heavily on this income stream and watched as their bodies suffered the consequences.
Picture and Film: All that time behind the camera adds up and can become a passion of its own! Some of the most talented photographers I know are parkour athletes. I also know athletes who went on to film for large studios or sporting events, after studying film in school, of course.
Editing: Editors are the unsung heroes of the media world, they’re the ones who tie the whole production together. Sorting through hours of parkour content and B-roll to create a cohesive viewing experience takes a lot of time, patience and vision.
The art of editing is a highly marketable skill. Businesses will pay good money to have their videos and advertisements look professional.
Health
Not many things in life are universal, but I venture to say parkour universally connects people to themselves. With awareness comes an interest in optimizing this one, powerful, yet fragile body. This can manifest as a desire to have a career helping others be healthy. These career paths can be categorized in two primary vectors.
Medicine:
Many parkour athletes take to the healing arts. Doctors, nurses and physical therapists are quite common paths practitioners will take. A surprising amount of psychologists have emerged from the parkour community as well. I attribute this to the deeply mental and philosophical edge our sport encourages. Early in my college life I thought I would be a psychologist, believe it or not.
Instruction:
This path is close to my heart. It’s something I wanted for a long, long time. Within the community, techniques and concepts are passed down informally, through word of mouth and shared practice sessions. Coaching is our way of spreading the good word of parkour, sharing knowledge to help bring new faces into the community.
This is not the only way that instruction appears. Learning parkour, can be a gateway to other movement modalities, such as Olympic lifting. Thanks to their body awareness and experience from parkour, athletes will excel in these other disciplines and may take to teaching them.
The Built Environment
Modern parkour began in the outskirts of Paris. The founders practiced in the urban environment, using whatever man made structures were around as training apparatus. Subsequently, parkour has been popularized in the built context.
This natural pairing has led quite a few athletes into this realm. Again there are two general pathways athletes will take.
Construction Trades: Exposure to heights, being in hard to reach places and training on different materials will all breed familiarity with the world of construction. Almost every athlete I know has built their own vault box at some point. Knowing the basics of carpentry is almost a must as an experienced athlete. Quite a few athletes will then take it the step further and lean into construction as a hands on, active career.
Construction Professionals: Some are more interested in the planning and design aspects of the built environment. The parkour athletes who get into architecture and engineering often discovered their inclination while designing parkour obstacles or planning full on spaces like gyms. These are the visionaries of the man made world. The ones who see possibility, then use math and science to bring it to reality. Not so different than parkour actually!
Service
No discussion on parkour inspired career paths would be complete without acknowledging the original intent of our beautiful discipline. Before it was a street sport, parkour was intended for the French emergency and defense services. To this day many parkour athletes want to use their skills and bravery to be of service.
The saying “Be Strong To Be Useful” (“Etre Fort Pour Etre Utile”) still rings true.
First Responders/Military: Parkour is a great tool one can have to be prepared to serve their nation. From the practical navigation skills to the resilience to fear, its a no brainer. Many basic training protocols include obstacle courses. I’ve worked with a number of fire and police academy students to help them get into top shape for their path of service.
Stewardship: The call to serve is not limited to emergency and military operations.
We gain such an appreciation for the world through parkour that our hearts just desire to help out in any way possible. Within the parkour sphere we have NPO’s like Parkour Origins which serve as governing/organizing bodies - helping aspiring parkour business owners, hosting events and creating inclusionary policy. In the world at large, parkour people may be drawn to conservation efforts such as being national park rangers (or hosting tree cleanups!).
Entrepreneurship
Had to sneak this one in here! There’s so many cool ways that parkour itself can be monetized. Among them include apparel, magazines, competitions, equipment/space design, video content and of course, coaching. Entrepreneurship spans the different categories listed above.
Why would a parkour athlete want to be their own boss? Parkour is a lifestyle. A lifestyle where risk vs. reward is a normal calculation. Taking the risk on a new venture, like a jump, can be scary. The parkour athlete though, can see this risk as an opportunity to live in alignment with themselves and help grow the sport they love!
Thanks for reading. If this piece stirred anything for you, please share your thoughts :)
