Parkour Generations Practice

Picture by Kiell of Parkour Generations

Amateurs practice until they get it right, pros practice until they can’t get it wrong.

I see thread after thread after thread on parkour forums say that they could do some move or technique or combination one day. Then they come back the next day or a few days later and can’t do it. They are baffled and frustrated, and I completely understand.

Everyone goes through this until they learn the secret to overcome it. It’s not mental discipline, it’s not visualization, it’s not having eaten healthy that day, and it’s not how tired you are. All of these things have an effect sure, but there is one thing that is the difference between nailing it once, and nailing for good.

Repitition.

When you do something new for the first time, it is a combination of mental strength, preparation, lack of fatigue, etc. But until you have that in muscle memory, you will have to have the same combination of factors every time you do it.

Muscle memory is very like your regular memory, there is short term and long term. When you do something, you now have it in short term muscle memory. You could go back and do it again and again the same day pretty easily. But it is not in long term muscle memory.

This is why if you go back the next day to do the same thing after only doing it once or twice, it will be much harder to do because only a little bit was committed to muscle memory and the short term memory has all but faded away.

So in order to nail techniques, once you do something for the first time, do it again, and again, and again. Then go back the next day and do it again and again and again. Until you can’t get it wrong.

It’s also at this point that I should bring up: practice doesn’t make perfect, it makes permanent. So if you are practicing something incorrectly, it will be incorrectly nailed into muscle memory.

The important thing here is, repetition, but not once you become fatigued. Once you become fatigued your form won’t be ad good and you will begin to commit bad habits to muscle memory.

Hope this helps! Now go train!


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