Otterbein student dives into parkour

Theodore Gorman is used to people staring at him.

That comes with the territory when crawling, climbing, jumping and rolling around campus.

Gorman, a senior at Otterbein, is a practitioner of parkour, defined by the American Parkour website as “the physical discipline of training to overcome any obstacle within one’s path by adapting one’s movements to the environment.”

What are some of your hobbies?

Parkour. Parkour is a running, jumping, climbing thing, testing your limits, finding out how strong you are.

How did you get into it?

I started training about two years ago when I moved back to Westerville.

I pretty much Google searched “parkour Columbus.” It’s something I have always seen on the Internet and was interested in, and then I found this group called Parkour Horizon and I went down and trained with them and found out they were really good guys.

I started training with them a lot and it snowballed from there.

What is the purpose of Parkour?

To be strong, fit, useful.

Why do you crawl around campus?

I’m trying to get ready for a challenge for my birthday this Saturday. I’m going to do a crawl that’s 2,300 meters, which is 100 meters short of a mile and a half.

Do you do parkour all the time? Even on dates and at the grocery store?

Parkour is a lifestyle. It never stops. You try to move around. The mentality never turns off. I’m always looking for things to climb on or jump off of.

How does it feel to practice parkour on such a small campus?

It’s a lot of fun. People stare at you a lot. I am pretty used to people staring at me when I do it anyways, because I’ll be crawling around, jumping on things. I look like a lunatic.

I am trying to start a club here on campus, and hopefully I get some positive interest for that. During the summer, I (was) told by one of the security guards that I am not allowed to do parkour on campus. I don’t know if he knew what he was talking about or not, but it was bothersome.

Do you get positive and negative feedback from students?

Positive. People are approaching me all the time like, “That’s awesome what you’re doing,” either interested or just amazed.

So a security guard tried stopping you from doing parkour?

He was like, “Dude, you’re not allowed to do parkour on campus.” And I was like, “Oh, OK.” So now I pretty much have changed how I do parkour on campus, just by doing it more quickly.

What are some actions that you do for parkour around campus?

Run, jump, climb, crawl (and) roll. I play a lot when going from class to class. I go out for runs and jump over stuff and land on things.

Why would you encourage someone else to do parkour?

To be fit and healthy. I’ve gotten so much happiness from just practicing. I rediscovered that element of play that I had when I was a very small child, but lost at some point.

Are there more of you guys here on campus?

I’ve met one student who is really interested in joining the club. I actually have a lot of students interested in joining the club. I don’t really know any other long-term practitioners that have as much experience as I do, but I think that is part of the reason for starting the club to get some people interested.

What activities do you guys do as a group when you get together with all the parkour practitioners?

Last night we went out on campus and jumped around for four hours and did conditioning in a back alley. It was pretty intense.

What do you guys call yourselves?

Traceurs. It’s a French word that I believe means bullet … and if you talk to the right people, “the art of movement,” and displacement if you talk to the founders. All the different names mean essentially the same thing, just training and movement.

Can parkour get dangerous?

The way I train, I try to find calculated risk. (I) try to find things that challenge me, but that aren’t stupid to do. Trying to approach it with that mentality, you’re pretty safe.

What are some challenges that you have faced?

Big jumps, scary looking things. Jumping from one curb to another … When you add height it’s another element of fear.

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