The athletes were moving quickly, flipping off and jumping over obstacles, running off the walls. It was a first for the Polarettes Gymnastics Club as the parkour athletes took centre stage in the Club's premier Parkour Jam last Friday.

It was an idea that has been floated about for some time now, said the Club's two parkour coaches, Ewan Campbell and Jon Amos. To be compliant with COVID-19 regulations, the athletes were divided into two groups headed by the two coaches.

"I think it went really well," said Campbell. "I took the older kids and the younger kids who have been in the program for longer. I knew they would have a big buy-in, and I wanted them to be competitive with it. I wanted to make sure they were being competitive in an environment they didn't feel left out.

"Everyone pushed themselves awesomely."

"My group, they were enjoying the competition and having fun with it," said Amos. "I had the kids that weren't there as long. Some of them were really head-to-head especially in the speed; they were really pushing themselves. Same with the freestyle on the floor.

"It was really neat to see even how the younger kids were trying to develop some skills we have been teaching them and then seeing it all in the process. It was really nice."

The athletes competed in two different competitions last Friday – speed, and freestyle on the floor.

For speed, Campbell and Amos designed a course with obstacles for the athletes to navigate as quickly as possible.

The freestyle, floor competition had several boxes and other obstacles to mimic an outdoor terrain. A score out of 10 was used and the athletes were judged on flow, how hard their run was, variation of what they were doing, and were there extra steps?

Campbell said he enjoyed watching the athletes’ thought process beforehand when deciding how they'd tackle the terrain.

"It was very cool," said Campbell. "When we first came, there was five minutes where they were walking around the floor and looking at all these things and thinking, 'Oh, I could do this,' then walk over somewhere else and be like 'This could also be really cool.'"

"It was neat to see them try to figure out what their lines were going to be."

Amos said the younger athletes got creative with their runs.

"I was surprised, actually, some of them were doing unique things I wasn't expecting," he said. "I was impressed. There were some that were tired by the end but it is good that they felt that way.

"It was interesting to watch the younger kids go on the floor. Some of them were taking a second to take time just to think. Then watching the older kids go and the more experienced kids go, it was cool to see that gap a lot more narrow."

The parkour program has been offered for five years. Last Friday, the athletes received a special surprise when their former coach, Mayson Peters, who started and grew the program into what it is today, came to help out and see how his former athletes have progressed.

"It was cool to have Mason come down and help out with the kids he had been coaching for a while," said Campbell, who had coached with Peters.

"I think they were all super-excited to see him. He basically ran the program the last five years; these are the first two sessions he hasn't coached parkour since he started working here."

Now that the first parkour competition is in the books, Campbell and Amos are excited to hold more events for the athletes.

"I think it was a really good inspiration for them to start taking it even more seriously," said Amos. "I think it was a good spark for a lot of the kids there to really try. I had a couple kids when they messed up want to go again. That was good to see in that aspect."

"I'd be very excited to have a similar thing that is a little bit more competitive even," said Campbell. "We tried it out, we saw how it worked, thought it went pretty well for the most part. We are pretty limited by the equipment that we have so I think if we had smaller groups and only one group at a time we could set up the speed and floor course even better.

"I'm hoping we do another one again by 2021 spring, but of course, super-dependent on everything else."