We caught up with the guys from 3RUN, the daredevil group of gymnasts and athletes, taken in by the dark side of Parkour. Here's what they had to say:

FF. Please explain for those people who have never seen or heard of Parkour what it is and how it all started.

3RUN: Parkour and Freerunning are two similar disciplines that have grown together in recent years associated with creative movement. Parkour tends to focus on efficient and effective movement to travel from one place to another, simply using the human body to climb and vault obstacles on a direct route.
Freerunning, tends to focus on a more creative and expressionate display of movement, often encorporating acrobatic flips as practicioners travel throughout their urban or rural environment.

Parkour and FreeRunning are said to have come into the Public eye through French practitioners such as David Belle and Sebastien Foucan, but have arguably been practiced for years by people such as Jackie Chan, just without the named discipline.

FF. So now we know a bit more about Parkour tell us how you all got started.

3RUN: Most of 3RUN actually started from a young age, following the footsteps of child hood heroes such as Jackie Chan and even fictional characters such as Spiderman. Having already practiced this form of movement, but without knowing it had a name and discipline, once the media had picked up on these art forms, 3RUN began to realise that this was what they had been training for, and the natural progression developed as we then brought other elements such as Martial Arts, into the movement.

FF. What are your individual sporting backgrounds.

3RUN: Generally the 3RUN athletes were all active individuals, with varying backgrounds from team based sports such as Football and Rugby. But also practising more urban sports such as Aggressive Inline Roller Blading, and Martial Arts such as Wushu and Taekwondo.

FF. How did you all come together as the group 3Run

3RUN: The 3RUN group was initially started by Chase Armitage, who practiced along with his brother Cole, and soon other friends got involved and together they began making their own videos and their website, which began to develop a bit of a following.

Members such as Sam, Mat, Curtis, and James joined at a slightly later date after training with the 3RUN group and essentially, despite being a high end professional performance team. The guys are all the best of friends.

FF. What inspires you all to go out there and do what you do everyday.

3RUN: We have so many inspirations. In terms of people that inspire us, we have great respect for people such as Jackie Chan, Cyril Raffaelli and Tony Jaa. But life itself continues to throw inspiration our way in the people we have the pleasure of meeting across the globe, the incredible places we have been fortunate enough to visit and our own desires to push each other on towards our goals.

FF. How dod you train for Parkour, and how often.

3RUN: We train practically every day. By combining different training methods and practices that combine to help improve our Parkour and Freerunning. We regularly work out at the gym to continue to build and develop our muscles. Training in gymnastic halls helps us to improve our aerial movements and air awareness within our movements. Rock climbing helps develop our climbing abilities aswell as finger grip strength and technique in climbing. And of course we all try to get outside as much as possible to train our specific Parkour and Freeruning movements and techniques, providing each other with support and drive.

FF. You guys have taken the Parkour game to new levels not only in the UK but around the world, tell us all a bit more about what you have achieved.

3RUN: It is incredible to witness the amount of people that get in touch with us to tell us how much we have inspired them or helped them within their own training and lives. Our goal with our videos was essentially to Entertain & Inspire, and with over a millions of views on our youtube videos, we hope that we are able to do just that.
We are also extremely fortunate to have had the opportunities to travel to places such as Argentina, Brazil, Israel and India to provide workshops, visit local practitioners and provide first hand support, as well as our regular UK based workshops and online tutorial campaigns. Helping others has always been something close to the heart of 3RUN, and of course, whilst we don’t want to lead people in a specific direction, it is great to be able to provide some kind of guidance/support to help others find their way.

Of course, working on huge projects such as the award winning television commercials, smashing Guiness World records, performing across the globe on live event performances and within Blockbuster films, further helps spread Parkour and Freerunning to the public, and allows others to get in touch if they are interested in giving it a go.

FF. When you have been traveling around making videos and films you have loads of fun, whats the best moment that sticks out in your mind.

3RUN: It is so difficult to pin point one single amazing experience or moment. Im sure we all have different ones that spring to mind. I know our first trip as a group to India performing on a huge stunt show will stay as one of our top moments, simply because of the huge exposure of understanding towards how fortunate we truly are, just to be living in homes, with families and friends etc.

Experiences such as working on James Bond and Harry Potter are likely to stay with the 3RUN guys involved in those films for a long time. But often it can be some of the most simplest things, like seeing the appreciation or happiness brought on by some of our students in workshops, or even some of the amazing comments on our videos about how our videos have inspired and helped others.

Life continually grants us amazing moments and we try to make the most of them all!

FF. Danger comes into this sport a great deal, and thats what makes the spectacle so amazing, but what injuries have you guys picked up, if any.

3RUN: This is always an interesting one. Some of us have been luckier than others. Some of the team have gotten through without a single major injury, where as some have had some really bad experiences.

Curtis snapped his ACL on his left leg a couple of years ago, which left him out of the game essentially for roughly a year! We have had a number of broken arms, and one or two broken ankles. But in more recent times everyone has been in good health and I think as we continue to develop our muscles and our abilities, we make fewer and fewer mistakes. Trying to focus on safety, despite trying to push our limits. Often easier said than done!

FF. Whats up next for 3Run , any projects etc.

3RUN: We have a lot of exciting things in the pipeline. Some movies, many live events and some other exciting projects abroad that we aren’t aloud to mention at the moment!

FF. And finally how would anyone get into this amazing sport, is there any clubs they can go to.

3RUN: Google is your friend! We have a large website: www.3run.co.uk with a lot of information about Parkour and Freerunning, as well as the weekly workshops we provide around Basingstoke and also at schools within the UK. Our forum is a great way to meet other Freerunners and Traceurs in your area. But also remember, when we started out, there was nothing. No videos for guidance, no professionals to seek advise from. Only our hearts and desire to train and just have fun!

3RUN.co.uk