Teenagers' free running in Basildon

8:09am Tuesday 18th November 2008

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MANY people moan Basildon is too built up, but for two boys their town is their playground and the more buildings, walls, bollards and kerbs, the better.

Antony Sillett, 17, and Dean Storey, 18, practise parkour, also known as free-running, and some of their favourite spots include the Westgate Shopping Centre, Tesco in Pitsea, and Northlands Park, Pitsea.

Free running involves jumping, swinging, and rolling over obstacles.

Antony said: “Parkour is about efficiently moving through the environment as fast as you can without stopping, only using your own body, and using everything in your environment to your advantage.”

The sixth-former of Collingwood Road, Vange, said he started Parkour two years ago.

He said: “At first I was a bit sceptical, but then one day I was in town with friends and we met some guys from Southend who were vaulting walls, jumping gaps and climbing up walls in St Martin’s Square, Basildon.

“I’ve been hooked ever since.”

However, it took Antony a lot of training to get to the standard he is today.

He said: “When you’re learning you don’t just go up and jump roof gaps, you train on the floor and jump at a very low level.”

“As you build up confidence, you can go higher and make bigger gaps.”

Now Antony spends between five and eight hours at a time training and also helps out at a parkour training class at Chase High School, Westcliff.

Dean, of Brickfield Road, Vange, works for a roofing firm during the week, but spends his weekends practising Parkour.

He said: “Parkour is something different around here. Normally you don’t see much sport, you just see people loafing around doing nothing.

“I’ll just be walking around and I’ll see something and think, ‘I wonder if I could climb up it’?”

Dean said he thinks parkour could be a positive influence on youngsters and he would like to see a community centre in Basildon so kids could go and learn the basics in a safe place.

He said: “Parkour makes you respect your surroundings instead of vandalising them, because you want to keep practising there.”