Famous UK athlete makes unique parkour video in Baku
By Nigar Orujova
World-famous UK freerunner and parkour athlete Ryan Doyle visited Azerbaijan on April 3-8 and added the capital city of Baku to his "Parkour Around The Globe" project.
The art of parkour developed from military obstacle course training, and includes running, climbing, jumping, and all suitable creative movements to go quickly and efficiently through environment using only body and surroundings. As part of the urban art parkour became popular in the late 1990s and 2000s.
Travelling around the globe and discovering his own seven wonders, 28-year-old Ryan chose Baku to show a drastically different approach to the parkour mastery.
In Baku, Ryan decided to create a unique video with a mixture of sentiments featuring his own philosophy, which is a lyrical one, not an average parkour video that mostly presents freerunning skills.
"When you are a freerunner, it does not have to be all about destination and going from point A to point B, at the end of the day I am not trying to get anywhere and nobody is chasing me. I realized that it was time for me to do something really different - an artistic and poetic video where I can just dance and play with the environment," Ryan says.
Ryan has shown his matchless skills in front of such world heritage sites as Taj Mahal in India, Coliseum in Italy and a temple in Mexico, touched the ancient Fort Mardin in Turkey, jumped and ran among the walls of Santorini, Greece and Machu Picchu in Peru.
Born in Liverpool, UK,Ryan graduated from the Liverpool Hope University in 2007 with a BA Media Degree.
According to the World Freerunning Parkour Federation (WFPF), Ryan was admitted to the WFPF as a founding athlete in 2007 and together with several athletes from the UK, USA and Europe, Ryan blasted the parkour art into the youth culture in America.
As soon as Ryan graduated he flew to the Red Bull Art of Motion 2007 in Vienna, where he became the First World Champion, but badly broke his leg.
With 14 screws, a titanium bar and a metal plate in his left leg, Ryan developed a new style by adapting to his injury. He made a huge comeback in 2009-2010 becoming a 4X national Tricking Champion.
During his visit to Azerbaijan, Ryan noted that Baku is known as the "city of contrasts" and decided to use that and something quite surreal with a different feel and different look.
The most characteristic sites of the city, the ancient Shirvanshahs Palace and roofs of the Inner City, the magnificent Opera and Ballet Theater, the newly built marvellous building of the Heydar Aliyev Cultural Center, the exquisite towers of the Philharmonic Hall, and oil wells -- all these can be found in the extraordinary video.
In Baku Ryan not only made a fantastically beautiful video, but also gave master classes to Azerbaijani tracers as well as Georgian visitors.
According to Ayaz Gurbanov, a 23-year-old local parkour athlete, who participated in the master classes and the video's creation, the master classes were held in an ordinary park of the city.
"The Red Bull team made us a present and invited world-known parkour star Ryan Doyle to Baku! First, Ryan conducted a general workout, showed how he warms up, gave us some advice, and then we all started the workout," Ayaz said.
Ayaz also noted that Georgian freerunners were at their best; they also liked the city and invited Baku tracers to visit Georgia.
"During Ryan's visit we and Georgian friends spent all day at shootings and practicing during our spare time. The pastime was full of positive emotions and fun," Ayaz said and thanked the sponsors of the event on behalf of all Baku tracers.
Parkour became popular in Azerbaijan quite recently, but gained popularity straight away.
Speaking about the parkour movement in Baku, Ayaz said he has been in this sport for about four years and has changed a lot since then.
"First I aimed to find new friends and spend some time, however, after the first fracture I started trainings from the ground up only for myself. Later we formed our first teams and took part in photo shoots and some projects. It was in fashion and many people were in it. However, then some left, they grew out of it. We were all friends, we supported each other and were holding trainings and workouts to support newcomers, even if it was not always successful," Ayaz said.
Ayaz is with the Free Style Family team, which was set up several years ago. The team gained popularity gradually.
"We were all nerve-wracked before the first public performance. However, now our team has had a number of major performances," he said.
The team appeared at the CoGo Urban Artistic Show, which was held after the City Challenge races, held in fall in Baku.
"That show was one of the best moments in our lives. There were a lot of different people from many countries, however, we all speak the same language -- acrobats, brake dancers, gymnasts -- we all were united by our favorite job, which all of us want to continue," the young tracer said.