Spectacular jumps in Konkordiapark - parkour park opens

Toni Mehnert

Since Wednesday last week, it has been possible to climb over walls, jump on plinths or swing on poles in Konkordiapark. The first parkour park in Chemnitz opened after several years of planning. The facility is a system of stainless steel poles and concrete elements at different heights. It was developed together with the users. The facility has now been realised at a cost of around 78,000 euros. The "Parkour Chemnitz" group was involved in the design together with the IF Urban Sports e. V. association. The chairman of the board, Toni Mehnert, was on hand to answer our questions.

How many people belong to your organisation and when did you form?
Toni Mehnert: The "Parkour Chemnitz" group was founded back in 2007. Planning for the parkour park, which is now open, began in 2012. It's not a club, but a community of people who enjoy the sport, and in April of this year we founded the IF Urbane Sports e. V. association. It consists of just under 40 people. As the name suggests, we practise urban sports such as slackline, BMX, skating, downhill riding, freerunning, cyr wheel, which is similar to the rhönrad but with only one tyre, and parkour. We are currently focussing heavily on youth development.

What does that look like?
On Tuesdays, children's training takes place with ten kids at the AJZ on Chemnitztalstraße. The children are aged between five and twelve. It is geared towards parkour, but is actually basic athletics training. Children can't do parkour yet. Their bones don't allow it and the kids can't yet properly assess their bodies.
During training, children should realise how their bodies work and gain stability of movement. For young people, the aim is to ensure that their body stability increases even more, thereby boosting their self-confidence.

In parkour, the athletes run up walls in a swing and acrobatically climb or jump over obstacles using muscle power. For Toni Mehnert, however, it is not a trend sport. Parkour is not just about spectacular scenes, such as risk-taking climbs over roofs. "Parkour involves a lot of training," says the 24-year-old, explaining the sport he has been practising for twelve years. It takes at least six months to master the basic technique. "It doesn't work without that. Once you've mastered it, it's really fun." You progress quickly if you pay attention to your body. Nevertheless: "When beginners realise that learning parkour takes longer, they often stop," says Mehnert. "But you train until the end of your life and always want to set yourself new goals." For Toni Mehnert, there will never be a life without parkour.

What makes parkour so fascinating?
You see your surroundings in a completely different way and deal with them much more creatively. The training has a childlike feel to it and it's simply fun. You can do whatever you want, you just have to be creative yourself.
For example, a kerb is not just a kerb, but an element that I can spontaneously think of five exercises for. Or you can also do a lot on a staircase.
Parkour combines a lot of different sports, such as many martial arts, and I think it's the best sport you can do for fitness because you use your whole body.
In the beginning, parkour was a way of getting from point A to point B quickly and efficiently. Now there is a lot of philosophy behind it: Paying attention to your body and the environment, not changing anything about it.

So why build a parkour park?
For training purposes. Beginners don't yet see the spot in the city or don't find it like advanced riders. But I've never been to a city where there wasn't a spot. For the average person, it's a series of walls and poles. We see a lot of movements in it and a place to practise.

Parkour is characterised, among other things, by jumps/rolls etc. Are you not afraid of injuries?
You have respect. Injuries are rare, especially in parkour. In twelve years of parkour, I've never injured myself. But I have in other sports.

How many people practise the sport in Chemnitz?
In summer, there are between 30 and 50 people. It comes and goes. Sometimes a few more and then a few less.
Parkour is not a competitive sport. "When we meet up, it's at so-called jams," explains Toni Mehnert. Traceurs (note: French for people who practise parkour) from all over Germany come together and train together. "The parkour community is very harmonious. Next year, we want to invite people to a three-day jam in Chemnitz."

You get to see a lot in the city. Do you have any favourite places to train?
I like to go to the theatre square or the Brühl, the concrete blocks at the main station are also good. I'm curious to see what will become of the Brühl, by the way. It will certainly be a nice spot again.

Chemnitz has a large urban sports community and is also known nationwide for it. Do people from outside come to you?
The people who come to us for the sport say that it's a beautiful city and that they like being in Chemnitz. With parkour, it's nice that the spots are relatively close to each other and centrally located. We can walk from one spot to the next in less than five minutes. In other cities, it takes much longer.

The next time you can see the urban sports community from Chemnitz is next weekend at the "Fuego a la isla" festival. This will be their third time there. They started out with a slackline and last year for the first time with a mobile parkour park. Designed as a workshop for anyone who wants to try out the sport.

A sport that is limited to the summer months?
At the moment, yes. But we are hoping that we can work together with Spinnwerk GmbH in Chemnitz. There is still an empty space in the premises on Altchemnitzer Straße that we would like to use for urban sports. We are also looking for supporters.

Are you originally from Chemnitz?
I come from Thalheim and moved to Chemnitz when I was 18. In the meantime, my job took me to other cities in Germany.

Do you have to encourage the people of Chemnitz?
A resounding yes. I've been to a lot of German cities, I've had the opportunity to live out my life in many of them and get to know people. I've been to Berlin, Mainz, Karlsruhe and Frankfurt am Main. I'm sorry to say that the young people in Chemnitz sometimes lack motivation. The young people don't really come out of their shells. They also lack a bit of self-confidence. You can't compare Chemnitz with Berlin, but there they are brimming with self-confidence. That's the mentality there. I wish that for Chemnitz and see a lot of potential here.