Sport & Fitness

Cali jumps off the wall of Waterloo underpass, spins into the air and descends to earth with the grace of a large cat primed for action. Commuters pause on their journey to the tube but Cali is unabashed. It’s all in a day’s work for this competitive freerunner and Urban Freeflow teacher.

Freerunning is parkour’s theatrical cousin. Where parkour – which originated in the Paris suburbs in the 1990s – uses the body to overcome obstacles when moving between two points in an urban environment as smoothly and efficiently as possible, freerunning is a physical art that incorporates acrobatics, martial arts tricks and stunts. Techniques are changing all the time as skate- and snowboarders, gymnasts and body poppers start to get in on the act. Feature continues

Cali (single-name monikers are de rigueur) has his work cut out today as we embark on a, er, crash course in the sport. He’s unfazed. ‘The key is to start slow, stay low,’ he says. ‘It’s not about big, showy moves, it’s the flow of movement that’s important and putting the moves together smoothly.’

Watching him perform a balletic back somersault, slip gracefully down a signpost and leap across a six-foot gap, I’m guessing that he’s a pro of several years’ standing. It’s astonishing, then, to learn that Cali, who is representing his homeland France in this week’s World Freerun Championships at the Roundhouse, has only been doing this for a year. He took up freerunning when injury cut short his career as a tae kwondo teacher. ‘Within a few months I was fit again,’ he explains. ‘Freerunning is very good for body conditioning and flexibility, but beyond this it makes you rethink your environment.’

Before the fear factor can set in, Cali has me crouching on all fours on a grubby south London pavement showing how to move seamlessly along the ground. Next come some leaps. After a few trial runs I manage to span three paving slabs – about two-and-a-half feet. Okay, so I haven’t actually left the pavement, but convert the distance into a yawning chasm and I reckon I could give Mr Bond a run for his money.

The routine I’ve been dreading is vaulting. Regular yoga keeps me fairly lithe but gymnastics has never been my forte – particularly not with the risk of a drop on to a concrete walkway. However, under Cali’s tutelage I perform a monkey vault (or, in my case, scramble) then ease into a fairly elegant reverse vault which involves changing direction while balancing on one hand.

Around us a crowd has gathered – not to watch me, but to show us how much more they can do. The Waterloo Imax junction is famous as a freerunning hot-spot. One teenager throws himself off the underpass wall in an attempt to land on the handrail opposite while his more cautious friend experiments with sliding down a lamppost.

Cali looks on: ‘When little kids play, they jump off the highest steps and balance on walls. We forget how to do this as we get older. When you get “parkour vision” you go back to that state and realise that the streets are just one giant playground.’

The Barclaycard World Freerun Championships are at the Roundhouse on Sept 3. www.urbanfreeflow.com