Yamakasi Parkour

Yamakasi are a French group of Traceurs, formed in 1997 by David Belle, Sébastien Foucan, Yann Hnautra, Charles Perrière, Malik Diouf, Guylain N'Guba-Boyeke, Châu Belle-Dinh, and Williams Belle.

Their philosophy is more about creativity and freedom of movement from point A to point B, in other words they perform flips and tricks. They believe that the art du decplacement was not invented and that it exists in prehistory when people need to chase and escape. They say that all they did was adapt it for a city.

They also train people. To make sure that the art does not become dead. Just a page in a book, alive and with many people practising it. This is one of the ways parkour grew.

The word Yamakâsi is often thought to be Japanese but it is actually from Lingala. It can mean, strong body, strong spirit, strong person, but in French the closest translation is high energy, which is an accurate name regarding the sport.

They were the first group to ever form and practise Parkour. All of the members were inspired by previous works by Georges Herbets and the obstacle course training they had received in the national service. The Yamasaki formed after they left the national service. This is where they had all met and discovered their physical passion. More about one of the yamakasi members, David Belle.

The group grew through out France and became well known in 2001 they stared in their own movie entitled "Yamâkasi - Les samouraïs des temps modernes" it was French movie and was written by Luc Besson. It shows off the skills of the Yamakasi, who battle against injustice in the Paris ghetto. They use parkour to steal from the rich in order to pay off medical bills for a person injured trying to imitate their techniques.

They also had a documentary made about them called generation Yamakasi which shows deep into their views on parkour and their way of thinking.