Chris Rowat

Chris and Shirley Darlington-Rowat: Serendipity, family, and relationships →

Published October 9, 2019  ·  All posts on Oct 9  ·  

Chris and Shirley Darlington-Rowat: Serendipity, family, and relationships

How do movement, coaching, and family intersect to shape personal growth and relationships over time?

Chris Rowat and Shirley Darlington-Rowat discuss serendipity, coaching, and Chris’s work with the fire brigade. They share their thoughts on raising kids, setting aside time for family, and training and moving together. Shirley and Chris share their current struggles, some stories about their past, and how parkour has affected their relationship.

You should both be able to enjoy your lives. So if we enjoy training and it’s a part of our lives, we shouldn’t suppress that. We should just find ways to bring it all together.

~ Chris Rowat (31:27)

The conversation covers the intersection of parkour, family, and coaching, exploring how movement shapes personal relationships and growth. Chris and Shirley discuss serendipity, recalling stories of chance encounters and how unexpected moments influence their lives. They reflect on how their shared passion for parkour has not only shaped their relationship but also influenced how they raise their children, focusing on movement as play rather than formal practice.

[My son Tyler] didn’t see it as parkour, it was just movement. So he’d be in the play park and he’d maybe cycle on his bike to the climbing wall, climb up the little climbing wall, jump across a little piece of railing. He just moved. Movement is movement, right? So whatever [our daughter Indy] wants to do, she can do, if she doesn’t want to do parkour. She’ll do it naturally anyway because it’s normal for that too.

~ Shirley Darlington-Rowat (12:27)

Chris speaks about balancing his career with the London Fire Brigade and his role as a father, highlighting the discipline and adaptability required in both spheres. Shirley emphasizes the importance of maintaining personal movement practices during motherhood and reflects on how physical training can coexist with family life. The conversation weaves between stories of parenting, training, and the philosophy of finding balance and joy in movement.

(more…)

§16 – Don’t be that guy →

Published May 10, 2019  ·  All posts on May 10  ·  

This entry is part 28 of 37 in the series Study inspired by Pakour & Art du Déplacement by V. Thibault

Serendipity.

I’ve been working on writing these thoughts for over three years. Without actually checking, I think it was the Fall of 2015 when I sat in Le Jardin Joan d’Arc and read my copy of Thibault’s book in one, all-day sitting. Almost 4 years ago?

I created this particular blank note for Chapter 16 in May of 2016. “16”?

As I’m writing, it is May of 2019. Another, “May”?

About three years ago I started the project which eventually became Movers Mindset. Two years ago the project grew to include a podcast.

This morning, I feel compelled to “finally” get around to writing something for Chapter 16. I open my digital copy, flip to Chapter 16, and I read, “Chris ‘Blane’ Rowat once wrote…”

Care to guess who I am interviewing for the podcast today? Yes, really.

This is sublime.

All those threads woven together lead to this moment of realization at 8:00 in a rented London flat, 6,000km from my home.

Critically, while I’ve known for months the exact date and time of Chris’ interview, I’ve not read Chapter 16 recently enough to have remembered that it starts with his sentiments. If I had, I’d certainly have made some complicated plan to co-publish this writing and the podcast, or something—but this serendipity would not have materialized. Energized by the jolt of adrenaline when I read Chapter 16 this morning, I now feel a renewed belief in the entire Movers Mindset project! (Which is good, because most days there’s more strenuous labor than love in the labor of love.)

But, serendipity and coincidence are bullshit.

It’s just my brain, (yours may be the same,) working its tremendous powers of pattern matching. This morning my mind found a slightly-more-interesting-than-usual pattern and screamed, (ala the old adrenal gland,) that it had found something that demanded much closer attention. I’ve been spurred to carefully read Chapter 16 about five times this morning, to mull over my thoughts, to spend an hour or so writing, and to think of all the people I want to share this story with. I was inspired to create a vision of how the interview will go, new questions have popped into my head, and I’ve thought of a specific person who I now realize I’d forgot for about two years!

I wonder: What would life be like if I simply paid closer attention?

What if—instead of needing a kick in the adrenals to be this motivated—I could begin to intentionally notice things a bit smaller than this morning’s coincidence?

What if!

…and of course, “don’t be that guy.”

ɕ

A person should be strong →

Published January 28, 2015  ·  All posts on Jan 28  ·  ,

This entry is part 11 of 72 in the series My Journey

It suggests that a person should aim to be strong, but not just in a physical sense. They should aim to be resilient, free thinking, confident and yet remain humble. They should learn to be self-sufficient and useful to their loved ones and they should be aiming to always progress in some way.

~ Chris Rowat, from «http://www.parkourgenerations.com/node/9399»

Written to have 5 parts, plus the introduction, he’s only completed two parts so far. But if parkour/art d’déplacement/free running you love, read this you must.

ɕ

To be and to last →

Published May 3, 2014  ·  All posts on May 3  ·  ,

This entry is part 5 of 72 in the series My Journey
To be and to last

To last? That old lesson about the brightest flame burning the quickest is particularly true in Parkour. What use is a person who lasts five years and has to stop training due to bad knees and a broken ankle? How useful is a body that can’t move pain free due to years of neglect and abuse? The journey of Parkour was never meant to be a brilliant flash of spectacle and show, it was always intended to be a lifelong pursuit of improvement and one that doesn’t need to end once the body begins to show signs of age.

~ Chris “Blane” Rowat from, 50 Ways To Be and To Last in Parkour | Part 1 – Training The Body

slip:4ubowa1.

Ignore the show reels. Ignore the spectacular. Those MAY be inspirational to you, but your journey SHOULD be a long series of small, eminently POSSIBLE steps. Go to your first class and try anything; try SOMETHING. Stop when your body has had enough. Repeat. In a few months, you will have grown so much that you will hardly recognize yourself.

ɕ

The Cat’s Out of the Bag →

Published April 12, 2013  ·  All posts on Apr 12  ·  , ,

This entry is part 2 of 72 in the series My Journey

If you want to repeat that little jump at an angle to a moss covered wall all day until you can do it with your eyes closed… well my friend, you are not alone. I want to repeat that jump with you. But let’s do 50, just to be sure. And one more for the others who can’t join us. That’ll do us both more good than that big roof gap whilst you hold the camera.

~ Chris ‘Blane’ Rowat from, «http://www.parkourgenerations.com/article/call-arms»

By now, all of my friends know I practice parkour with Lehigh Valley Parkour. I’m pushing 42, with graying hair and the BMI calculator says 34.9, (which is “obesity.”) So when people first find out, they raise an eyebrow and say, “You’re a brave soul!” or “Huh? The jumping from roof-top to roof-top thing?!”. …my answer is ‘no’ to both of those.

Please do not go to TouYube and look up parkour; Total waste of your time. This is one of those Catch-22 things where the people who believe — quietly, to themselves — that they “get it”… well, those people aren’t posting spectacular videos on TouYube. So you don’t notice their point of view on the whole thing.

I am not saying, “those people over there have it wrong.” I am not saying, “parkour is the One True Path(tm)”. I am not saying, “these ideas are to be found only through parkour.”

I am saying parkour is…

…a journey composed of tiny steps so easy that failure is impossible.

…the grueling, deconstructing, work of self-improvement.

…that well-earned sense of accomplishment.

…the joie-de-vivre that I hadn’t noticed I let slip away.

Playfulness.

Freedom.

…and one more for the others who can’t join us. :*)

ɕ