Alissa, or “Muse of Fire” as she is known as on the American Parkour forums is the founder of www.madparkour.com that she founded to help bring together traceurs and traceuses in the Madison area. Alissa inspires us because of her commitment to learning and spreading the love of parkour not only to the parkour community but to the general public through her work with Girls Inc. We applaud you, Alissa for having the bravery to tread a path less travelled and thank you for sharing your story that we hope will inspire other girls.
- Girlparkour.com
1. Name: Alissa J. Bratz
2. Location: Madison, WI, USA
3. Occupation:
French teacher, retired ballet dancer, ballet faculty at School of Madison Ballet
4. Tell us about you:
I have loved movement my whole life. This love has mostly expressed itself through dance, although I have dabbled in martial arts and in yoga quite a bit. I also love languages, travel, and food. I am passionate about living well and living fully, although some could easily argue that I live so “fully” that I don’t rest enough, which gets in the way of living well.
5. How did you get in to parkour?
- Alissa with Madison Parkour team and Zac Cohn (Photo credit: Zac Cohn, American Parkour)
As a French teacher I keep up with French cinema. I saw Banlieue 13 and was immediately intrigued. It kept tugging at me until finally about a year later I did some Googling and found parkour. I was eager to try it, but couldn’t find a group in my area to train. I was able to start a little training on my own using online resources, but I really wanted that group experience, so I created Madparkour.com and then went to as many jams as I could to learn as much as possible about the discipline.
I had the good fortune to meet some very qualified people, via the Madparkour forum, in the Madison area to help me with a good training program, and it has been growing ever since. It was definitely an, “If you build it, they will come” situation. I built it, and they came; but it would not have survived if I hadn’t been blessed by the people who came. They came and rolled up their sleeves and helped me get the train rolling. I took a chance, and I encourage anyone who is really interested in parkour to start their own group even if they’re new themselves. As traceurs and traceuses, we are all teachers, and we are all learners. It is a bidirectional relationship. By throwing a pebble out into the water, you never know where the ripples will stop. Fortune sides with he (she!) who dares–give it a try, the right people will most likely come to you if you create somewhere for them to go.
6. How long have you been practicing?
About a year and a half, although there have been some significant periods of interruption during that time.
7. What does parkour mean to you in less than 5 words.
The strength to be free.
8. Whats your best parkour related achievement to date?
That Madparkour exists, and that we have developed a fledgling, but positive, relationship with the city. Also hosting the Midwest jam and being able to participate so actively in the larger national community–having those opportunities to contribute to the discipline as a whole has just been priceless. Not so much an achievement, but an honor and a life-changing experience, was participating in the Ohio Parkour Horizons training weekend with Parkour Generations. Getting to translate/interpret for the Parkour Generations guys during that weekend (even though my French is soooo rusty!) was definitely one of the highlights of my life as it brought together my love of movement and my love of the French language in a context of usefulness and service.
- Traceuses with Parkour Generations coaches at Parkour Horizons Memorial Day Expo, Ohio (Photo credit: Alissa Bratz & Parkour Horizons)
Also, helping to teach at the Primal Fitness Womens Parkour seminar was a huge honor and a massive learning experience for me. The ladies who participated were so inspirational. They came from all walks of life, all ages, all fitness levels, and /not a single one of them gave up or quite for the *whole* weekend/, which was pretty amazing. Teaching alongside Amanda, Janine, and Laurie was such an honor–they have so much more skill and experience than I do and I am still learning from my experiences that weekend.
Primal Fitness Women's Parkour Seminar (Photo credit: American Parkour)
I am also exceedingly proud of one of the girls at the Girls, Inc. program. She was pretty out of shape/heavy, and we were doing balance practices along a fence railing. She was terrified of standing up on the railing for a couple of weeks, but finally she walked the whole rail, and then took it a step further by doing a couple of squats on the rail and then some QM.
It was amazing to watch that transformation and watch the strength emerge–and I’m speaking of inner, personal strength here. It took a lot of courage for her to conquer her fear and commit to doing it. It’s just proof that the teaching-learning relationship is bidirectional.
That girl taught me so much in that moment of commitment. I still call it to mind when I am faced with a scary situation–parkour or otherwise. It took her longer than it took the other girls, but she arrived at her destination in her own time. And she kept moving forward.
9. What is your favorite parkour move?
I don’t have one specific move per se, but I do tend to prefer cat hangs/wall work, and balance/rail work when I train. In terms of conditioning exercises, if I were abducted by aliens and sent to work as a slave in a mine on an asteroid, and could only do one conditioning exercise ever, for my whole life, it would be QM on a rail. That exercise is the Truth.
10. What advice would you give to other girls thinking of getting in to parkour.
Do it! Don’t be afraid of what other people say or think. Don’t be afraid of that voice in your head (you know the one I’m talking about). Don’t be afraid of getting dirty, cutting up your hands, or failing over and over again.
Don’t be afraid of the hard work or the intimidating concept of “upper-body strength.” Don’t be afraid of “looking like a girl.” You are a girl! And that’s a wonderful thing. Your girlness is neither here nor there when it comes to parkour. Be prepared to work hard. Be prepared for it to hurt. Be prepared to confront fears and obstacles.
You will never realize how strong you are (and it is formidable) until you commit to this.In thousands of subtle ways, society tells us that we are fragile creatures. Parkour will tell you otherwise, and it will tell you loudly.
To paraphrase Nelson Mandela:
“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.”
However don’t do parkour to prove something to society. Do parkour to prove something to yourself. Work hard, but make parkour work for your body. You can be tough and hard, and still be feminine. A human body moving, and a spirit playing, is a compellingly beautiful and miraculous thing.
10+1. Personal thoughts, comments, goals, dreams…
I would like to see a world where it is perfectly normal for human beings to continue to play and interact physically with their environments as a lifelong pursuit. More within the realm of what I can control, I would like to see Madparkour grow into a self-sufficient organization, providing training opportunities to anyone who wishes to learn and experience movement.
I would like to further cultivate relationships with the city. I really, really enjoyed the Girls, Inc. workshops especially, and hope those continue to grow in the spring and summer. In my schoolteaching job I try to expose my students to parkour and I hope to create a parkour club at the school where I teach. I would also like to be able to do a pullup, which has been a longtime goal of mine since I started training.
Here are some links some of the posts and articles written by Alissa that you might enjoy reading: Stretching tips http://www.americanparkour.com/component/option,com_smf/Itemid,159/topic,5887.0/Meditationhttp://www.americanparkour.com/component/option,com_smf/Itemid,159/topic,8629.0/The following are articles that Alissa has been involved with: Isthmus, “Parkour in Madison: The new urban workout”
http://www.isthmus.com/isthmus/article.php?article=24114 American Parkour, “Madison Parkour Community Outreach”
http://www.americanparkour.com/content/view/2507/318/ American Parkour, “Where’s Zac? – Madison, Wisconsin”
http://www.americanparkour.com/content/view/2527/317/ American Parkour, “Women’s Parkour Seminar”
http://www.americanparkour.com/content/view/2406/318/ You can reach Madison Parkour at their website, www.madparkour.com
To learn more about Girls Inc., go to http://www.girlsinc.org/girls-inc.html
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