Earlier this year, a Parkour coach named Chase Connors passed away. Chase was the founder of Level Up Parkour, a Parkour gym in Columbus, Georgia. Here is a link to a video about Chase, published by the Ledger-Enquirer.
Clearly Chase had an amazing heart, and he touched a lot of lives. His legacy will live on in Georgia, through his students, and even directly through the lives of others. Due to the nature of the car accident, his organs were able to be donated to 7 different people.
What it means to be a Parkour coach?
Chase is an amazing example of how teaching Parkour can have so much more of an impact than just Parkour. Through encouragement, guidance, mentorship, and the lessons a coach imparts on their students, a Parkour coach can inspire passion, help others finds meaning, ignite a community, and change lives in a positive way forever. If you’re a Parkour coach you have both an amazing opportunity and an amazing responsibility. If every Parkour coach left a legacy like Chase Connors did then surely we’d be living in an amazing place in no time.
Parkour Tragedies
Chase is not the first Traceur to pass away, and a few Traceurs have actually died while doing Parkour. The death of Pavel Kashin was the first major death that reverberated through the Parkour world when it was announced in 2018 that he fell 16 stories after losing his balance. Last year, April 2021, Deyvid Wolf passed away from a fall, and in 2015 Basilio Montilla, a known figured in the New York Parkour scene, passed away from hitting his head after performing a back flip. All these serve as stark reminders that although Parkour can be done safely, it does have inherent risks, so practice safely.
Any time a Traceur passes away unexpectedly, it breaks our hearts. We hope the legacy of Chase Connors and others continues to inspire the next generation of Traceurs.
Special thanks to Jodi Behar, a former student of Chase Connors, for inspiring this story and contributing to the video on Leger-Enquirer. You can follow Jodi on Instagram by clicking HERE.