About us
The origins of Apex trace back to Boulder, CO in September 2006 when Ryan Ford established the first formal parkour training program in the Western Hemisphere. In March 2009, we opened our first school in downtown Denver followed by more locations in Colorado and California.
Our team
Since 2004, we’ve traveled the world, studying parkour with many prominent and diverse parkour communities. It’s our goal to not only improve our own skills, but to also find quality training methods for all. To better understand all styles of human movement, we also work with educators and researchers in other fields such as biomechanics, physical therapy, chiropractic, martial arts, and strength training. Through this journey, we’ve learned that sustainable, effective parkour training is practiced by few and coached by fewer.
Many of our coaches are at the forefront of developing high quality and innovative parkour training methods through projects such as Amos Rendao’s Parkour Ukemi & Parkour Randori, as well as Ryan’s Parkour Strength Training. We’ve also helped develop many world-class athletes who have been featured in movies and reality TV, performed for Cirque du Soleil, and won elite, international parkour competitions. Some of these athletes and artists include Brandon Douglass, Renae Dambly, Kristine Dietrich, Rob Schihl, Paul Kasemir, Dylan Baker, Erica Madrid, Mason Fleet, Justin Clark, Jesse Clark, Brian Arnold, Dante Grazioli, and Camille Leblanc-Bazinet.
Why parkour?
Recently, words such as “gym”, “exercise”, and “fitness” have taken on negative meanings. Exercise should not mean suffering through 30 minutes on a stationary bike, only made bearable by the TV on the wall and the headphones over your ears. A gym should not be a dreadful place, easily erased from your schedule by the slightest excuse. And fitness is not only for the bodybuilding magazine model or the elite athlete. Instead, we aim to inspire fitness at its purest roots, movement.
Think back to when you were a kid, jumping off benches and climbing trees for fun. Fitness used to be something we achieved without consciously trying. Fitness is for everyone, no matter what your goals are. Movement is the foundation of any physically fit lifestyle.
Through innovative movement training, we help people achieve a broad, all-around fitness. We coach people to excel in their chosen athletics, we inspire people to become more physically active through play, and we help people attain their fitness goals through natural exercise. There is something for everyone along at least one of these three paths to fitness; Athletics, Play, and EXercise. With these three paths, we are APEX Movement; useful fitness through natural movement.