Latest News
Smart Car and Parkour
In the beginning of June a team sent out from the MV will be doing shows for 4 days for an arts festival in the distillery district put on by smart car. Can’t really say much more at this time, but bouncing around and flipping off of smart cars is going to be very very fun!
Outdoor Parkour Conditioning Classes
We have been really busy lately but here is the first news post on our long awaited outdoor program! We will be running 2 sessions, one on Saturdays and one on Sundays both starting at 11am at Cloud Gardens Park in downtown Toronto (map coming later). The classes run $10 for 1.5 hours and will start the weekend of the 29-30 of May.
The goal of these outdoor classes is to get people who have been training indoors/on their own, or people who are just new and want to start outdoors, some knowledge and practice from our perspective and a better aptitude on training Parkour outdoors in general. Both classes are for people aged 16+. More news and a way to sign up and register for classes online later.
MV in Yonge Street Mag
Here is a link to a feature story Yonge Street Media did on the Monkeyvault and Dan. We don’t like a lot of articles that get done on Parkour in Toronto (we are closing in on 100 articles done on us.. so strange!!), but this one definitely makes the cut. Anyways, the link is below!
http://www.yongestreetmedia.ca/features/monkeyvaulut0505.aspx
Taco Bell Viral Video
3 members of the Monkey Vault team were involved in a viral video shoot that took place inside a Taco Bell location. The video is about the Mini Crunch Wrap and will be available online pretty soon. We’ll make sure to link it when its up.
Rock Wall Re-Construction
We are currently in the process of removing the back rockwalls and rebuilding the structure into a better shape. We originally had followed plans we got from a rock climbing site that were very simple and now that we understand the process (and climbing) alot better we decided to rip em down and making a true cave in the back area. Because of this climbing is limited in the MV for the next couple weeks until we get it all going. If you want to come help us set routes later on, send us an email we would love to have you.
Birthday+Group=Open Gym Closed!
This Sunday, because of a birthday party booking, and a large group event (welcome back Waterloo parkour club!!), I’ve decided open gym time will not be available. The only exceptions I will make is if you want to come in to boulder, or use the weight room (If you are not a member you will get a discounted rate). The gym floor will not be available for use!
Easter Weekend Parkour
Easter Weekend Hours: Thursday 1st: 3pm-11pm, Friday 2nd: 1pm-10pm, Saturday 3rd: 2:30pm-10:30pm, Sunday 4th: Closed, Monday 5th: Closed.
Sorry for the lack of news on the site lately, A LOT is going on both internally in the MV, and with Parkour in general…. Don’t think it’s slowed down because of the lack of posts. All that’s changed is my patience for the computer! ha!
Gymfloor limited on Sunday
For those who check the site before coming… The gym floor will not be available Sunday March 7th from 1-3pm because of a booking. Regular hours will be from 3-9. Sorry for this inconvenience.
Girls Meet Sunday March 14th
On Sunday March 14th at 1-3pm, there will be another girls meet, in hopes of starting the one-a-month girls training sessions again we were doing last year. The cost for the training session will be 15, and you are free to stay as long in the space afterwords. The theme has not been chosen yet, but we usually go over 4-5 different skills, hand out a few challenges, and do some obstacle coursing. Most of the things we do will be scalable, so its a perfect fit for all and a nice intro to Parkour if you haven’t before. If you know of someone who would be interested in this, please pass it along! We ask that you please email us and let us know you are coming, so we can prep the lesson plan according to the numbers we get. See you all there.
PoorButSexy Photoshoot
This week Danno took part in a photoshoot for POORBUTSEXY magazine, which will be shown in it’s second issue. The theme of the picture was ‘falling’, and it portrays dan falling upside down from, well I guess were not sure, alongside a whole bunch of bouncy balls of different colors. Thanks to Thomas at Seed9 for contacting us with the cool idea!
Gymfloor limited on Sunday
For those who check the site before coming… The gym floor will not be available today from 1-3pm because of a booking. Sorry for this inconvenience.
AGYU Parkour art project…
The first phase of a new project with the Art Gallery of York University and Panama artist Humberto Velez has just begun. It will lead to a live art piece featuring Parkour later this summer somewhere in the city of Toronto. We’re really excited as Humberto has an very interesting and very real opinion on what we do, and it should end up being one of our most interesting live events displays yet. More news to come mid summer!
Year off with a Bang
January has been a crazy month here at the MV with some of the highest attendance numbers we’ve ever seen. Thanks again to those that took advantage of the yearly passes, and we are reinvesting it to get some goodies for Feb! I personally love asking people in the training centre, “what do we need next!?” and I’m going to take this a step further by making a section on the site that mirrors a whiteboard in my office where we list off the top 10 things the space needs according to it’s users. Ropes, more gymnastic blocks, a vertical opening garage door (seems weird but YES!!) and a sign are on their way for Feb, well see what makes the list for March and April. As always, feedback is always welcome so if you think the MV needs something, let us know! Who knows you could be the one that points out something we don’t see, and, can’t grab and play with yet… 
Monkey Vault Year Pass Discount
In order to offset some of the costs we go through during the beginning of the year, we are going to offer 5 discounted year passes for anyone willing to help us out. The passes will work from January 1st 2010 to January 1st 2011 and will cost $500 tax included. We think this is a great deal, especially for people who buy a lot of monthly passes (its like 50% off). These will be available first come first serve until they run out.
Holiday Schedule
We have been getting a lot of emails this last week about our holiday schedule at the MV. We were going to keep hours the same, but then we realized there would be a few obvious times no one would show up. We are also opening a little earlier to emulate the summer schedule since most of our members are out of school. Also, if you or your friends can get together a group that wants to train during a closed time, please email us and we’ll see what we can do based on the group size. That being said, below is a revised holiday schedule:
18th Closed
19th 1:30-10:30
20th 2-8
21st Closed
22nd 1pm-9pm
23rd 1pm-9pm
24th 1pm-7pm
25th Closed
26th Closed
27th Pkto Dinner and Training (see pkto.ca website)
28th Closed
29th 1pm-9pm
30th 1pm-9pm
31st 1pm-6pm
1st Closed (May be open for a special workout, news coming soon)
Limited Floor Space again..
Tomorrow (13th) there will be limited floor space again because of a group session taking place at the training centre. We have guests from the university of Waterloo coming back for their 3rd time (or is it 4th) and we need all the room we can get! Sorry for this inconvenience. The floor will be available the second half of the day during open gym time.
WestJet Christmas Party Performance
This weekend a 5 man team will be flying out to Calgary to put on a live show for WestJet’s end of year Christmas Party. There will be 1800 guests and multiple cameras displaying all the action on 3 massive monitors suspended in the room while we perform on scaffolding and some objects. The theme is ‘Arabian nights’ and we will only leave you guessing who is playing the role of ‘Aladin’.
Limited Floor Space today
Today we will be running several classes, and as such there will be limited floor space until about 5pm. Sorry for this inconvenience.
Lost and Found Donations
Over the last 1.5 years we have collected a lot of sweat pants, t shirts, random shoes, bandannas, and even items like underwear (how?!) and other unmentionable things. As much as it’s been like a treasure hunt with each new item we find, it’s come time for them to all go. We are giving people 1 week as of today to come and pick up anything they may have lost here. Next week, we will be donating whatever is left over to a charity that provides clothing for the homeless over winter. If you don’t come pick up ‘your donations’, thank you very much ‘for donating’ to the cause, and if you want to drop off other things (hats, scarfs, whatever is old for you but useful for the homeless), you can do so and I will add it to the collection!
“Hobo Vs Ninja”
Check out this cool new fight demo by Brayden and Riley Jones of our MVTeam, and 2 of our bestest friends Mat Ledoux and Yan Lecomte. The MV looks pretty cool when lit all funky like that and Yan’s camera is so nuts I’ve set my next goal to buy one.