When former Rouge et Or basketball star Dominique Soucy founded Pur Instinct in 2011, it was all about helping athletes advance in their discipline. Today, her baby has grown so much that she is having babies in hundreds of schools in Quebec.
Throughout Thursday, at the Académie Saint-Louis, hundreds of young people dedicated themselves to this sport, which is a happy mix of basketball, football, soccer and rugby.
Let’s say you need to move from one goal line to the other in a three-on-two game without being touched, while continuing to play the ball without engaging in an arduous exercise in pronouncing the rules. The name Pur Instinct evokes decision-making that has to be extremely quick and instinctive.
“The mental aspect of sport is not addressed often enough and with Pur Instinct we are looking for that. It’s a sport where you have to move, you can’t fool around. The goal is not necessarily to ensure that young people become Pur Instinct players, but that Pur Instinct helps them advance in their sport,” explains founder Dominique Soucy.
Growing Popularity
PHOTO PROVIDED BY AHLY PILIPILI
Dominique Soucy motivates a Pur Instinct follower to give all his energy.
In Quebec alone, no fewer than 125 schools have joined the concept, which is also tending to multiply in Montreal, Gatineau and Ottawa. The sport may not be that new anymore, but it is booming.
“In the last few weeks I have organized around 300 hours of Pur Instinct everywhere in 40 days. Sometimes I feel like I’m on tour and I don’t even know what day it is or what city I’m in!” says the former basketball player with a big laugh.
Soucy even managed to bring several former NFL, NBA and MLS players on board while he was based in the United States in New York, Los Angeles, Miami and Atlanta.
He estimates that around 50,000 people have currently played Pur Instinct and that there are more than 1,500 regular followers and counting.
PHOTO PROVIDED BY AHLY PILIPILI
Pur Instinct sports enthusiasts at the Académie Saint-Louis.
Inclusive sports
The success of Pur Instinct can be explained, among other things, by the fact that it does not impose any barriers in terms of gender, age or sport specialties.
“Schools have embraced this inclusive approach. Many began to say to themselves: why impose a rigid structure when you can practice an intense sport that brings men and girls together?
“Why put the footballers in one corner and the women footballers in the other when all these beautiful people can be grouped together? You rarely think like that in a collective sport,” argues the man who develops both the community and the event aspect of his sport.
This Monday, the Pur Instinct Quebec Championship will take place on the Notre-Dame-de-Foy campus with different components from morning to evening.
With the growth of his sport, Dominique Soucy reckons Pur Instinct will be appearing at various festivals over the next year. He’s even in touch with the organizing committee for the next Super Bowl in Las Vegas.