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Parkour traceurs are head over heels for their Vibram Five Fingers Sprints

Vibram Five Fingers fan, Charlie, on Parkour in Vibram Five Fingers Sprints:I am always looking to convert newcomers to the Way of Bare Feet. Walking around in “those toe shoes” always grabs peoples’ attention, and I have grown to love the freeing…

Vibram Five Fingers fan, Charlie, on Parkour in Vibram Five Fingers Sprints:

I am always looking to convert newcomers to the Way of Bare Feet. Walking around in “those toe shoes” always grabs peoples’ attention, and I have grown to love the freeing feeling of wearing them. One of the activities I have enjoyed most while in my VFFs is Parkour. I am one of the leaders of an unofficial Parkour group at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville, and I use my year-old Sprints during every practice. Cole, my co-leader, bought some Sprints of his own soon after he first saw me using them, and now wears them constantly, as well. The grip, balance, and strength you gain from using them are an amazing addition to parkour, and we now recommend them to any other traceurs we happen across.


Charlie and Cole demonstrate a variety of Parkour moves in what Charlie describes as one of their “lightweight practices”.

Wiki – Parkour (sometimes also abbreviated to PK) is the physical discipline of training to overcome any obstacle within one’s path by adapting one’s movements to the environment. A practitioner of parkour is called a traceur if male, or traceuse if female.

Thanks, Charlie and Cole for the incredible pics!

By Britt

Hailing from College Station, Texas (Home to Texas A&M!), I grew up running cross country. Believe it or not, I gave Justin the name for this site back in early 2009 but I didn't jump on the toe shoes bandwagon until a year later. I am also really into quadcopters and drones and have a blog called OddCopter.com.

6 replies on “Parkour traceurs are head over heels for their Vibram Five Fingers Sprints”

I watched some videos of PK’ers and freerunners using Vibrams. Definitely seem like a good fit for the activity.
I wonder if most favor more supportive footwear or this minimalist approach.

Yeah I bought my V5F KSO’s for parkour and haven’t looked back.

What we look for in a shoe is an extremely thing sole of cushioning, that way when you press off the ground to jump it presses back right away without compression/ hesitation.

Second would be grip, alot of guys turn to stealth rubber which is used in Rock climbing shoe company’s like 5.10.

Vibram is not far off with Grip though especially on the VFF’s with the sipes and singular piece for the bottom of the shoe. No bullshit 20 piece Grip that wears down, rips off or gets rocks stuck between compression pads.

Bottomline I love em, and If I didn’t need to put on a suit to do sales I wouldn’t take them off.

I could see more Traceurs enjoying the bikila over the sprints. I know I just around quite a lot on trails when running and the Trek’s are amazing for off-road…I think the Bikila’s would be a happy medium.

A question as a traceur. I am thinking of getting either the Komodo Sport, Bikila or LS, or the KSO. I’m not sure which is best for parkour. I only really care about the grip and ground feel. So which is best for forward and lateral movements (going up and along walls), and feel for rails and stuff. Thanks

What do you guys use nowadays when the Sprints are discontinued?
I’m thinking EL-X. The other ones are just too bulky for me, and I like the amount of breathability in the EL-X.

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