Sandy Sommer Talks Kettlebells and Five Fingers

Name:	Sandy Sommer
URL:	http://www.charmcitykettlebells.com
Birthday:	August 24, 1961
Age:	47
Regular shoe size:	11
VFF shoe size:	43
Feet are:	power

What prompted you to get Vibram Fivefingers?

Delaine Ross, RKC in Atlanta GA was the first person I know who owned a pair and she raved on and on about them.

What type and color fivefingers do you have and how long have you had them?

Bright Red Sprints and Gray KSO. I’ve had the Sprint pair for over a year and the KSO for about 3 months.

What do you do most while wearing your fivefingers?

Kettlebell

As an RKC instructor you do a great deal of kettlebell training. What differences do you see in using VFFs in your kettlebell training and do you think fivefingers work well with kettlebells?

One of the tenets of the RKC school of strength is “Compress the Ground.” We want to maximize our stability and take full advantage of the reactive ground force. No other footwear always me to get rooted to the deck as the Vibram Five Fingers.

Ever worried you might drop a kettlebell on your pseudo-bare feet?

No, not really. To tell you the truth unless I was wearing steel toed boots I’d be in trouble!

How do Five Fingers fit in with who you are as a person?

I’m me. I’ve never been afraid to try new things to enhance my athletic ability. For example, I was one fo the testers for this type of shoe back in 1984 or so. So Vibram Five Fingers addresses a real need for me.

Anything else you’d like to share about your Five Fingers?

They are really cool and very useful for me and my training. I wouldn’t trade them for anything now that I’ve used them. Oh and one more thing, when I wear them to the grocery I do get a lot of looks and also a chuckle every now and then. It makes me smile 🙂

The above two photos show Sandy demonstrating two stages of a Turkish Get Up, a great full-body workout you can do with kettlebells (For more info, check Sandy’s YouTube video on “TGUs”).

Thank you, Sandy!

In addition to his Charm City Kettlebells site, Sandy blogs and has a number of other helpful videos on kettlebell training up on YouTube (He’s on Twitter, too, if you have any questions for him).

If you’ve ever held a “pood” (16 kg / 35 lbs) or “two pood” (twice that) kettlebell overhead with one arm, you’ll appreciate the importance of your feet feeling “rooted” like Sandy describes above. And his point is well taken: even steel-toed boots would probably do little to stop a crashing “beast” (The 106 lb. kettlebell!), making foot agility all the more important when training with kettlebells. Nimble feet are “happy feet” in the event that a snatched/swung/juggled or pressed kettlebell comes loose!