About a year ago, “Vibbys” caught the Student Activities Center staff off guard. Were they shoes? Were they socks? Whatever they were, they certainly didn’t look like sneakers.

Vibram FiveFingers, known by wearers as “Vibbys,” are barefoot sport shoes that are designed to promote natural foot movement. They fit on feet like gloves fit on hands. Every toe has a place. This year there has been a spike in the number of Vibrams seen on campus and now, because of safety reasons, they are banned from the SAC gym.

Steve Macchiarolo, manager of student personnel and special events at Stony Brook, said the shoes hit SBU about a year ago when he noticed one person with them, but now, he said they are popping up everywhere.

“Revolutionary design makes feet healthier by allowing them to move more naturally and freely,” the Vibram FiveFinger website states.

The human foot has 26 bones, 33 joints, 20 muscles and hundreds of sensory receptors, tendons and ligaments. According to Vibram FiveFingers, in order to keep feet healthy, they need to be exercised and Vibram’s medical advisory board says these shoes are the way to do it.

Macchiarolo is in charge of reviewing department policies and turned the National Intramural Recreational Sports Association, NIRSA, and other universities, to see how they were handling the Vibram trend. He said about a year ago, roughly 95 percent of other universities also prohibited Vibrams in the gym.

Vibram enthusiasts argue that these shoes are no less safe than Converse sneakers, which are commonly worn to the campus gym. Macchiarolo said that the FiveFingers don’t provide protection for the dorsum, or top of the foot. These shoes allow the five toes to be “out and about.”

Jonathan Feldman, junior and rugby player at Stony Brook, wears his Vibbys to run sprints and lift in a local gym. “It’s possible you can get hurt anytime you are at the gym,” Feldman said about the banning of Vibrams from the gym. “Lift at your own risk.”

Nick Campitelli is a board certified podiatrist and member of the Vibram FiveFingers medical advisory board. He joined the board just a couple of months ago to promote these shoes to the medical profession as an educational type of collaboration. He said that he doesn’t gain benefits for endorsing the shoe.

“Somebody that bans those shoes from a weight room is uneducated and ignorant as for the reason for doing that,” Campitelli said.

According to Campitelli, these shoes are changing ideas about what running should be. He said a runner should run naturally by landing on the mid-foot and Vibrams force a runner to do that.

“You don’t need a shoe to run, you just need your feet,” Campitelli said. “The shoes don’t make athletes run better, but changes the style of their running.”

He said that ideally these shoes are great for weight lifting because they help exercise the muscles in the foot. The company is still doing studies on whether or not the shoes will actually strengthen intrinsic foot muscles.

“If you put someone in a splint for their neck, their neck muscles will atrophy,” Campitelli said. Atrophy is the wasting away of the body tissue or organ due to underuse. “Wearing a rigid shoe or hard toe shoe will cause foot muscle atrophy.”

Recently, Wesley Macker, a freshman and member of Stony Brook’s track and cross country teams, was reprimanded for wearing Vibrams in the SAC gym.

“I was like, are you kidding me? If I drop a forty pound weight on my foot it doesn’t matter if I’m wearing shoes or Vibrams,” Macker said. “It’s going to smash my foot to pieces.”

Macker said the shoes have helped him take care of his recurring foot problems. He added that he doesn’t believe they will be a trend because they are expensive. Plus, according to Macker, “It’s easy to stub your toes if you aren’t paying attention.”

Not all runners are succumbing to the Vibram trend. James Snak, also a freshman track runner at Stony Brook, but he doesn’t run with these shoes. He says there is no way he would have time to work them into his running schedule.

“Ideally, it would take a few months of gradually increased mileage,” Snak said. He also said he doesn’t see any reason why they shouldn’t be allowed in gyms, adding that the shoes are better than Converse sneakers.

Macchiarolo said the Wellness Center is “not opposed to changing any policies.” He said this summer he plans to do more research on Vibrams to figure out what is best for Stony Brook students.

One idea Macchiarolo proposed is to have people sign a waiver. “We don’t want anyone hurt or injured,” he said. “Safety is our number one goal.”

As for Vibbys being the next trend, Campitelli thinks that running with these shoes will be the next big thing, but only time and sales numbers will tell.

“When people start wearing them, they are going to be trendy,” Campitelli said, referencing their health benefits and appearance.

“I think they look cool,” Snak said. “They are certainly odd at first, but they are interesting at the same time, definitely not as bad as Crocs.”