Does rucking build muscle?
We can answer that question by describing how muscle gets built. Let's simply call it time under tension. When your muscles experience stress ("tension") they get small tears throughout them. Those small tears get repaired and your muscles grow. Pretty simple, right?
Well, it's a little more complicated than that, but you get the idea. Time under tension creates micro tears and your body repairs the muscles and makes them bigger. You know when you're lifting something really heavy and there's a sticky moment in the middle where the weight feels heaviest? The spot where you're not sure if you can finish lifting it? That's where your muscles experience the most tension.
So to build muscle, we want more of that.
Table of Contents: Jump Ahead
Does rucking stress your muscles?
So the question becomes does rucking qualify as time under tension? Well, yes. You don't need to measure a given muscle's electrical response to know that when you're rucking, your muscles are turned on. In fact, rucking works most of your major muscle groups at the same time, pretty intensely.
You know how we know that? Because we ruck. A lot. And we have a huge community of rucking enthusiasts on Tribe 'n Training who give us constant feedback on their fitness and rucking journeys. Everyday, all over the world, people are rucking to get strong.
If you've completed a ruck march before, you've experienced the muscular fatigue of carrying heavy weight on your back. Your shoulders, upper back, core, and legs all engage to stabilize and support the weight. The longer and heavier you ruck, the more these muscle groups are stressed, the more tension you experience. There is no easy ruck march. Your whole body fights to carry the load.
Rucking vs. Isolation Exercises
Isolation exercises (like dumbbell flies, triceps extensions, or curls) are the best way to build muscle in one area. If you want to pack on muscle in your chest or biceps, rucking shouldn't be a cornerstone of your training (but you should still ruck--here's why). But if you're looking for lean muscle mass and high stamina, you should be rucking regularly.
Rucking is a compound exercise
Because rucking recruits your upper body, legs, and core to support the weight, it's a compound exercise. Deadlifting, squats, and overhead presses are compound exercises, too. Compound exercises require stability and strength throughout the movement, from the moment the weight is lifted to the moment you place it back down.
With rucking, though, the weight doesn't get put down. There is no break, no relief from the unique tension of wearing a loaded rucksack. Throughout your entire workout, your muscles are under tension, working.
Rucking is functional fitness
There's a reason rucking is a crucible in Special Forces selection and training. Carrying heavy things is really good for you. It taxes your heart and lungs, strengthens your legs, and builds a solid core. Functional fitness means the exercise makes you better at life. Whether you're hauling luggage through the airport, picking your kids up, or helping a friend move furniture, rucking puts you in a better position to do these things.
It adds the lean muscle mass needed to carry a combat load across rugged terrain, scale walls, and kick down doors, too.
Before it was called "rucking," soldiers, hunters, and explorers carried heavy loads on their backs across harsh landscapes. Now we're doing it with indestructible rucksacks, but it's as functional now as it was in centuries past.
Pro Tip!
Rucking is a compound, functional fitness tool that helps build muscle. But like other full body exercises, there are supplemental tools that you can use to create a well-rounded workout. Adding tombstone carries or Sand Kettlebell swings to your rucking workouts is a great place to start. Different kinds of training sandbags can help you add pushing, pulling, and carrying exercises to your program.
Which muscles does rucking primarily work?
So where will you see the gains from rucking? First, in your shoulders and core. Rucking pulls your shoulders back and improves posture, and that might be the first soreness you notice. Your traps (technically a part of your back) and deltoids will be sore after your first ruck, and they'll continue to be challenged as you increase your weight and distance.
You'll want a shoulder rub after a heavy ruck.
While a sternum strap and padded hip belt can help, you don't need them to get started. Heavier rucks may call for them, though.
Transferring weight to your hips & core
When you use a padded hip belt, you transfer much of the rucksack's weight from your shoulders and back to your hips and core. For heavier ruck marches, this makes good sense. Your hips and core are better suited for carrying heavy weight.
Your core is the second muscle group to experience gains from rucking, even without a padded hip belt. When we ruck, we lean forward slightly to counteract the weight on our backs. This slight lean also helps us move forward, like a runner's posture. Leaning forward while wearing a rucksack actually shifts the weight from our backs to our abs (and takes pressure off the lower back). Our abs are recruited to stabilize and support the weight.
Improved core strength is a noticeable side effect of regular rucking, and carrying heavy things is better for your core than sit ups.
Obviously rucking will also make your legs much stronger. Especially your hips, glutes, and calves. Your quadriceps and hamstrings will gain muscle, too, especially if you add some step ups to your rucking workouts. You'll notice your legs getting the most work when you're rucking uphill and downhill, as your legs push against gravity for stability.
Finally, your back muscles are heavily involved in rucking. They maintain your posture, stabilize the weight, and engage to pull your shoulders back. Your lats, especially, get stronger from rucking.
Gain more muscle rucking
Rucking alone will improve your body composition, torching calories and giving you more lean muscle mass. Go for a ruck and you'll see exactly what we mean. You can level up your rucking, though, and increase the strength gains. When U.S. Army Special Forces soldiers ruck, for example, they're usually not only carrying a rucksack. Usually they've got a rifle, too. And they don't stick to nice paved surfaces. They're on uneven ground, they climb over obstacles, and they perform PT.
Special Forces soldiers are built in selection and training to do anything.
You can build yourself into a strong human who can do anything, too.
Hills and uneven ground
Rucking on hills makes your heart and lungs work harder, and it makes your legs really work harder. So if you're looking to maximize your gains while rucking, utilize hills and trails. The more elevation change during your workout, the more sore your legs will be the next day.
If the ground is uneven (like on dirt trails), the stabilizing muscles in your back, core, and hips will benefit. These muscles are often neglected by people who sit at work all day. Because rucking involves motion, too, it uniquely targets these important muscle groups. It turns out moving under a heavy load has big muscular benefits.
Rucking on uneven ground
If you're rucking on trails (AKA hiking with a loaded rucksack), use good rucking shoes, like the purpose-built Mackall. These all-terrain rucking shoes keep your feet underneath you with aggressive tread and support all three of your foot's arches.
Obstacles and PT
Now, you might not have access to obstacle courses like Green Berets do. But that doesn't mean your community and local parks don't have benches, stairs, and monkey bars. Step ups, elevated pushups, and chin ups are all much more challenging when you're wearing a rucksack.
If there isn't much to improvise with, squats, lunges, and planks with a weighted rucksack are excellent ways to build muscle.
In short, simple calisthenics and PT exercises become much more intense when you're wearing a rucksack. That intensity means more time under tension, which leads to muscle growth.
Push, Pull, Legs: Rucking Style
Push, pull, legs (or PPL) is a foundational strength training program for putting on muscle in the gym. It splits your workouts into three categories: push days, pull days, and leg days. You get one rest day per week as each is performed twice. This split allows for adequate recovery and intentional training. Recovery and intention are very important when you're building muscle.
Rucking can elevate a PPL style workout program by incorporating zone 2 cardio into your strength workouts. In other words, you can ruck your way to a stronger body with the recovery and intentionality of PPL combined with the cardio benefits of walking with weight.
For this style of adding muscle to your frame, you'll need a couple tools. Just three items will give you a perfect home gym for PPL training...
- Rucksack + Ruck Plate: we recommend Rucker®, AKA the gym on your back
- Training Sandbag 2.0: 12 handles, indestructible, endless versatility
- Sand Kettlebells for goblet squats, presses, and rows
We've got a whole video series right here on sandbag training technique. Plus all these videos about training with Sand Kettlebells.
Build your PPL program
Your PPL program will likely consist of a handful of exercises performed on each day. In the gym, there is a slow progression toward lifting heavy weights. Your rucksack + sandbag PPL can be treated the same way, though you won't go as heavy. Eventually, when your sandbags aren't as challenging, you'll increase the number of reps, decrease rest time, or upgrade to heavier sandbags. You can also increase the volume of rucking or carrying you include in the workouts.
There are tons of great PPL resources online. Pick your favorite exercises and incorporate them into a ruck march. Get creative, get uncomfortable, and get strong.
Training with sand
Training with sand has tons of benefits over lifting weights in the gym. First, sandbags are a compact way to build a home gym, and they travel well for fitness on the road. They're also safer: sandbags can be dropped on any surface (including your foot) with no damage. Your local gym probably isn't outdoors, either (if it is--lucky you). Sandbags are great for training outdoors and reaping the benefits of fresh air and sunshine.
Add heavy carries to complete the picture
Okay, you're locked in. Rucking will build muscle and make you strong. Sandbag training and PT will give your rucking workouts some real intensity, possibly in a popular strength training format like push, pull, legs.
Those workouts are going to be gnarly, and they're going to help you accomplish your fitness goals.
But consider adding one more thing to your home gym and rucking routine. Maybe you mix it in to your other workouts, or maybe it replaces your second leg day in PPL. Either way, you should be carrying heavy things to build muscle.
Like rucking, right?
Yes, but you should mix up your carries, too. Sand Tombstones, Sand Jerry Cans, and Sand Med Balls each might have a place in your arsenal.
Carrying heavy sandbags like these (with their various shapes, sizes, and weights) is a real stability workout. Your grip and core strength will be tested. Your mental toughness will be tested. Mix tombstone carries into your leg days. Take your Jerry Cans for a walk while rucking. Perform squats with your Sand Medicine Ball.
Lift heavy things. Walk with them. Thrust them. Toss them.
That's how we're getting strong and building muscle at GORUCK HQ.
Rucking builds muscle, but that's not all
Rucking builds muscle, and it proves that fitness doesn't have to be complicated. You don't need a gym membership or a bunch of weights and machines. You just need a rucksack and some weight. Maybe some sandbags, too.
Building muscle requires consistency, intention, recovery, and proper nutrition. Our style checks every box. Rucking checks every box.
The best parts of rucking are that it's versatile, it's outdoors, and it's open to everyone. Getting started is simple, and progress doesn't take much time. As you ruck farther, increase your weight, and start incorporating sandbags and PT, you'll see that rucking has no limits.
Neither do you. That's the point.
