Why Walking Works

Walking for 30 minutes or more per day has been shown to improve or maintain overall health. Some of the benefits include:

• increased cardiovascular fitness
• reduced risk of heart disease and stroke
• improved management of conditions such as high blood pressure and diabetes
• stronger bones and improved balance
• increased muscular strength and endurance
• reduced body fat
• improved mental health
• walking with others can be an enjoyable social event

What Is Rucking?

Rucking takes the concept of walking for wellness one step further by adding resistance to enhance the benefits.

At its most basic level, rucking is simply filling a backpack (or rucksack) with some weight and going for a walk. It’s harder than walking (more energy burned), but generally less stressful on the body than running.

Scalable for Every Fitness Level

The best thing about rucking is that it’s scalable — people of all fitness levels can take part together. You can start with no weight until your body gets used to walking.

When you’re ready, add light weight (around 5–10kg), then progress by adding more weight, carrying extra sandbags, walking faster, or using the ruck for simple resistance exercises.

Great for Sport, Training, and Recovery

Rucking is a great complementary activity for other sports such as running, CrossFit, triathlon, or team sports. It can be a useful recovery session for endurance training — or a way to push past sticking points by building strength and capacity under load.

Where Rucking Comes From

Rucking has modern roots in military training, but it goes deeper than that. Long before animals were domesticated, wheels were invented, or modern technology existed, humans had to carry what they needed to move anywhere. Early humans quite literally rucked their way out of Africa.

Rucking, Mental Health, and Connection

Today, rucking is also a way for people to work together, share experiences, and build resilience. It can be a safe place to listen, be heard, and talk with others without judgement.

Rucking is a key component of the Back to Basics program because it represents the stressors we all carry day to day. When we ruck with others, it’s a reminder that while we all carry a load, we don’t have to carry it alone.

And at the end of the ruck, when we take off our backpacks, it represents lightening the loads we carry — recognising that stress is temporary and more bearable when it’s shared.

Ready to Start?

Start with the basics, or find out when we ruck together.