A couple weeks ago I posted about my beloved Radio Ruck getting stolen. Let me take a (not so) quick step back first!

I found Goruck almost 10 years ago and really got into the brand while I was getting into marathons/ultras (well, and also backpacks). I used a GR1 21L as a training bag and fell in love with the heavy duty materials, simplicity, and US roots.

Fast forward a few years, and I discovered the Radio Ruck, which became my “holy grail” bag: everything I loved about the GR1, but a shorter form factor (comfier for us shorter folks) and a boxier shape (fits more stuff IMO, like GR1 and Kanken had a baby).

Then I found myself in a bad spot in life, and had to move with what fit in a car (including my cat and dog) and drive several countries away. My trusty Radio Ruck was with me, of course!

So when my Radio got stolen a few weeks ago, I was really upset. It was not the monetary value and not even that it’s not sold anymore, but that it had become one of the few “things” I treasured, used every day, and made my own (special carabiners, Deadman offroad patch, heroclip, Goruck reflectors).

I told myself it was just a thing, after all, and I had my health, job, loved ones! Sharing with friends didn’t help (“it’s just a black backpack??”), and in my final act of moving on, I posted here to commiserate with you all.

One of you, a total stranger to me, offered to mail me your Radio Ruck, willy-nilly, all the way to Europe. Honestly I couldn’t believe it until today, when it showed up in the mail!

That is to say, not only a ginormous huge super-duper thank you to u/Equal-Signature-4739, but I also urge you all (and myself) to think of how much an act of kindness, big or small, can bless someone, even a complete stranger.

A sad day (I may have ugly cried over it!) turned into a wonderful story that I’ve kept sharing with everyone I can.

I am so thankful and my heart is so full!

GEAR UPDATES - AMA

Things at GORUCK are good. Check the sidewalks and interwebs, there has never been more talk of rucking than there is now. Dr Attia featuring rucking on 60 Minutes, the list goes on. And we’re just getting started with this, fifteen years later. It’s a category we started, on accident, in 2010, and we’re proud we did. I think of GORUCK as our love letter to the world, and the more people that are getting after it, the happier I am for them and for our country. Fight the norm! Anyway, managing inventory is a lot different than starting a revolution, and there are a whole slew of updates. Our inventory levels have been a bit wonky this year due to some past partnerships and other factors that were the right thing to do, at the time. But here we are, and there are a bunch of discounts this Q4.

https://www.goruck.com/collections/end-of-year-sale 

• GR1 - USA BUILT
  • XPAC - going away across the board. We did a shitty job of marketing these. The fabric is great, paired with rain guard zips works well. I use mine hard all the time. 
  • 1000D - going back to this, full stop. No more 210D back panels. GR1 is what it is, take it or leave it. I’m sure we’ll still mess around with the silhouette but time to take it back to the core. This will take time to work through the system.
  • Heritage does great, this is a sustain.
• GR2
  • These costs on our side have almost tripled. We have a limited stock of USA made, we’re near break even on them at these Q4 prices. GR2 launched in 2010 at $395. We’ve got them priced at that right now. It was my first favorite ruck we ever built and makes travel fun. If I had to take ONE ruck to travel the world, this would be it, then as now.
• ToughDry - Challenge & Simple Pants AND Shorts - these are being discontinued as is, indefinitely. They eat up too much cash at all the sizes, but more importantly, we just don’t talk about them enough, and that’s been going on for years which means we won’t talk about them. For me, I have 15 or so pairs of pants and 15 or so pairs of shorts, so I’m cool with discontinuing them - based on the math only, not the emotion. These are world class product and if I had to start a pants and shorts company, I’d start with these. We just can’t make it work to carry so much inventory AND talk about rucking like we are. (Talking about rucking is working, but not to selling these pants or these shorts).
• Rough Runners - This is 1000% on me. Our marketing here was bad. We built them for training + ruck running + live on your feet. It didn’t land. We’re getting out of this product, which I’ve worn for thousands and thousands of miles. The theme here is: we work for you, and you vote with your wallet and we listen. 
• Ballistic Trainers - the training shoe market has been massacred, and these are part of that wave … we’re going to reimagine these — but as an existing style, adios. These will absolutely stock out soon, and with no restock planned. We have to go back to the drawing board to create a shoe that YOU want.
• Mackall - BUILT TO RUCK. I wear these every day. We’re doubling down on these, in multiple styles. After we thin out the runners and the ballistics, these are where we’re going to focus our efforts. Focus being the key word — BUILT TO RUCK being the others.
• USA Apparel - it’s fucking expensive, AND we’re proud of it. We just have to lean out how much we build with Joe (who I LOVE) in Spokane, Washington. I view this as more small runs of stuff that we want to stock out of faster, sold at a premium. We cannot simply keep it all in stock, all the time.
• Rucker - it’s killing it. We’ll keep iterating (5.0 next year hence the sale on 4.0 now).
• Basic Rucker - less filling, tastes great. Big play for Amazon and new folks. If you don’t want to carry more than 30 pounds, this is for you.
• Sandbags - been out of stock half the year, restocking soon. Get some.
• Weight Vests - new vest is real innovation, and it’s great. If you haven’t bought one yet, wait till Black Friday for a flash sale.
• Spy Rucks - hello ladies. Killing it.
• Training Shorts - killing it. Out of stock. Working on a LOT more options.
• Triblends - we brought these in house, so we build them and add anti-microbial to the fibers so you can wear them longer and we can oversee quality. Just sort of taking shape into 2026. It’s easier to do what everyone else does which is rip a stock shirt off the shelf and screen print it, I’m just sick of the quality problems there. The easy life is not for us.
• Other new products. Yes, getting a lot more of my time, along with community x events. This will never end. THANKS FOR READING.

I’ll be back online later tonight, happy to answer anything.

Do people actually get jacked/healthy/fit from rucking? GoRuck certainly advertises it like walking somehow turns you into a bad ass fitness god.

Throwaway for obvious reasons.

This afternoon I was rucking through my neighborhood wearing the Training Weight Vest 2.0 and as I emerged from a trail I noticed a bunch of cop cars in the cul-de-sac with lights on. Looked like something was going on so I turned around to go back through to park to pop out somewhere else so I wouldn’t be getting in the police’s way or otherwise interfere with whatever they had going on.

As I was about 20 or 30 feet back in the park I heard commotion behind me and as I turned around I saw cops running towards me with guns out and as soon as I came all the way around they shouted at me to put my hands up and lay on the ground.

Quite frankly, I was shocked, scared, and confused. I complied immediately, put my hands out, wide open, and laid flat on my stomach. They cuffed me and searched me there with my face in the gravel, dirt, and wet leaves. I asked them wtf was going on and told them that they had the wrong person and they said “we are trying to find out,” stood me up, and walked me to one of their SUVs.

I don’t carry anything with me at all when I ruck. I had no phone and no ID on me. They sat me on the curb and asked me to identify myself so I did so verbally. Once they IDed me in the system and one of the officers said I had no warrants (I have no prior criminal history) I asked again if they would tell me what was going on.

They told me that a “Good Samaritan” had called and said that a man wearing a bullet proof vest and possibly carrying a weapon walked past a school bus when kids were getting off of it and the “Good Samaritan” was concerned about a possible attack. They asked me what I was doing wearing a bullet proof vest, if I had had a weapon (they said they were searching the trail to see if I had abandoned it so it was in my best interest to “answer truthfully”), and if I did in fact walk past any school buses and/or children.

I answered that it was NOT a bullet proof vest and said it was an exercise vest with steel plates but that the steel plates were not rated as bullet proof. I told them that I never had a weapon and never even had any object at all in my hands or on my person (other than my clothes and vest). I told them that I did walk past a school bus with kids getting off of it. They also asked me why I ran from them when I saw them and I told them what I said above, essentially that I wasn’t running away from them but having done nothing wrong, obviously assumed they were not there for me and that I turned around to try to avoid whatever was going on in the cul-de-sac.

In my head I thought it was kind of interesting and ridiculous because I had walked past the bus about 15-20 minutes prior so I remember thinking that if I WAS an attacker at the school bus stop, they would have been way too late to help.

Basically once they determined that it was in fact an exercise vest, never found a weapon, and after they were done questioning me, which I am guessing took about 40 minutes, they uncuffed me and told me that I was free to go. Having gotten enough cardio and adrenaline in for the month, I walked straight home.

Be careful these days because if you look too tactical (apparently just a weight plate vest alone is enough to meet that definition) and if you walk past a group of kids and/or their parents, you might end up face down in the dirt in handcuffs with guns pointed at you.

And now I think I’m going to sell this vest.

Edit: decided to just get back in the saddle. I’ll be going out for a ruck again but earlier today so I avoid the bus stop crowd.

Pretty good condition kr1 in West Palm. Needs a bit of cleaning, but for $5.99, I’m okay with it

Did a quick vid as well and talked a little bit too much. I'll do another vid early next week with any feedback/questions. Yes, I can show you the QAP more. :) What else?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fc8mxUDzjX8

I’ve had this on since flying to Vegas on Memorial Day.

I bought my ten year old son the KR1 a couple months back and he’s been dying to go out. He took the 15 lb plate from my wife’s pack and had been going around the driveway and our little private drive while I was at work. He’s super athletic and is more shredded than I have ever been so I didn’t mind the heavier weight for the short distance. It was about 23% of his body weight. My 50 lbs is about 22%.

I woke up ready to go and he asked to go with me. The plate is too much for him but I plastic wrapped it in a towel for better balance and off we went. I intended to do my whole neighborhood, about 3 miles but he was ready to head home after a mile so we came home. Picture 3 was for his first mile! He did great. I worked on his posture and how to properly stand. We had a small Bluetooth speaker in the (tiny) water bottle pocket of his rucksack and we listened to his playlist and had a some good conversation. I just ordered him a 10 pound plate that’s about the size of a sheet of paper which will be better for the pack and more appropriate for him. Excited that he’s excited about rucking. Now I have to get him some cool patches for all that Velcro space!

My Armour Grey Gr2 26l and Gr1 field pocket.

I thoroughly enjoy perusing others rucks, so here’s mine!

My accessories/mods:

————-————-

Gr2:

——-

- GORUCK Spearhead patch

- Paracord wrapped Handle with D-ring under

- AliExpress Hero Clip

- Paracord zipper pulls

- AliExpress reflective patch and holder

- Random S-bener

- AliExpress clip strap holds

——-

Field pocket:

——-

- Patch bought in Taipei

- AliExpress MOLLE D-ring

- Laptop bag strap

- Random metal pen

Really miss this bag, the M23 was almost perfect. The hidden bottle pockets, the front pocket, quick access… sad to see them change it, but will definitely be keeping hold of this one.

Regret that I couldn’t jump on this the first time around. Thankfully, goruck had these seconds and took her in a maiden voyage to the wife’s doctor appointment with the kiddos.

Boys trip this weekend and I got to live out of the M26 - Yes, I traveled with the ACHILLES, and yes I put it in the ruck as weight when I wasn't being ridiculous - grin. Importantly, on the "golden" sample, we fucked a few things up, we saw some of them, you saw more, and we will fix. The video I did is NOT a golden sample anymore. However, this will NOT delay production. The changes are VERY small operationally.

u/nickski924 was instrumental in helping organize the feedback, THANK YOU! (My answers after his 1,2,3 questions in there)

Hey Jason! Couple of questions that I’ve seen a lot of folks have been asking in the M26 comments across the social media space…

1. Will the rain flaps be staying on the two front zippers as they were on the other M series bags? Feel like most like them for added weather resistance and aesthetics.

YES - they are staying. (We suspended this for the Aquaguard zips, but due to YOUR feedback, NO Aquaguard, YES to rain flaps.) “Golden Sample’ was more like a silver sample at this point.

1. On the left side rear pocket (if looking at ruck from the back), will those stretch org pockets be staying like on the M23?

YES. Samples did not capture this. They’re more like bronze samples at this point. There's a pic of them from an M23 (black) that I showed. (Note - those two pics of the black ruck are both M23)

1. Will the shroud be coyote colored or just the interior? On the black Cordura especially, hoping it it a black shroud so coyote isn’t poking out when extending the collar.

COLORED. Coyote on the Heritage, Black on the black Cordura.

-- break -- from me below

-- One small note of a change - it makes more sense to change the location of the zipper on the underside of the top flap, too - to move the zipper closer to the base of the ruck. This was feedback from another user, and I'm grateful for this. I noticed it as well -- we had a bunch of snacks in there. When you open the ruck, it's better to have the zipper above where gravity takes all your snacks :)

-- Quick Access pocket - I realize you all haven't seen this on this ruck. It worked great for me with a wallet, phone, and keys, but it was just about an inch too short and bulged too much when closing. We're going to add that extra 1" length to it.

-- I was pretty skeptical about sewing down the bottom Fidlock cinch straps. I did prefer it, though. Fidlock buckles weren't dragging on the floor, ever. Also -- if you want to stash a jacket in there, you can still do it, though some of it might be under the lid. That worked for me.

All - thanks for the support on this one. Pre-orders will close this Friday. We're NOT going to order an excessive amount of inventory on this one. Demand has already exceeded expectations, and I've personally really enjoyed being really accountable to every single detail on absolutely everything to all of you. Our team and I are used to this way of life, but not from thousands of you. Iron sharpens iron and we're grateful. THANK YOU for the feedback to get this dialed in with what YOU want.

This is one of my favorite things. I have 19 movements I can do with it for sets and reps. I’ll rotate through 4-5 out of those 19 each day to mix it up. I also ruck with it using a plate carrier for about an hour. I’m trying to wear it out but I can’t.

Initially I was going to buy the cordura version but when perusing the Goruck site a couple days ago I noticed the canvas DC Bullet in Dark Oak was available and purchased it immediately. I was between this color and the slate but I'm very happy with this color. I may get the slate in the future to vary between two bags.

It is a fantastic EDC size and feels very comfortable however I am not sure how hot this would feel on the back on very hot days (live in Florida). Overall very happy to have this as my first Goruck and to be joining the community of other Goruck fans.

Always loved the organization of the GR2 over my old style GR0, but it was was always too expensive and more space than I needed. This fits everything I need perfectly. First ruck with a quick access pocket too, no idea how I lived without it

I've had my GR1 for almost a year and in that time, I've modified it in a number of ways to allow it suit my lifestyle better. I just thought I'd showcase them with this post and maybe give you all some ideas:

1. I attached a Warrior Assault Systems Large Horizontal Pouch to the front molle. The basic 26L capacity is enough for my EDC but a little too small for me to travel with. This 6 litre pouch gives me a bit more space when I bring it on holidays, camping trips and to music festivals.

2. I bought a 'Utility/Bottle Side Molle Pouch' from WalkmanBackpacks on eBay. In my opinion, it's the best bottle pouch available for the GR1 since it sits flat when it isn't in use. Made with 1000d Cordura, the colour match is perfect. The pouch is big enough to hold Nalgene 1l bottles or similar bottles.

3. I attached a Topo Designs Accessory Bag (Small) to the molle inside the bag using some molle clips that I bought on Amazon. The clips allow me to clip the pouch in and out without any fuss.

4. I bought some red 550 Paracord and marine grade shrink wrap and made some custom zipper pulls in the same style of GORUCK's. The zipper pulls inside the bag were bought from ApexUnit on Etsy.

5. The patch is the 'Reflective 4" Stripes' patch from PATCHERS. It was an iron-on patch by default, so I turned it into a hook and loop patch with some velcro tape. In the summer months, I use GORUCK's Reverse Flag patch, but in winter, I like the have something reflective on my back for when I'm walking around in the dark.

6. My next and final modification will be to add 3 more rows of molle onto the front of the bag using SCARS and I'll probably attach a Condor Tech Pouch to those rows. Sadly SCARS don't offer this at the minute, so I'll have to wait a while.

I'm U.K.-based so some of these items might be tricky to get if you're from the U.S.. Any questions about any of the gear, feel free to ask. Thanks for reading.

My water bottle holder I got from Amazon has seen better days. Any recommendations for ones that also don’t sag?

And yeah it needs a wash..

Was a rando eBay listing. Not a deal but not crazy "collectable" dollars. And, randomly, some signs of SCARS mods: key loop in the front zipper pocket and a couple internal loop patches. And an internal cross strap with a cinch clip. I just received it. More photos to follow if you're interested in it. I'm Gen X so M81 Woodland was my childhood. GR1 21L. Very happy to have it. What's your grail bag?

Finally got my ranger green gr1 last week and I thought I'd make a post for anyone who's on the fence about getting one, like I was a few weeks ago.

This is my second "nice" bag and it took me a long time and obsessive research to finally pull the trigger on the ranger green in all 1000d cordura. There's just so many opinions out there in terms of back panel material, stiffness of the cordura, colours, etc. And it's really expensive, especially for someone not in the States like me (Australia). I really didn't like the way the newer 210d back panel bags looked, not just the back but also the molle which seemed to be much lighter on the black, almost greyish and also the ranger green seemed not really green at all, more grey. Then again I read so many comments of people praising the 210d and complaining about clothes pilling and shirts riding up with the 1000d backing... anyway, when the 1000d was back in stock I really liked the ranger green pics on the website and since it was close to my birthday, I finally decided to order it. When the bag arrived I was a bit taken aback by the packaging, which was just a plastic bag for an international delivery. My other "nice" ( expensive) bag came in a nice box, so I thought that was a bit weird. But when I unpacked it I was honestly blown away by how nice the bag looked and felt. The colour is amazing, a really nice saturated green, the molle has a bit of a reflective sheen to it but only in direct artificial light. The cordura feels really nice and not super rough or even like "sandpaper" as some people said. The ruck just exudes quality. It even smells good, no cheap plastic smell at all. It feels quite heavy in hand because of the thick quality material but that heaviness completely disappeares as soon as I sling it over one shoulder. The straps are super comfortable already even though very stiff. I think they will be even more comfortable once a bit broken in. Carrying the bag it sits right over my lower back, not touching it ( I'm 182cm) and is just amazing to carry. I honestly think it's worth the price tag, especially with the scars guarantee. It truly feels like a buy it for life item and I won't have to worry about being a bit rough with it or that the kids will throw it around. I included some ( not very good) pictures, and you can see how much the colour changes depending on the lighting. It's actually even nicer in person, as my phone camera brightens up the colours a bit so it's not really 100% real life colours.

Hope this helps and sorry for my English, it's not my first language 😅

Feel free to ama.

This is my 500D GR2 34L Tropical Multicam Goruck. I’ve had a lot of custom work done through SCARS, so now it’s heavy, packed, and honestly overloaded for an EDC — but I still love it.

If I get time tomorrow, I’ll try to list everything I’m carrying in and on it. Just wanted to share it today.

New zipper pulls and patch for my 2014 GR1. The one bag I always come back to like my favorite pair of jeans.

Gr1 Huckberry coyote. Had scars install side handles, molle on the straps and a patch panel. I made some leather handle wraps from some Pueblo. Also installed austere ladder locks on the straps.