Tallahassee Ruck Crew – Ruck Club Spotlight

The Tallahassee Ruck Crew started before ruck clubs were even a thing. From there they have gathered their club for training, ruck club callouts, and occasionally match-making!

Name: Tallahassee Ruck Crew

Link: Facebook

Ruck Club Size: We have 172 members in our FB group but I think we have 25 who actively ruck and participate in the ruck club callouts and the GORUCK challenges. We had a large group do the Tallahassee Tough and the Light last July. For quite a few of them, it was their first events and now they are hooked.

When/How/Why did Tallahassee Ruck Club start?

Before we knew about any ruck clubs, we had a group of 8 that got together to train for our first GORUCK Tough in 2013.

One of our most memorable training rucks was the night we all went to see The Conjuring together late at night and then from there we went for a ruck on the heavily wooded trails in the wee hours of the morning. That was both scary and hilarious at the same time.

Then in 2016 we had a bigger group training for another GORUCK Tough in Tallahassee. At the event, I met a bunch of guys from F3 in Tallahassee who were also involved in GORUCK and had been training and working out for quite a while. Of course, we all bonded during the event, became friends on FB and then started to become organized. We met up for rucks and training and did another Tough and Light together the following year.

Our ruck club grew because we invited our friends to some casual weekend rucks that usually involved about 3-5 miles followed by lunch and beer. Then the new people got their friends involved and it just grew from there.

What sort of activities does Tallahassee Ruck Club do?

We haven’t done as many activities as I would like because everyone has such different schedules.

We also have small groups that live in Thomasville, GA, which is about 35 miles from Tallahassee and another small group in Crawfordville and out to Apalachicola.

Many of us are training for the GORUCK reunion and the upcoming Tough and Light in June. Those of us who are doing the Pathfinder training will meet up for overnight rucks, coupon rucks and marathon rucks.

We had a great group for our St. Paddy’s Day Meet and Ruck and 10 of those people had never rucked before.

I follow other ruck clubs and love what they are doing as far as getting more people involved on a regular basis. We aren’t quite there yet. After the Reunion Tough, we are going to start doing a regular ruck on the 3rd Sunday of each month.

I think keeping a set date allows people to better plan to attend. I also would like to incorporate themes such as beer rucks, in which we ruck to different breweries and coffee and donut rucks.

The Ruck Club Callouts have been great. It really helps get everyone together. People will pretty much do anything for a patch.

What do you think is the key to having a great Ruck Club?

I think the key to having a great ruck club is to have a lot of involvement and greater attendance. I know for me personally, rucking with a larger group is a lot of fun. I have met the best people through our ruck club.

Anything else you want to share that would be of interest to readers?

My favorite rucking memory was when two of our members got engaged during the patch ceremony after a Tough. It was a complete surprise for Kristen and the pictures are priceless. They had met the previous year at one of our Toughs, got engaged at the following Tough and got married the following year.