Sandbag Workouts: Exercises, Routines and How to Choose a Bag

A sandbag workout trains you to control a load that refuses to cooperate. Sand migrates toward whatever side sits lowest, so the center of mass moves mid-rep and your grip, trunk and hips spend the entire set correcting for it. That is the demand a casualty drag, a hose bundle or a shifting 60-pound pack puts on you, which is why the sandbag has been a field-expedient staple in military physical training for decades and why our tactical fitness programs build it into strength and work-capacity blocks. This guide gives you twenty sandbag exercises with load guidance, three complete routines you can run this week, a beginner on-ramp, the Ranger-style protocol, and an honest answer on which bag to buy or how to build one for about fifteen dollars.

Key Takeaways:

• A sandbag trains the correction, not just the lift. The load shifts, so your trunk and grip work continuously rather than at a single sticking point.

• Twenty movements cover every pattern. Floor-to-shoulder, bear hug squat, Zercher squat, over-shoulder toss, drag and five carry variations are the core.

• Start lighter than you think. Most people should learn on 40 to 60 pounds, not the 100-pound bag they saw online.

• One bag covers a decade of training if you buy an adjustable shell with filler bags. Capacity, not fixed weight, is the spec that matters.

• You do not need to buy one. A duffel, contractor bags and play sand build a working bag for roughly fifteen dollars, with two safety rules that matter.

Why Train With a Sandbag?

A sandbag is dead weight with no groove. The sand migrates toward the low side, so the center of mass moves during the rep and your trunk, hips and forearms spend the set chasing it. A barbell rewards a practiced bar path. A sandbag punishes one.

That instability is why the carryover is occupational rather than cosmetic. Casualties, gear and jammed doors have no knurling and no balance point, and research comparing strongman-style odd-object events with conventional lifting shows distinct trunk activation and spine loading patterns across those events (McGill, McDermott and Fenwick, 2009).

We are not going to rebuild the case here, because we already made it at length. The full argument for sandbag training benefits covers the physiology, the grip demand and the transfer in detail. The rest of this guide is the what and the how.

What Exercises Can You Do With a Sandbag?

A sandbag covers every basic movement pattern plus one category a barbell cannot touch: awkward loading. The twenty movements below give you hinges, squats, presses, pulls, throws, drags and carries from a single implement. Most guides stop at five. You need the full menu, because sandbag programming progresses through movement difficulty and position more than through added plates.

Figure 1.1 - twenty sandbag movements with the pattern each trains and a starting load range, covering hinges, squats, lunges, presses, pulls, power, throws, ground work and a drag. Loads run from 20 to 40 lb for rotational tosses, slams and get-ups, through a 40 to 60 lb band that holds most of the menu, up to 60 to 100 lb for the deadlift and 80 to 150 lb for the drag. Every movement on the list has a starting load at or below 80 lb, so one bag with 80-pound capacity runs the whole menu, only the drag wants more, and only at the top of its range. Handled training sandbags come in roughly 40, 80 and 150 pound capacities with seven webbing handles; handle-free strongman bags step 25, 50, 100, 150 pounds and upward and are a different tool, suited to floor-to-shoulder and carries but not to get-ups or high pulls where a grip point is needed. One pattern is absent from the twenty: there is no loaded carry, which the step-up is standing in for. These loads are coaching convention rather than published standards, since no governing body sets sandbag weights. Sources: Rogue Fitness product specifications for training and strongman sandbags.

Floor-to-shoulder and clean variations

Floor-to-shoulder is the signature sandbag movement and the one worth learning first. Hinge, get your forearms under the bag, pull it to the lap, then extend the hips hard and roll it onto one shoulder. Alternate shoulders every rep. The clean finishes in a bear hug at chest height instead, which is faster and lets you chain straight into a squat or press. The high pull is the same pull without the catch, which makes it the best sandbag movement for pure conditioning intervals.

Squats and lunges

The bear hug squat is the default. Crush the bag against your chest, keep your elbows tight, and the bag will try to peel your upper back into flexion the whole way down. That is the point. The Zercher squat cradles the bag in the elbow crooks and shifts more load onto the trunk and biceps. Shouldering the bag first turns any squat or lunge into an anti-lateral-flexion drill, because the load now sits off-center and your obliques hold the line.

Presses, pulls and hinges

The sandbag deadlift is heavier than it looks, because a wide soft bag drags the load away from your shins and lengthens the lever. Rows and presses both suffer from a grip that keeps sliding, which is the training effect rather than a flaw. Good mornings with the bag shouldered load the hamstrings with a fraction of the spinal compression a heavy bar would create.

Throws, drags and ground work

Over-the-shoulder tosses are the most honest power test available with one bag: hinge, extend, throw it behind you, turn around, repeat. Rotational tosses and slams cover the transverse plane. Get-ups and drags round out the ground-based work, and drags in particular tolerate far heavier loads than anything you can lift cleanly.

Sandbag Workout Routines

Three routines cover most of what a tactical athlete needs from a bag: a conditioning circuit, a strength session and a carry session. Run one to three of them per week alongside your main programming. Each is written for a single adjustable bag.

Routine A. Conditioning circuit (20 minutes)

Figure 1.2 - a five-movement sandbag conditioning circuit: floor-to-shoulder, bear hug squat, high pull and over-the-shoulder toss at forty seconds of work against twenty of rest, then a bear hug carry at forty seconds with a full minute after it. One round runs 5 minutes 40 seconds, 200 seconds of work against 140 of rest, a ratio of about 1.4 to 1. That does not divide evenly into the twenty minutes the routine is named for: three rounds is 17:00 and four is 22:40, so hitting twenty exactly takes three rounds plus a three-minute carry finisher. The carry earns its extra rest as the only station with nothing to set down and the only one taxing grip, trunk and breathing at once. Forty seconds of work against twenty of rest is a conditioning prescription rather than a power one, standard guidance for efforts this long sits nearer one to three when the goal is repeating maximum output, so output falling across rounds is the stimulus rather than a pacing failure. Sources: round timing calculated from the prescribed intervals; work-to-rest context per NSCA interval guidance.

Five rounds. Use a bag you can move for a full 40 seconds without setting it down, which for most people is 40 to 60 pounds rather than the heaviest bag they own.

Routine B. Strength session

Figure 1.3 - Sandbag Routine B, a five-movement strength session: deadlift 4×5 and Zercher squat 4×6 on two minutes rest, then floor-to-shoulder 5×3 per side, bent-over row 3×8 and push press 3×5 on ninety seconds. Nineteen working sets, 113 reps, about 38 minutes end to end, 31 of those minutes are rest and only seven are lifting, which is what separates a strength session from conditioning. Sources: session totals calculated from the prescribed sets and rest intervals; rest-interval evidence from Davidson & Barillas, medRxiv 2025 (preprint) and a 2024 Frontiers Bayesian meta-analysis.

Progress by adding sand, then by slowing the eccentric, then by moving to a harder position (bear hug to Zercher, two hands to one shoulder).

Routine C. Carry session

Figure 1.4 - Sandbag Routine C, a five-movement carry session: bear hug and shoulder carries at 50 meters for four sets each, then Zercher, front-rack and drag at 30 meters for three. Seventeen trips, 670 meters, roughly ten minutes under load. Rest is the column the table leaves out and the one that decides the session, ninety seconds between trips makes it strength work, thirty turns it into conditioning at a lighter bag. Fifty meters is around forty-five seconds under load, more than double the ten-to-twenty-second interval in NSCA carry guidance and well past the thirty seconds its functional-strength marks are set at, so the load comes down rather than up. The drag is the outlier: a horizontal pull with nothing on the spine, and the only movement here a handle-free bag suits. Sources: distance and trip totals calculated from the prescribed sets; carry programming reference NSCA Coach 7.3, "Increase Hip and Trunk Stability with Loaded Carries."

Rest as long as the carry took. This is the session that transfers most directly to load carriage, and it is the one most people skip. These three tables are the working chart, so screenshot them or print the page and take it to the garage.

Full-Body Sandbag Workout

This is one complete session that hits every pattern with a single bag in about 35 minutes. Run it as written when you have one training day and no gym.

Figure 1.5 - a complete full-body sandbag session: floor-to-shoulder 4×3 per side, bear hug squat 4×8, good morning 3×10, clean and press 3×6, bent-over row 3×10, front-loaded lunge 3×8 per leg, then a bear hug carry 3×60 m to finish. Twenty-three working sets, 182 reps and 180 meters, covering power, squat, hinge, press, pull, single leg and carry with one bag, every pattern a sandbag can load except a vertical pull. The stated 35 minutes is exact, but only at sixty seconds of rest between sets: at ninety it runs 46 minutes and at two minutes 57, so the clock in the heading is really a rest prescription. Sources: set, rep and session-time totals calculated from the prescribed sets; rest-interval evidence from Davidson & Barillas, medRxiv 2025 (preprint).

Two minutes of rest between the first four exercises, ninety seconds after that. If you have a second bag, superset the row and the lunge to cut ten minutes off the session.

Beginner Sandbag Workout

Start at 40 pounds if you are new to loaded carries, 60 if you already deadlift over 300. The bag will feel heavier than the same number on a barbell, and that is normal.

Learn three movements before anything else: the bear hug squat, the sandbag deadlift and the floor-to-shoulder. Those three teach you to brace against a load that moves, which every other sandbag movement assumes you can already do.

The beginner session: bear hug squat 3 x 8, sandbag deadlift 3 x 6, floor-to-shoulder 4 x 2 per side, bear hug carry 3 x 40 m. Two sessions a week for four weeks.

Progress by adding ten pounds of sand once you finish every set with clean positions, not once the session feels easy. Sandbag work punishes rushed loading harder than barbell work does, because the failure point is usually grip or trunk position rather than the prime movers.

Sandbag Carries

Sandbag carries are the most transferable thing in this guide. Five variations cover the useful positions, and each one changes where the load sits relative to your spine.

Figure 1.5 - five sandbag carry positions with the load and distance each one allows: bear hug and shoulder at 60–100 lb, Zercher at 40–80, front rack at 40–60, overhead at 20–40. The load ceiling falls in a straight line as the bag climbs the body, because the further it sits from your base the less of it the trunk can hold in position, and distance falls with it, so at the top of each range the overhead carry moves roughly sixteen percent of the work the bear hug does. The shoulder carry is the outlier: identical load and distance to the bear hug but run per side, making it twice the work of anything else in the table and the only asymmetric position, which is why sides have to be matched trip for trip. No governing standard exists for sandbag loads by carry position. Sources: percent-bodyweight and time-under-load figures derived from the listed ranges; carry programming reference NSCA Coach 7.3, "Increase Hip and Trunk Stability with Loaded Carries."

The bear hug carry is the closest single drill to carrying a casualty or an awkward piece of equipment. The shoulder carry loads one side and forces the opposite obliques to resist side bend, which is the same demand a one-strap load creates in the field. Overhead carries stay light on purpose, because the failure mode is a bag landing on your head.

Run carries the way you would run a farmers carry: pick a distance you can complete with a locked trunk, and stop the set when your posture changes rather than when your grip gives out. Load carriage research has consistently linked pack weight and carriage duration to injury risk in soldiers, so the volume you add should be gradual and deliberate (Knapik, Reynolds and Harman, 2004).

Carries also feed straight into rucking and load carriage, which trains the same quality over longer durations with the load on your back instead of your chest. Sandbag carries build the position strength. Rucks build the tolerance. Program both.

Sandbag Strength and Strongman Work

Heavy sandbag work builds a different quality than a barbell does. A 200-pound bag is not a 200-pound deadlift, because the load is wide, soft, unbalanced and far from your center of mass. That combination limits how much you can lift and increases how much you have to stabilize.

The honest framing is that a sandbag complements barbell work rather than replacing it. If you want a bigger squat, squat. If you want to lift an unbalanced 150-pound object off the ground and get it onto your shoulder, train that specifically.

Three ways to load it heavy:

1. Heavy singles on floor-to-shoulder. Work up to a bag you can shoulder once per side, then do five to eight singles.

2. Floor-to-shoulder for reps against a clock. Ten reps as fast as possible with a moderate bag is a work-capacity test that leaves nothing in reserve.

3. Heavy drags and short bear hug carries. These tolerate the most load and the least technique risk.

Low-load and high-load resistance training both build muscle when sets are taken close to failure, so the moderate loads a sandbag allows are not a ceiling on hypertrophy (Schoenfeld et al., 2017). The ceiling is on maximal strength, which is what the barbell is for.

Sandbag Workouts by Body Part

A sandbag is a full-body implement, but you can bias it.

Legs

Bear hug squat, Zercher squat, front-loaded lunge and step-ups. Higher reps than you would use with a bar, because the limiter is upper-back endurance rather than leg strength. Three sets of ten to fifteen works.

Arms and grip

Zercher holds, bent-over rows and any carry where the bag has no handles. Grip strength is a durable marker of general strength capacity, and a shifting bag trains it under continuous tension rather than in short pulls (Bohannon, 2019).

Back

Bent-over rows, high pulls and bear hug carries. The bear hug carry is a back exercise, because holding a wide load against your chest is an isometric upper-back hold that lasts as long as the walk.

Shoulders

Strict press, push press, get-ups and overhead carries. Keep loads modest and pay attention to the lockout position, since a soft bag will settle behind your head if your ribcage flares.

Choosing a Sandbag: Weight, Size and Brands

The spec that matters is capacity, not weight. Every serious training sandbag is an empty shell plus filler bags, so a single shell covers a wide load range and grows with you. Buying a fixed-weight bag is the most common mistake in this category.

Figure 1.6 - four training sandbag makers compared by capacity, format and fit: GORUCK 20–100 lb, Rogue Strongman 25–400 across eight sizes, Brute Force 5–125 across three kits, CERBERUS 88–397 lb. All four ship an empty shell with a filler bag or liner and none includes sand, which is why capacity rather than weight is the spec to buy on. The divider the table doesn't name is handles: twelve on a GORUCK Sandbag Kit, eight on every Brute Force, none at all on a Rogue Strongman or CERBERUS, and a handle-free bag shoulders, carries and drags but cannot be high-pulled, rowed or pressed. Two lineup notes: GORUCK's 100 lb bag is the two-handle Simple model, since the twelve-handle Kit stops at 80, and CERBERUS's range is wide only at the heavy end, starting above the heaviest GORUCK.

Which capacity to buy:

• Training solo, general fitness or first responder conditioning: a 60-pound-capacity shell. It covers 20 to 60 pounds and handles every routine above.

• Already strong, want carries and strongman work: a 100-pound-capacity shell.

• Two people training together, or you want drags: add a second heavier shell rather than sizing up once.

Handles matter more than most buyers expect. Multiple handles make cleans, rows and presses easier to learn. No handles makes everything harder, which is the point for strongman-specific work and a nuisance for everything else. Beyond the bag itself, the rest of the kit question is covered in our guide to the gear that actually matters, which is worth reading before you spend on anything with a logo on it.

One caution on searching for this: the terms sandbag and sandbags without a qualifier return flood control and construction products. Search workout sandbags or training sandbags instead.

Build Your Own Sandbag

You do not need to buy anything. A working sandbag costs about fifteen dollars and an hour.

1. Get a heavy-duty duffel bag, ideally military surplus with reinforced stitching.

2. Buy play sand or all-purpose sand in 50-pound bags from a hardware store.

3. Fill contractor-grade trash bags to no more than two-thirds capacity, so the sand can still shift without straining the seams.

4. Squeeze the air out, twist the neck, fold it over and tape it thoroughly with duct tape. Then put that bag inside a second bag and tape it again.

5. Load the sealed inner bags into the duffel and zip it. Build several smaller inner bags rather than one large one, so you can adjust the load.

Two safety points that matter. Double-bag everything, because a bag that bursts mid-shoulder dumps 40 pounds onto your feet and coats your training space. And fill the bags outdoors: play sand contains crystalline silica, and manufacturer safety data sheets warn against breathing the dust (Quikrete Play Sand SDS; OSHA respirable crystalline silica standard).

A homemade bag is the entry point to a broader approach. If your gym is a hotel room or a barracks, our work on training with limited equipment shows what a minimal kit can cover, and our guide to training with zero gear covers what to do on the days you have nothing at all.

The Ranger Sandbag Workout

Sandbags appear in Army doctrine as field-expedient resistance rather than as a published workout. The 75th Ranger Regiment's Ranger Athlete Warrior handbook lists sandbags alongside kettlebells and plates as loading options for lunges, split squats and muscular endurance circuits, and FM 7-22 treats the same principle across Army physical readiness training. No official Ranger sandbag protocol exists in print, so treat any workout labeled that way, including this one, as a coach's interpretation of the demands rather than a standard.

Here is ours, built on the three demands that show up: awkward lifting, load carriage under fatigue, and repeated ground-to-shoulder work.

Figure 1.7 - a four-block sandbag session built on the demands the job actually makes: a shoulder ladder of ten rounds at two floor-to-shoulder per side, six hundred-meter bear hug carries, five forty-meter drags at a hundred pounds and up, and three minutes of max over-the-shoulder tosses. Forty ground-to-shoulder reps and 800 meters under load, about twenty minutes of work, roughly 43 minutes with a minute of rest between efforts, 55 with ninety seconds. Worth knowing before calling any of it a Ranger workout: the Army's current field manual, FM 7-22 Holistic Health and Fitness (1 October 2020), and its exercise companion ATP 7-22.02 name no sandbag anywhere; the prescribed loaded work is the ruck march, with a twenty-week progression in Chapter 7. This is a coach's interpretation of the demands, not a published protocol. Sources: FM 7-22, Holistic Health and Fitness, 1 October 2020; ATP 7-22.02, October 2020; rep, distance and time totals calculated from the prescribed blocks.

Rest 60 to 90 seconds between sets. Complete it in under 45 minutes.

The reason this belongs in a selection prep block rather than a general fitness block is the fatigue profile. The current Army Fitness Test already includes a Sprint-Drag-Carry event using a 90-pound sled and two 40-pound kettlebells, which tells you what the institution values. Selection pipelines extend that to hours instead of minutes. If you are pointed at a course, sandbag work is an assistance tool inside a plan, not the plan itself, and the sequencing matters more than the session: our breakdown of peaking for selection covers how to time this kind of work. For the standards themselves, start with the Army Ranger requirements before you build the training around them.

Programming Sandbag Work Into Your Training

Sandbag work is a supplement. One to three sessions a week is the right dose for most tactical athletes, and it sits best on days that are not already heavy barbell days or long ruck days.

A workable weekly split: one heavy barbell day, one sandbag strength session, one ruck, one sandbag conditioning circuit, one easy aerobic day. That gives you three loaded sessions without stacking the same connective tissue stress twice in a row.

The mistake we see most often is treating the sandbag as an entire program. It builds work capacity, grip and awkward-object strength efficiently. It does not build a maximal deadlift, and it does not replace aerobic base work.

If you would rather not assemble this yourself, start with choosing a training program, which walks through how to match a plan to a standard or a selection date. Our overview of structured tactical training programs covers what guided programming includes and how it differs from a workout list. And if you are weighing an app against a class-based gym, our comparison of app-based training versus a gym class lays out the trade-offs for people who train around a shift schedule.

FAQ: Frequently Asked Questions

What is a sandbag workout?

A sandbag workout is resistance training using a bag filled with sand as the load. Because the sand shifts as you move, the bag has no fixed center of mass, so every rep demands continuous correction from the grip, trunk and hips. Typical sessions combine floor-to-shoulder work, squats, presses, carries and drags with a single adjustable bag.

How heavy should a workout sandbag be?

Most people should start with a 40 to 60 pound bag and buy a shell rated to at least 60 pounds so there is room to progress. A sandbag feels heavier than the same load on a barbell because it is wide, soft and unbalanced. Strong lifters focused on carries and drags should size the shell to 100 pounds or more.

Can you build muscle with a sandbag?

Yes. Muscle growth depends on taking sets close to failure with sufficient volume, and research shows low-load and high-load training produce comparable hypertrophy when effort is matched (Schoenfeld et al., 2017). A sandbag delivers that through higher-rep squats, rows, presses and carries. Maximal strength development is where a barbell still holds a clear advantage.

How do sandbag carries compare to farmers carries?

Farmers carries load the grip and traps in a fixed, balanced position at the sides. Sandbag carries place a wide, shifting load against the chest or one shoulder, so the trunk works harder and the grip works differently. Farmers carries let you handle more absolute weight. Sandbag carries better resemble carrying a person or an awkward object.

Do the military use sandbags for training?

Sandbags appear across military physical training as field-expedient resistance. The 75th Ranger Regiment's Ranger Athlete Warrior handbook lists them alongside kettlebells and plates for weighted lunges, split squats and endurance circuits. They are valued for being cheap, durable and available anywhere, not because a specific sandbag protocol is mandated by doctrine.

How do you make your own workout sandbag?

Fill contractor-grade trash bags with play sand to about two-thirds capacity, squeeze out the air, tape them shut, then double-bag and tape again. Load the sealed inner bags into a heavy-duty duffel. Build several smaller inner bags so you can adjust the load. Fill outdoors, because play sand contains crystalline silica dust.

A sandbag workout gives you awkward-object strength, grip endurance and carry capacity from one piece of equipment that costs fifteen dollars to build and lives in a corner. Start with three movements and 40 pounds, run one strength session and one conditioning circuit a week, and add carries before you add weight. The bag is not the hard part. Fitting it into a plan that also builds your deadlift, your aerobic base and your ruck tolerance is, and that is what a structured program solves. Pick the standard you are training toward, then build the schedule backward from it.

References:

Department of the Army. FM 7-22, Holistic Health and Fitness. October 2020.

U.S. Army. Army Fitness Test (AFT) events and requirements.

75th Ranger Regiment. Ranger Athlete Warrior (RAW) Handbook v4.0. U.S. Army, Fort Benning.

Knapik JJ, Reynolds KL, Harman E. Soldier load carriage: historical, physiological, biomechanical, and medical aspects. Military Medicine. 2004;169(1):45-56.

Orr RM, Pope R, Johnston V, Coyle J. Load carriage: minimising soldier injuries through physical conditioning. Journal of Military and Veterans Health. 2010;18(3).

McGill SM, McDermott A, Fenwick CM. Comparison of different strongman events: trunk muscle activation and lumbar spine motion, load, and stiffness. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. 2009;23(4):1148-1161.

McGill SM, Marshall LW. Kettlebell swing, snatch, and bottoms-up carry: back and hip muscle activation, motion, and low back loads. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. 2012;26(1):16-27.

Behm DG, Anderson KG. The role of instability with resistance training. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. 2006;20(3):716-722.

Behm DG, Colado JC. The effectiveness of resistance training using unstable surfaces and devices for rehabilitation. International Journal of Sports Physical Therapy. 2012;7(2):226-241.

Schoenfeld BJ, Grgic J, Ogborn D, Krieger JW. Strength and hypertrophy adaptations between low- versus high-load resistance training: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. 2017;31(12):3508-3523.

Schoenfeld BJ. The mechanisms of muscle hypertrophy and their application to resistance training. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. 2010;24(10):2857-2872.

Bohannon RW. Grip strength: an indispensable biomarker for older adults. Clinical Interventions in Aging. 2019;14:1681-1691.

Occupational Safety and Health Administration. Silica, Crystalline: overview and respirable crystalline silica standard, 29 CFR 1910.1053.

Quikrete. Play Sand Material Safety Data Sheet.

GORUCK. Workout Sandbags product specifications.

Rogue Fitness. Rogue Strongman Sandbags product specifications.

Brute Force Training. Strongman and Athlete sandbag specifications.

CERBERUS Strength. Gym sandbags range.

Disclaimer: This article is for general informational purposes and does not constitute medical advice. Training with heavy or unstable loads carries inherent risk. Consult a qualified physician before beginning any new training program, particularly if you have an existing injury or medical condition. Product specifications and military standards change; verify current details with the manufacturer or the relevant service before relying on them.