Mark Zuckerberg Straps On a Plate Carrier and Takes On the 2026 Murph

Mark Zuckerberg spent his Memorial Day the way an estimated 300,000 people spent theirs. He strapped on a 20-pound plate carrier, ran a mile, knocked out 100 pull-ups, 200 push-ups and 300 squats, then ran another mile.

The Meta chief executive posted a seven-photo album to Facebook on Monday night documenting his attempt at “Murph,” the punishing CrossFit-style workout that has become an annual Memorial Day fixture in the United States.

“Taking a page out of the Jocko Willink playbook,” Zuckerberg wrote in the caption to the Facebook post. “Murph challenge 2026. Proud to be a part of it.”

The post pulled in 67,000 reactions, 19,500 comments and 3,800 shares in its first 14 hours, according to the engagement counts displayed on Facebook.

The photos show Zuckerberg in a multicam plate carrier, running on a Peloton treadmill and reaching for what look like pull-up handles inside his home gym. The post does not include a finish time.

The workout, and the man it honors

Murph is named after Lt. Michael P. Murphy, a Navy SEAL who was killed in action in Afghanistan on June 28, 2005, during Operation Red Wings, as CrossFit has documented. Murphy was awarded the Medal of Honor posthumously.

The workout was one of Murphy’s own training favorites, according to the CrossFit account. He called it “Body Armor.” CrossFit added it to its official roster of “Hero” workouts on August 18, 2005, less than two months after his death.

The full Rx, or prescribed standard, calls for the work to be done while wearing a weighted vest, per the official Murph Challenge guidelines. Twenty pounds for men. Fourteen pounds for women. The vest is optional in the official challenge, but it is the version that gets the bragging rights.

By 2014, as Operation Military Kids has reported, the LT. Michael P. Murphy Memorial Scholarship Foundation had built the event into an official annual fundraiser. Organizers say it now brings in more than $2 million each year for scholarships in Murphy’s name. Registration for the 2026 edition is open at themurphchallenge.com.

The shoes, and the sister

Runners watching the post quickly latched onto something else. The shoes Zuckerberg is wearing on the treadmill look like they come from Mount to Coast, a road-ultra brand launched in April 2024 and based in Hong Kong.

The brand was founded by a team of footwear designers with combined experience at Nike, Brooks, ASICS and New Balance, and it makes shoes built specifically for distances well beyond the marathon. Co-founder Yeti Zhang spent more than 20 years on the product side at major running labels before starting the company.

The connection to the Zuckerberg family is direct. Randi Zuckerberg, Mark’s older sister, is a Mount to Coast brand ambassador. She is also a serious ultrarunner in her own right. Last year, as Marathon Handbook reported, she ran 82 miles across Baja California from Todos Santos on the Pacific to Cabo Pulmo on the Sea of Cortez, with 13,000 feet of elevation gain, in 24 hours, 53 minutes and 11 seconds. She wore Mount to Coast’s T1 trail shoe on the run and set a new outright fastest known time on the route.

Neither Mark Zuckerberg nor Mount to Coast has commented publicly on whether the shoes in Monday’s post were a deliberate nod to his sister.

Not his first Murph

This is also not Zuckerberg’s first time at it. In a 2023 appearance on the Lex Fridman podcast, he said he tries to do the Murph with his daughters every Memorial Day as a tradition to honor those who have defended the country. That year, he posted on Instagram a finish time of 39 minutes and 58 seconds, just inside the under-40 mark that serious Murph athletes target.

Over the past several years, the Meta founder has rebuilt his public image around endurance and combat sports. He has competed in Brazilian jiu-jitsu tournaments, posted MMA training clips, and made his fitness routine part of his executive persona in a way he never did in Facebook’s early years. He has also run a sub-20 5K on very little training.

Strapping on a plate carrier on Memorial Day, in front of 67,000 likes and counting, is part of that arc.

For the rest of the running and pull-up-and-push-up world, the takeaway is simpler. The workout is the easy part. Remembering why it exists is the point.