The King Kong bag definitely felt like over the course of many years that it wouldn’t have much wear and tear. I’m tossing it around in the gym, throwing it in and out of my truck, and traveling with it to powerlifting meets. So durability is key. I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty hard on my gym bags. The bag is made of canvas fabric, which is extremely durable that can take a beating while resisting wear and tear. So for a ‘powerlifting-specific bag’, this was an excellent feature. Not many bags I tested had enough room for both shoes. The bag also has multiple compartments to store various big and small items including both your squat shoes and deadlift shoes.

It can definitely fit a standard-sized powerlifting belt. I have a 10mm lever belt, and I thought the lever attachment wouldn't be able to fit into the side pouches, but I was wrong. So rather than trying to put your powerlifting belt inside the bag, you can wrap it around the bag, which saves a lot of other room for other items inside the actual main compartment. The King Kong Core35 bag has an external belt attachment. This brings me to the main feature that I love about this bag… I chatted with Stefan on the phone not too long ago, the CEO of King Kong, and he told me the story of how by creating the bag he was trying to solve his own pain point of walking into the gym with a bag that just simply wouldn't hold all of his gym gear properly. The King Kong Core35 Duffel is my top recommendation for a powerlifting gym bag because it was built from the ground up to be a gym bag, and a gym bag only. The canvas material is ultra-durable, which will be good to take both to the gym or a powerlifting meet.It has multiple smaller compartments to neatly stash other items like wraps, sleeves, chalk, ammonia, or anything else your powerlifting heart desires.It’s wide enough to fit your powerlifting belt and up to two pairs of shoes (squat and deadlift shoes).While this bag wasn’t initially marketed toward powerlifters (originally it was for Crossfitters and Strongmen), it has everything that a powerlifter needs in a gym bag: So what’s the best powerlifting gym bag?Īfter testing five popular gym bags and speaking with each of the manufacturers, the best powerlifting gym bag is the King Kong CORE35 Duffel. Rather than being that guy (or girl), the easiest solution is to actually buy a proper powerlifting gym bag. If you’ve been part of the powerlifting community, chances are you’ve come across a lifter who walks into the gym with an awkwardly huge travel-sized luggage bag with all sorts of equipment and other stuff mashed up together inside and wasting more time taking things in and out than actually working out. Some links in this article are affiliate links, which means I earn from qualifying purchases.

Extra large gym bag with compartments