My fellow Lifehacker writer Beth Skwarecki is a weightlifter. I’m a marathon runner. Together, we make one reasonably competent Hyrox athlete—and in four weeks, we’re going to find out if that’s enough.
Beth and I are competing together in a Hyrox doubles race on May 29, in something of a joint experiment in just how little training you can get away with before showing up to one of these things. Hopefully, we can each bring our respective strengths to the floor, cover for each other’s weaknesses, and survive. Hopefully.
What is Hyrox, anyway?
If you haven’t encountered Hyrox yet, here’s the short version: It’s currently the trendiest fitness-race-sport-competition-lifestyle since Crossfit. You’ll hear people compare the two, but they have some key differences. For instance, while Crossfit competitions may include just about anything in any format, the Hyrox format is standardized, which is part of its appeal.
You run a total of eight kilometers (around five miles), broken into eight one-kilometer segments. Between each run, you complete one functional fitness station, always in the same order: a SkiErg, sled push, sled pull, burpee broad jumps, rowing, farmers carry, sandbag lunges, and wall balls. The entire thing is timed. You’re racing against yourself, your friends, and thousands of others who’ve done the exact same workout under the exact same conditions.
In the doubles format, two athletes share the workload—to an extent. All the 8x1km loops must be run side-by-side, but we can split the workload of the eight functional stations however we need. Right off the bat, I think I luck out more than Beth in this situation. I get a weightlifter to help me with the feats of strength (or “functional movement,” to be more accurate), but she still has to run the same as me no matter what.
My strengths going into Hyrox
As of writing, I’m bringing a cardio engine sitting at a comfortable half-marathon level of fitness. For a race that’s fundamentally built around eight kilometers of running, this is by far my greatest asset.
I also have hopes that my marathon experience in particular will provide me a certain “psychological toolkit.” Marathon training teaches you to hurt for a long time and keep moving anyway. You learn to negotiate with your own suffering and to push through the wall—something that will no doubt come up for me on Hyrox race day. In theory, the running portions alone of Hyrox shouldn’t break me. But I know what probably will.
My weaknesses going into Hyrox
Ironically, strength is my weakness. My resistance training is, generously speaking, inconsistent. The stations that require you to move heavy things—specifically the sled push and sled pull—are the ones I’m most afraid of. The sled push is station two, and the sled pull is station three. That means if I blow up my legs fighting those stations in the first quarter of the race, every single thing that comes after—the running, the lunges, the wall balls—is going to hurt in a completely different way than I’m used to. Marathon pain is a slow burn, but some of these functional stations sound like the pain will arrive fast—and last for the rest of the competition.
Beyond raw strength, I’m also concerned about technique and efficiency—and honestly, the injury risk that comes with poor form under fatigue. I’ve taken exactly one Hyrox class so far, at my local F45 gym. I’ll be able to attend three more before race day, but as of right now, I know enough to know that I don’t know enough.
Wall balls normally wouldn’t scare me, but after eight rounds of running and seven other stations, the idea of repeatedly squatting and launching a weighted ball overhead sounds significantly less manageable. Beth and I have much to discuss when it comes to strategy and how we plan to conserve our strength.
How I’m training for Hyrox
Given that I have less than a month until race day and can’t realistically build meaningful strength in that window, I’m prioritizing technique over everything else. I can’t radically transform my power output in four weeks, but what I can do is learn to move efficiently, avoid compensating in ways that cause injury, and conserve energy by not fighting the movements.
For me, that means more time with a sandbag and sled than I’m used to, specifically focused on form rather than load. As I mentioned above, I’ll be training at classes with Hyrox-specific stations in sequence. Still, these classes don’t have the running portions, so I have yet to really know what it feels like to transition from a run into a strength station on tired legs.
I’m also exploring the official Hyrox training modes available for Garmin and Amazfit watches, along with some unofficial off-brand apps that have popped up for Hyrox-specific preparation.
The bottom line
Having Beth as my partner makes me feel significantly better about all of this. The one thing I’m slightly nervous about on her end is the cardio. Eight kilometers of running interspersed with eight stations might end up being a lot for someone who doesn’t regularly train for endurance. In doubles, you can tag in and out, but there’s a limit to how much you can cover for each other. My biggest fear is I burn out and leave her with way too much of the heavy lifting—quite literally.
We’ll figure it out on May 29. Either we’ll discover you need surprisingly little prep to survive a Hyrox doubles race, or we’ll discover exactly what happens when a marathon runner and a weightlifter underestimate a fitness competition. At least both outcomes make for a good story.
