The men on the starting line at the Hyrox in Berlin in April exuded nervous enthusiasm. Dramatic music played from small speakers. A booming voice announced, “This is the moment you have been training for!” The lights flickered and the spectators applauded.
For Christian Toetzke, 55, and Moritz Furste, 39, the founders of the Hyrox fitness race, this kind of spectacle was always part of the plan. The idea, when they introduced the race in Hamburg, Germany, in 2017, was to “create an event that is a 200 thousand euro production” (about 214 thousand dollars) “that looks like a 2 million euro production” (2.1 million dollars), Furste said.
Hyrox’s “modern entertainment and lighting effects create a very special feeling,” said Toetzke, to create a “new proposition for mass participation events.”
A Hyrox run combines running with several functional fitness movements, such as the weighted lunge and long jump burpee. It takes about 90 minutes to complete, although elite runners can finish in less than an hour. The race has grown in popularity since the end of the pandemic: more than 175,000 people are expected to participate in the more than 60 races that Hyrox has organized by 2024.
Hyrox relies heavily on CrossFit, including the equipment it uses. In CrossFit gyms it is common to see ski and rowing machines, kettlebells, ropes, and weighted sleds. Some Hyrox moves, such as the wall ball throw, were created by CrossFit, although CrossFit workouts do not use these moves frequently, following founder Greg Glassman’s ethos of “constantly varied high-intensity functional fitness.”
CrossFit involves many Olympic lifts and complex gymnastics skills, which can be difficult to master. Hyrox has avoided those types of techniques and stuck to simple movements that, Toetzke says, “are very difficult to do wrong in a way that can harm your body.” Despite, or perhaps because of, the similarities between the sports, Hyrox has deliberately positioned itself as the safer and more accessible alternative.
“Look, I honestly think they’re smart to try to take advantage of that,” CrossFit CEO Don Faul said in response to the claim. “When you try to enter a new space, you define yourself against the benchmark, the company that has defined the category.”
Faul, 47, a former platoon commander in the United States Marine Corps, said the apparent difference in accessibility between CrossFit and Hyrox is really just a difference in perception.
“The vast majority of people in our gyms are ordinary people, not elite athletes,” he said.
Although it’s hard to say how much overlap there is between CrossFit and Hyrox, Chris Hinshaw, a 60-year-old trainer who trains athletes in both sports, said that “most of the people who come into Hyrox started at CrossFit.” Many of the runners on Hyrox podiums are also elite CrossFit stars.
Hyrox says it has more than 2,500 affiliated gyms around the world, where athletes can train for public races.
The question now is whether Hyrox can continue to grow as the novelty wears off. It could also, like CrossFit, deepen in intensity and narrow its appeal: it could inspire passion, but the passion of a few devotees.
Toetzke doesn’t think so. “I don’t see the risk of becoming a sport only for committed people,” he said. “We seek the success, longevity and sustainability of the marathon.”
The goal is to become as popular as marathons.
“We really think that’s the potential,” Toetzke said.
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