Training
How to train for HYROX
Updated · Rivo
To train for HYROX®, run at least three times a week, make one of those runs a compromised run (station work, then 1 km straight after it), lift twice, and give each four-week block to your two weakest stations. The race sets that order: in the 2025/26 season the eight runs were 47% of the average Open men’s finish and 48% of the women’s, and wall balls, burpee broad jumps and sandbag lunges separated finish times more than any other station.
This guide puts the race’s numbers next to the training rules they lead to. The numbers come from 702,095 public HYROX results with all 16 splits; the rules come from what athletes reported about how they trained and how they raced. Below: what the race demands, where faster athletes find their time, each rule and its evidence, what a week holds at three, four and five sessions, how long to train, how to find your two stations, and every guide on this site.
What does HYROX demand?
A HYROX race is eight 1 km runs, each followed by a station: SkiErg 1000 m, sled push 50 m, sled pull 50 m, burpee broad jumps 80 m, row 1000 m, farmers carry 200 m, sandbag lunges 100 m, then 100 wall balls. You change between running and station work in the roxzone, and the clock keeps running there. In 2025/26 the middle Open man finished in 1:27:52 and the middle Open woman in 1:36:19.
| Division | Results | Runs | Stations | Roxzone |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Open men | 174,215 | 47% | 44% | 9% |
| Open women | 98,478 | 48% | 43% | 9% |
| Pro men | 34,004 | 45% | 47% | 8% |
| Pro women | 16,119 | 46% | 46% | 8% |
| Men’s doubles | 106,408 | 55% | 35% | 10% |
| Women’s doubles | 111,895 | 56% | 35% | 9% |
| Mixed doubles | 121,546 | 55% | 36% | 9% |
| Men’s Pro Doubles | 24,307 | 53% | 39% | 9% |
| Women’s Pro Doubles | 14,488 | 53% | 38% | 9% |
HYROX season 2025/26, results with all 16 splits. Each part’s share of the average finish in its division. Doubles times are team times: both partners run every kilometre and share the station work. Rounding can make a row add to 101%.
Running is the biggest part of the finish in every division but Pro men, where the heavier sleds, carries and wall balls take the stations to 47%, against 45% for the runs. In doubles the runs grow past half, 55% for mixed teams, because both partners run every kilometre while the stations are shared. The roxzone takes about a tenth of every finish, and for Open athletes it takes longer than any single station: a median of 7:27 for men against 7:11 on the wall balls, the longest station.
Where do faster athletes find their time?
Compare Open men who finished in 80:00–84:59 with the men who finished ten minutes later, in 90:00–94:59, and Open women in 90:00–94:59 with those in 100:00–104:59. The table splits each ten-minute gap into its parts, from the average splits of every finisher in each group.
| Part | Open men | Open women |
|---|---|---|
| SkiErg | +0:09 | +0:12 |
| Sled push | +0:21 | +0:17 |
| Sled pull | +0:39 | +0:41 |
| Burpee broad jumps | +0:53 | +1:00 |
| Row | +0:13 | +0:14 |
| Farmers carry | +0:14 | +0:12 |
| Sandbag lunges | +0:47 | +0:44 |
| Wall balls | +1:14 | +1:10 |
| All eight stations | +4:31 | +4:28 |
| All eight runs | +4:15 | +4:19 |
| Roxzone | +1:12 | +1:10 |
| Average finish | +9:56 | +9:56 |
HYROX season 2025/26: average splits of the Open men who finished in 80:00–84:59 (21,690 results) and in 90:00–94:59 (17,379), and of the Open women who finished in 90:00–94:59 (11,778) and in 100:00–104:59 (9,094). Each cell is the slower group’s average minus the faster group’s; the parts add up to the finish within a few seconds of rounding.
Read it as a training budget. Of the men’s ten minutes, 4:15 is running, 4:31 is the eight stations together, and 1:12 is the roxzone, more than the sled push, farmers carry, row and SkiErg add up to. Three stations hold most of the station gap: wall balls (1:14), burpee broad jumps (0:53) and sandbag lunges (0:47). The sled push holds 21 seconds. The women’s gap is built the same way, with burpee broad jumps closer to wall balls. Your own gap will not be the average one, which is why the third rule below is about your two stations, not these three.
The rules of HYROX training, and the evidence for each
The rules come from 108,244 public posts and comments by HYROX athletes, read for what held their races back and what made them faster, and from the 17 athletes in them who reported a faster race and described the week that produced it. Where the race data speaks to a rule, its numbers sit beside it.
1. Running is the limiter: run three times a week or more
In those posts, 1,153 named running as what limited their race; 9 named strength. The splits agree: running is the largest single part of an Open finish, and 4:15 of the men’s ten minutes above, more than any one station. Run at least three times a week, whatever else the week holds.
2. Do one compromised-run session every week
A compromised run is running on legs a station has just tired: station work at race load, then 1 km at race pace, repeated. Athletes describe the 8 km and the stations as manageable apart and a different race together, and the splits show it. For the median Open man, run 3, straight after the sled push, took 23 seconds longer than run 2, and run 8, after the lunges, 41 seconds longer than run 7. The kilometre in this session never grows: it is the race’s own distance.
3. Train your two weakest stations, four weeks at a time
The mistake athletes report most is training all eight stations equally every week. Stations do not cost the same: between the median and the top quarter of Open men, the wall balls differ by 83 seconds and the SkiErg by 13. Find the two costing you the most, give them a four-week block, then check again. When they change, the block changes.
4. Never a quality run the day after heavy legs
A quality run is the compromised run, an interval session or a race rehearsal. Heavy legs means lifting or station work: squats, deadlifts, lunges, sleds. Athletes who ran hard on legs still wrecked from squats describe building fatigue, not fitness.
5. Keep the long run 48 hours from a sled session
Keep at least 48 hours between any session with a sled push or sled pull and the long run, before it and after it. At four sessions a week or fewer, never put two hard days back to back; the compromised run, a rehearsal and heavy legs are the hard days.
6. Lift twice a week, never more than three times
Seven of the nine athletes who got faster and said how often they lifted did two or three strength sessions a week; none did more than three. At three or four sessions a week, lift on the compromised-run day, the day that is already hard. From five, strength gets a day of its own.
7. Build the running every week until the peak
Weekly running climbs through every week of base and build, then holds. The athletes who got faster and gave their volume ran between 15 and 50 km a week. Fourteen of the seventeen ran a separate interval or threshold session; here it is 1 km repeats, the race’s own distance, a little slower than your fresh 1 km pace. The long run starts at 8 km, the race’s own running distance, and grows to 75 minutes at an easy pace, never less than 12 km.
8. Rehearse the race twice: eight weeks and three weeks out
A full simulation eight weeks before the race, and a half simulation, every distance halved, three weeks before. Each replaces that week’s long run and drills the roxzone: transitions come up in 1,147 posts as the part of the race nobody trains, and they hold 1:12 of the men’s ten minutes above.
9. Taper: 40% less, then 60% less
In the week before race week, cut the volume by 40%; in race week, by 60%. Cut rounds and repetitions, never pace or load: the 1 km stays 1 km and race weights stay race weights. No barbell in the last six days, and nothing but a short easy run in the two days before the race.
What does a week of HYROX training look like?
Three sessions is the least that holds every rule; the athletes who got faster and gave a count trained between four and ten times a week, most often five or six. What changes with the count is which session types fit, not the rules.
- Three sessions: a compromised run with the lifting after it, a station day, and the long run. The station day ends with a little station-into-run work, so the week still holds three runs.
- Four sessions: the three, plus 1 km intervals.
- Five sessions: strength leaves the compromised-run day and gets a day of its own.
- Six sessions: the five, plus an easy run.
The sessions
- Compromised run: half-station pieces at race load, each straight into 1 km at race pace. It trains rule 2, the run on tired legs. At three and four sessions the lifting follows it, because that day is already hard.
- 1 km intervals: the race’s distance, repeated, a little slower than your fresh 1 km pace. They build the running speed rule 7 asks for, without the station fatigue.
- Station work: your two weakest stations at race load, for the four-week block of rule 3.
- Long run: easy, from 8 km toward 75 minutes. It builds the volume, and it is the session rule 5 protects from the sleds.
- Strength: at five sessions and more, a full-body day of its own: a squat, a hinge and a press.
What decides where the days fall
Three rules place the days, and any week that keeps them works. No quality run the day after lifting or station work. The long run at least 48 hours from the station day whenever it holds a sled. At four sessions or fewer, no hard day straight after another, counted across the weekend into the next week too.
Where is the week written out?
In Rivo. The Plan writes each week out, session by session, from your Number and your race date: the running, the strength and the stations, a compromised run every week, every four-week block aimed at the two stations costing you the most, and loads for your sex and division. It has a 14-day free trial and runs on the iPhone and the Apple Watch only.
How long should you train for HYROX?
Twelve weeks holds every phase, and most published HYROX programmes run twelve. Counted back from race week, the phases are fixed: base until ten weeks out, build from nine to four, peak at three and two, and the taper in the last two weeks. On twelve weeks that gives two base weeks; six build weeks, with the full rehearsal in week 4, eight weeks out; two peak weeks, with the half rehearsal in week 9; and the two taper weeks. A longer runway only lengthens the base. With less than six weeks there is no base and no peak: build, then taper.
How do you find your two weakest stations?
After a race, put your 16 splits beside the average splits of athletes who finished in the same five minutes as you; the HYROX splits guide has them for every bracket. The two stations where you are furthest behind are your two. The station times guide shows where your time sits in the whole field.
Before a first race, or between races, Rivo’s free Number does it from three inputs: a 5 km time and your sled push and sled pull times give a predicted finish, the range it could land in, and the stations costing you the most time, in seconds. Time the sleds rather than guess them: sled times follow bodyweight and the sled surface more than running speed, so a 5 km says little about them. Check again at the end of every four-week block.
Can you train for HYROX without a sled?
Yes. Every station has a stand-in, and every chain of stand-ins ends in something that needs no equipment: an incline backward walk for the sled push, an inverted row for the sled pull, burpees for the SkiErg and the row, jump squats for the wall balls, walking lunges for the sandbag, a carry of anything heavy for the farmers carry. Burpee broad jumps need nothing at all. In the posts behind these rules, 426 came from athletes with no sled or no SkiErg to train on. The full list of stand-ins, in order of preference, is in the HYROX training guide for beginners.
Every HYROX guide on this site
Times and data
- Good HYROX times by age, sex and division
- HYROX splits for every finish time, sub 60 to sub 2:00
- Average HYROX time for every station
- HYROX running pace, run 1 to run 8
- Good HYROX doubles times for men’s, women’s and mixed teams
- The fastest and slowest HYROX courses
- HYROX Boston: times, course and pacing
Stations
- HYROX weights for every division, in kg and lb
- HYROX sled push: weight, distance and times
- HYROX wall balls: ball weight, target height and times
Starting out and training
- What HYROX is, how long it takes and who races it
- HYROX training for weightlifters
- What a beginner’s HYROX training plan needs each week
How these numbers were made
- Race data: 702,095 results from 98 venues, season 2025/26, all public, read with pyrox-client (an independent open-source client) and loaded 2 September 2026. A result counts when it has all 16 splits and a finish of 40 to 300 minutes.
- Shares and brackets: a share is a part’s average divided by the average finish. A bracket is every finisher whose time fell in the same five minutes; its averages add up to its average finish. Doubles times are team times.
- Small groups are left out. No bracket or cell with fewer than 50 results is published, and nothing here describes one athlete.
- Training evidence: 108,244 public Reddit posts and comments about HYROX, March 2025 to August 2026, counted for what athletes named as their limiter, and the 81 athletes in them who reported a faster race; 17 of those described their training week, the rows behind rules 6 and 7.