Why Everyone’s Talking About HYROX

If you haven’t heard, there’s a new race taking over the functional fitness world.

Are you a runner who likes to lift? Or a strength athlete who doesn’t mind short runs?

If your style of fitness involves a little bit of everything, you might like to hear more about Hyrox.

In 2020, I happened to watch a live feed of a fitness race on YouTube (cite the YouTube link and embed in text). I had followed the career of a functional fitness athlete, Hunter McIntyre, for about five years as we competed in Spartan years earlier. And he was racing this event.

But the fitness race I was watching unfold before me on YouTube five years ago was NOT Spartan. In fact, it looked like a Suffer City workout.

They had sled pushing, sandbag lunges, and wall ball shots — and they even had non-motorized runners with a large screen showing the run metrics.

And there were about 15 athletes racing one another. “Okay, this is cool,” I said to myself.

I showed up to my first race about a year later in Dallas. There were about 70 Men’s Pro athletes and maybe 1,000 total racers.

Fast-forward five years and HYROX is the biggest fitness phenomenon since Richard Simmons.

It has spread worldwide, exploding to over 90,000 participants in the 2022–23 season. (cite) — “Since its launch … with over 90,000 athletes in the 22/23 Season alone.”

The Men’s Pro Division I’m racing in this year will have over 600 athletes with more than 10,000 total racers for a weekend-long event.

Why such a rapid explosion in popularity? This comes down to four factors:

Repeatability: It’s the same race with the same distance, same movements, and same sequence every time. That makes tracking progress and training for races more systematic and specific.

Tracking: Every aspect of your HYROX race is tracked, measured, and available immediately—split times for runs, times in each station, and global comparisons.

Functionality: You won’t ever do a barbell snatch or handstand walks in a Hyrox race. The technical skill required is subordinate to functional strength, speed, and endurance—making HYROX more accessible.

Leadership: HYROX leadership balances fitness and sport enthusiasm with business acumen. They’ve scaled globally, standardized rules, and pushed growth while managing brand and race logistics. 

HYROX hasn’t grown so fast without hiccups…

While some call it trolling, the fitness community has criticized movement standards. And for good cause...

From questionable burpee broad jump rules to wild variations in wall ball standards, Hyox has had to greatly improve judging and dictating standards to athletes.

Additionally, Hyrox tested a new race tracking tech that backfired—some participants complained results were inaccessible, and race data was delayed or completely unavailable.

The problems peaked at the 2025 World Championships, where sled strength discrepancies caused controversy. Some sleds moved easily, others appeared stuck, depending on lane. HYROX later issued an apology acknowledging inconsistent sled performance and pledged improvements.

And here we are in the 2025–26 season—and HYROX is still gaining momentum. It is arguably the fastest-growing fitness race model in the world. 

If HYROX has you intrigued and wanting to learn more, contact Suffer City today — the premier HYROX training facility in Arizona.