Hyrox advanced training plan: how to get faster after your first race

Why training more is not enough

There is a difference between being fit for Hyrox and being fast in Hyrox. Many athletes preparing for their second or third race simply train harder than last time. They run more kilometers, do heavier sled work, and push every session a little further. And yet the time improvement is disappointing.

There is a reason for that. Once you are past your first race, you have already taken the easiest gains: you did not know the stations, your pacing was poor, and you did not know what was coming. You will not make those mistakes again. The remaining gains are deeper and require more targeted work.

In practical terms: you need to know exactly where you are losing time, and train specifically for that. Not generically harder, but smarter.

Step 1: analyze your race honestly

Before you plan even one training session, do one thing: review your race data. Hyrox publishes full split times for each run lap and each station. That data is extremely valuable, but most athletes look at it once and then forget about it.

Use the Hyrox Race Analyzer to compare your splits with the average for your finish-time category. Or check the average times per category and see where you were above or below average for each station.

Three patterns you can recognize:

Run times that fade
If your first run lap was 4:50/km and your last was 6:20/km, then running endurance is your biggest limiter. Not strength. More sled training will not solve this.

Station times that stand out
If you clearly lose more time than the average for your category on one or two specific stations, those are your weak points. Identify them and address them directly.

Long transition times
Many athletes underestimate how quickly RoxZone seconds add up. If you waste 15 seconds eight times during transitions, you lose two minutes without your legs even feeling it. This is the easiest time gain available and the most neglected one. Use our Hyrox Race Analyzer for this as well. It compares your RoxZone time with everyone who raced on the same course. If your runs are faster compared with the field than your RoxZone time, you are leaving too much time there.

Step 2: find your limiter

At advanced level, there are three types of limiters. Which one you have completely determines how you should train over the coming weeks.

Aerobic engine

You recognize this if your run times clearly deteriorate as the race progresses, if your heart rate barely drops during the run laps, and if after the race you were more out of breath than sore.

What it means: your lactate threshold and/or VO2max are the bottleneck. You can cover the distance, but not under the cumulative fatigue of eight stations.

What you do: more running volume, structured threshold training, and temporarily less focus on strength work.

Strength endurance

You recognize this if your run times stay stable, but your station times increase. You need to break up sets on Wall Balls or Lunges that you can do unbroken in the gym. You are strong enough for one station, but not for eight in a row.

What you do: higher set volumes, more specific muscular endurance, and more compromised training where you combine stations.

Race execution

This is the most subtle limiter. You are fit, your training times are good, but the race still disappoints. You started too fast, your transitions were messy, or you had no plan for when things got hard around station 6.

What you do: race simulations with deliberate pacing, transition drills, and potentially using a second race purely as a learning session.

Step 3: threshold training and VO2max

The biggest training shift from beginner to advanced is the move from volume toward intensity. A beginner builds an aerobic base with a lot of low-intensity work. An advanced athlete needs to extend that base with targeted high-intensity blocks.

Threshold training

Your lactate threshold determines how fast you can run without lactate accumulating to an unsustainable level. In Hyrox, you want to run just below your threshold during the run laps, so that you can handle the stations without emptying the tank.

Jack Daniels, author of Daniels’ Running Formula and one of the most cited running coaches in the world, describes threshold training as one of the most efficient methods to improve running economy and endurance at the same time. That also applies to hybrid athletes who do not train purely as runners.

In practice:

Tempo runs: 20 to 40 minutes at a pace where you can still just about talk, but no longer comfortably. That is your threshold pace.

Cruise intervals: 3 to 5 repetitions of 8 to 12 minutes at threshold pace, with 2 to 3 minutes of recovery between reps.

Hyrox-specific: a tempo run of 15 to 20 minutes, followed immediately by a heavy station. This combines threshold training with race reality.

VO2max intervals

Shorter, harder, more recovery. Do this no more than once per week and only after you have built a solid aerobic base.

4 to 6 repetitions of 1000 meters at a pace you can just hold for six minutes, with three minutes of recovery

6 to 8 repetitions of 600 meters slightly faster, with two minutes of recovery

Two high-intensity sessions per week is already close to the limit for most recreational athletes. More is not better if recovery is insufficient.

Step 4: advanced compromised sessions

Basic compromised training — doing one station and then running one kilometer — is enough to finish your first Hyrox. To improve your time, you need more specificity.

Race-pace compromised runs

The most common mistake in compromised training: running too easily after a station because you get enough recovery. That is not how a race works.

Deliberately train at your target race pace, even immediately after a heavy station. That pace should feel like mild torture. If it feels comfortable, you are running too slowly.

Example session:

Combined station blocks

Instead of training one station at a time, you train blocks of two or three stations chained together, followed by a run lap. This simulates the cumulative fatigue of the race more accurately than isolated stations.

Example: Sandbag Lunges for 100 m immediately followed by RowErg for 1000 m, then 1 km run at race pace. Four minutes of recovery, repeat two to three times.

Training negative splits

The best Hyrox athletes run their final laps faster than their first. That is not coincidence; it is training. Deliberately practice negative splits in your compromised sessions: the first rounds slightly more controlled, the final rounds slightly faster. An athlete who controls pacing wins time in the second half of the race against athletes who do not.

Step 5: station-specific time gains

At advanced level, you already know how every station works. The question is where the marginal gains are.

SkiErg: learn pacing without the screen

Many athletes attack the SkiErg as if it were a sprint. Wrong. The SkiErg is station 1, and if you go too hard here, you pay for it all the way to station 8.

Train with a heart-rate monitor on the SkiErg and learn to feel your race pace without looking at the screen. On race day, you cannot check your heart rate during the SkiErg, so you need to be able to feel the pace. You can find everything about technique and pacing on the SkiErg station page.

Sled Push and Pull: technique over weight

At advanced level, technical refinement brings more improvement than simply training heavier.

For the Sled Push: train regularly at or slightly above race weight and focus on a consistent step frequency and a low, stable position. If you lift the sled, you lose friction efficiency.

For the Sled Pull: experiment with combination techniques. Many athletes gain 10 to 15 seconds by stepping backward for the first half and switching to pure arm or hip use for the final meters. More technical details are available on the Sled Pull page.

Wall Balls: optimize your set structure

100 Wall Balls at the end of a Hyrox are a mental and physical test. At advanced level, it is all about finding your personal optimal set structure.

The best structure is the one you can actually hold on race day, not the fastest one in the gym. Test multiple options in training. Everything about Wall Ball strategy can be found on the Wall Balls page.

Farmers Carry: train your weak side

Many athletes carry asymmetrically. The dominant hand unconsciously takes over more of the load. Over 200 meters, this is barely visible, but over a full season with multiple races, it increases injury risk. Train deliberately with your weaker hand as the leading hand.

Weekly plans for advanced athletes

Below are two concrete weekly structures. The intensity distribution per week is 75 to 80 percent low intensity, Zone 1-2, and 20 to 25 percent high intensity, threshold, compromised, and intervals. If you reverse that ratio, you accumulate fatigue instead of converting it into adaptation.

5 sessions per week

Target group: athletes aiming to finish under 1:30, Open men, or under 1:45, Open women.

4 sessions per week

Target group: athletes with less training time who still want targeted improvement.

Periodization across a full season

Advanced athletes often do multiple Hyrox races in one season. That creates opportunities, but also risks.

Use your first race as a measurement

If you plan two races with ten to sixteen weeks between them, use the first race as a real test: race by effort, not by tactics. The data from that race, combined with the Race Analyzer, becomes the input for your second preparation.

Recovery after a race

After a Hyrox, you need at least one to two weeks of active recovery before returning to structured training. The muscle damage from the Sled, Wall Balls, and Sandbag Lunges is significant. Athletes who resume too quickly carry fatigue that can last for weeks.

A realistic recovery protocol:

Week 1: walking, swimming, or light mobility
Week 2: easy endurance runs, Zone 1-2, no strength training
Week 3: resume normal base-phase training
Week 4: only then begin targeted build-up for the next race

Planning structure for two races

Race 1
→ 2 weeks recovery
→ Base phase, 4-5 weeks
→ Build phase, 4-5 weeks
→ Race prep, 2-3 weeks
→ Taper, 10-14 days
Race 2

Everything about tapering and the final week before your race can be found on the Raceday page.

When should you switch to Pro?

Pro is not just a matter of ambition. The weights are fundamentally heavier: for Open men, the Sled Push goes from 152 to 202 kg, Wall Balls from 6 to 9 kg, and Sandbag Lunges from 20 to 30 kg. That is a different race.

Fergus Crawley, elite Hyrox athlete and coach, is clear about it: “Most athletes switch to Pro too early. They think heavier weights will make them faster. But if your run is still your limiter, Pro just makes everything harder without teaching you anything new.”

An honest threshold to consider:

• You complete the Open stations unbroken, even mid-race and not only in the gym.
• Your Open finish times have stabilized across multiple races and you no longer see progress.
• Your running base is in place: the stations are heavier in Pro, but the runs still matter just as much.

There is no exact time cut-off. What matters is this: are you ready for a new stimulus, or are you still leaving time on the table in Open?

Frequently asked questions

Ready to take on your next race?

• All Hyrox stations: technique and time gains
• Running for Hyrox: compromised running and running mistakes
• Hyrox Raceday: taper, nutrition, and pacing
• Hyrox Race Analyzer: analyze your previous race
• Back to Hyrox training overview