BBCIt’s midday in a central London gym, and Charles Carroll has just finished his first Hyrocks class.
“It was tiring, but very rewarding,” the 30-year-old says.
He was part of a class of 20 people, but thousands of people across London are donning the trainers to follow this new fitness trend.
They are part of a rapidly growing global movement that is said to have seen a 1,000% increase in participants over the past five years.
Today’s session at Paddington was led by Master Trainer Jenny Tardif from The Gym Group.
She says Hyrox is essentially a “global fitness race.”
“It’s basically a 1-kilometre (0.6-mile) run followed by functional exercise like sled pushing or rowing machine.”
Participants compete in pairs, quartets, or alone and must complete eight stages totaling 8 km (5 miles). However, training he does not have to formally compete to participate in the routine..
The word Hyrox itself doesn’t actually mean anything, but it all started as a race in 2017.
Christian Tetzke set up his first race in his native Germany with Olympic champion hockey player Moritz Fürste.
The inaugural event had 650 participants, and to date, Hyrox says there are approximately 200,000 competitors scattered around the world.
In London, 522 people took part in the first race of 2021. Back in 2023, he had two races with more than 24,000 participants.
HirocksHighlocks was most popular among people aged between 35 and 39, with the average age at the London Highlocks race being 37 years old.
The gender ratio has leveled out since its inception, with 48% of participants registered for this year’s London race identifying as female, up from 42% in the inaugural race.
The ability to train in groups and use a variety of equipment also attracts people to the program.
Social media has promoted this pastime, with #hyroxlondon garnering millions of views on TikTok and tens of thousands of posts on Instagram.
“I love weightlifting and it’s really important to have proper conditioning, so being able to combine all the exercises is really great,” says Pusi, 28.
She came to class during her lunch break and brought her friend Eva to her first class.
“It was my first time and I loved everything about it. I had heard so much about it on social media that I wanted to give it a try and see what it was like.”
A growing number of gyms are now offering Hyrox classes across London.
One of the participants was London-based The Gym Group, which offered Hyrox classes for the first time at one of its venues in March last year. This has since expanded to 14 gyms across the capital offering classes.
“It quickly became the most popular class at the gym,” Tardif says.
“It probably started with members who knew about Hyrox, and then it exploded to everyone.”
This trend may be here to stay, but it’s not cheap.
Prices to enter the race start at £70, with the average gym membership in the capital costing £40 a month. Times investigation.
But so far this has not proven to be a deterrent, with the next London race in May already sold out.
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