What does it take to be at the Elite level in HYROX?
The Elite 15 races at the 2025 HYROX World Championships will see the 15 fastest men and women in the sport battle it out for the crown of HYROX World Champion.
As the sport continues to grow, so does the standard of the top athletes…
On the Men’s side, the average personal best time of the top 15 was 55:17m (53secs faster than last season), and the Women’s side it was 01:00:19 (2:09mins faster than last season!). It is perhaps worth highlighting that 13 of the 30 PB’s were set at Glasgow in March 2025.
To gain an understanding of what it takes to reach this “Elite” level in the sport, we surveyed the 30 qualifying athletes. Here’s some of the main findings…
The Athletes
The Elite 15 athletes for the 2025 World Championships are shown below (along with their current personal best time in the Pro division)…
Lauren Weeks – 00:56:23
Joanna Wietrzyk – 00:56:49
Megan Jacoby – 00:58:52
Vivian Tafuto – 00:59:38
Seka Arning – 01:00:28
Kate Davey – 01:00:43
Linda Meier – 01:00:50
Lucy Procter – 01:00:58
Jess Pettrow – 01:01:00
Amy Bevilacqua – 01:01:09
Emilie Dahmen – 01:01:10
Lauren Griffith – 01:01:15
Melanie Maurer – 01:01:03
Sinéad Bent – 01:02:13
Ida Mathilde Rubens Steensgaard – 01:02:19
Hunter McIntyre – 00:53:22
James Kelly – 00:53:23
Alexander Roncevic – 00:54:07
Rich Ryan – 00:54:28
Tim Wenisch 00:54:31
Beau Wills – 00:55:02
Pelayo Menendez Fernandez – 00:55:23
Dylan Scott – 00:55:34
Jake Dearden – 00:55:44
Rylan Schadegg – 00:55:46
Tomas Tvrdik – 00:56:03
Tom Rodgers – 00:56:05
Graham Halliday – 00:56:33
Hidde Weersma – 00:56:33
Jon Wynn – 00:56:40
(click on their names to check out some of our interviews with them from the Rox Lyfe podcast)
Geography
15 of the athletes are from Europe, 9 from America, and 6 from Australasia.
By country, the breakdown is as follows:
USA – 9
UK – 5
Australia – 5
Germany – 3
Netherlands – 2
Austria – 1
Czech Republic – 1
Spain – 1
New Zealand – 1
Switzerland – 1
Denmark – 1
Age
The median age of the athletes is 30 on women’s side, and 32 on the men’s (averages are 31 and 32 respectively). This is slightly younger than last year’s line-up, where the women’s median was 31.5, and the men’s was 35. The youngest athlete this time round (Emilie Dahmen) is 20 years old, and the oldest (Amy Bevilacqua) is 51. The second oldest is Kate Davey at 40.
Height
Median height of the athletes is 170cm (5’6) on women’s side, and 184cm (6’0) on the men’s.
The shortest female (Kate Davey) is 157cm, and the tallest (Emilie Dahmen) is 183cm.
The shortest male(s) (James Kelly and Jake Dearden) are 181cm, and the tallest (Hidde Weersma) is 192cm.
While there is a reasonably broad range of heights in the women’s field, that’s much less the case on the men’s side. All athletes are within just 10cm of each other, with Hidde Weersma tallest by 3cm (at 192cm).
Weight
Median weight of the athletes is 139lbs (63kg) on women’s side, and 180lbs (82kg) on the men’s.
Sporting Background
Here is how some of the athletes described their sporting background prior to discovering HYROX…
Lauren Weeks- CrossFit, soccer, swimming
Megan Jacoby- Cross country, track and field, powerlifting
Joanna Wietrzyk – Tennis and netball
Kate Davey – Triathlon many years ago, then more CrossFit style training after having children
Ida Mathilde Steensgaard – OCR
Lauren Griffith – OCR, rock climbing, running
Linda Meier – Fitness and running
Amy Bevilacqua – Running, triathlon, road cycling
Lucy Procter – Track & Cross Country
Vivian Tafuto – Swimming
Seka Arning – Strength Training
Jess Pettrow – Track- mid-distance 800m/400m
Emilie Dahmen – Field hockey and tennis, followed by hybrid training in the gym and a sprint triathlon
Sinead Bent – Track/road/fell running, cross country in the past
Melanie Maurer – Handball until 25, then Duathlon and Triathlon
Alexander Roncevic- Swimming
James Kelly – Australian rules football
Rylan Schadegg – Futbol, Cycling, Rock Climbing, Fire Fighter racing, Trail running, OCR, Paragliding, Ski Mountaineering
Tim Wenisch – Track and Field Athlete
Graham Halliday – Bodybuilding
Pelayo Menendez Fernandez – Triathlon
Dylan Scott – Distance Running
Hunter McIntyre – OCR
Beau Wills – Tennis at College in the US, then CrossFit
Rich Ryan – Running, CrossFit, OCR
Tomas Tvrdik – Mountain bike, Strongman, Mountain bike, OCR/Spartan, Crossfit
Tom Rodgers – Triathlon
Hidde Weersma – Triathlon (also football and track & field as a child)
Jon Wynn – Athletics and rugby league as a junior. Then as an adult I was in the military and didn’t do sports until finding HYROX
Jake Dearden – Running
Job / Occupation
In previous years I’ve highlighted in this section than many of the Elite 15 athletes have other jobs / businesses, and are far from being full time athletes. Last year, around half were involved in the fitness industry in some way (gym owners, coaching, etc). This time, it feels that has shifted a little and a greater percentage – especially on the men’s side – are either full time athletes, or at least involved in the fitness industry and derive their income from being an athlete, coaching, owning a gym etc. That’s NOT the case for everyone I should add but this shift is perhaps a sign of the continued growth of HYROX, the increased sponsorship money becoming available, and athletes dedicating more of their lives and focus to the sport (which is perhaps even becoming necessary in order to be able to compete at the top level).
Running Times
The athletes were asked for their running times over certain distances. Some were unable to answer at all for some distances, and some had to make a rough estimation. The results were as follows…
5km – 18:11 (women), 16:00 (men)
10km – 38:07 (women), 33:30 (men)
Half Marathon – 01:23:00 (women), 01:15:00 (men)
Marathon – 03:05:00 (women)*, 02:45:00 (men)
* Only 3 women were able to estimate their time for a marathon so this number is based on a very small data set.
In general, one of the quickest runners on the women’s side looks to be Sinead Bent, with 16:30m over 5km, and 34:17m in the 10km.
On the Men’s side, Pelayo Menendez seems to edge it with 15:10m over 5km, 32:00m for 10km, and 01:12:00 half marathon.
SkiErg and Row
The average 2km times for the athletes on the Concept2 Ski Erg and Row machines looked like this…
Ski – 07:52 (women), 06:50 (men)
Row – 07:48 (women), 06:37 (men)
Hunter McIntyre (06:20 ski, 06:10 row) was one of the faster athletes on the men’s side, and Vivian Tafuto (07:30 ski, 07:07 row) was one of the faster women.
Strength
Approximate median 3 rep max (3RM) deadlift, squat, military press and bench press were as follows:
3RM squat – 194lbs / 88kg (women), 290lbs / 132kg (men)
3RM deadlift – 255lbs / 116kg (women), 364lbs / 165kg (men)
3RM military press – 100lbs / 45kg (women), 154lbs / 70kg (men)
3RM bench press – 136lbs / 62kg (women), 228lbs / 104kg (men)
Again, these numbers are based on those who were able to answer or estimate (not everybody was).
The strongest women (in general) appear to be Megan Jacoby (345lbs deadlift, 280lbs squat, 125lbs military press, 205lbs bench), closely followed by Lauren Weeks and Lauren Griffith.
On the men’s side it was Hunter McIntyre (525lbs deadlift, 370lbs squat, 205lbs military press, 295lbs bench) and Graham Halliday.
Training Volume
So how much do these athletes train to get to this level? Well, it varies quite a lot, but the median was around 18 hours a week for both the men and the women.
This is a couple of hours up from what we saw for the Elite 15 last year (and I said exactly the same for last year’s article in comparison versus 2023). These athletes are putting in more and more work to reach the top level – perhaps because that’s what it now takes with the increasing strength and depth of the field, and also possibly due to the fact that increased sponsorship money / prize money etc helps make increased training hours possible.
Running Volume
Running is obviously a major component of HYROX, and running volume is a large part of most athlete’s training schedule. The median total was around 49 miles (79km) per week for both men and women, though again there was a lot of variance…
Lauren Weeks, Lucy Proctor and Vivian Tafuto are 3 of the athletes with some of the highest running volume at around 96km (60 miles) running per week, whereas Linda Meier is doing around 24km (15 miles).
On the men’s side, Graham Halliday is doing somewhere between 95-120km per week (59-74miles), and Tomas Tvrdik and Alexander Roncevic are on the lower end at around 40-48km (25-30 miles).
It’s worth adding that this volume can vary significantly from week to week for each athlete, and will be dependent (amongst other things) on where they are in their season. Most had to make very rough guesses.
What Else?
There is much more to HYROX than being strong and good at running. Of course, those are important, but muscular endurance, pacing, tactics, nutrition and mindset all obviously come into play, amongst many other things.
There are certainly athletes in the elites who are not the strongest in a deadlift or squat, and not the best runner, but still compete at the top level. Rebecca Mason (who finished 6th in the Elite 15 at the 2023 World Championships) touched on this in the past with this comment:
“I feel it’s great to have really good numbers in the above but I have watched so many really good athletes who are far better than me in training & on paper, not be able to pull it all together on race day. The mental ability along with the ability to stick to a game plan suitable for you – not get caught up in race adrenaline/hype is so so important. Know your strengths, know where you can push & race your own race. You can’t measure that. For me personally, competition exposure & composure came from my time as an ex-gymnast, mental resilience & the courage to dig deep when things get tough!”
One major factor in HYROX is someone’s ability at “compromised running” – i.e. being able to run at a good pace after the HYROX functional stations. It’s all very well being a great runner, but if you slow dramatically after pushing a sled for 50 meters, for example, then it can hurt you in HYROX. Anyone who has watched an Elite 15 major race this season will have been impressed by James Kelly‘s pace as he leaves the stations. His compromised running appears to be very good, and he often has one of the quickest overall run times in an Elite race. But on this survey, his 5km, 10km etc run times are definitely not the fastest in the field.
This kind of compromised running perhaps takes training and in particular the specificity of HYROX training, but it can also require a degree of mental toughness. It’s made me wonder whether some athletes – such as James Kelly – who can make it to the Elite level are not necessarily just physically more capable than others who don’t reach that level, but they have the grit / mental toughness that allows them to be incredibly uncomfortable for the duration of a HYROX, and grind it out, whereas others may back off a little.
The word “grit” is something that Elite athletes such as Megan Jacoby and James Kelly have used when I’ve spoken to them on the Rox Lyfe podcast, and it’s something too that ex-Australian special forces Jon Wynn alluded to when telling me about where his mind goes during a race: “I empty my mind. If you’ve followed me for a bit, you know that in some of the big races, I’ve run an extra lap. It’s costly, but it’s literally because I had this disconnect. I’m in so much discomfort I just detach from my body. I’m just moving. My background and experience allow me to go to that place and stay in it.“
Grit can’t be distilled down to a number in a survey (I can’t give you the median grit level unfortunately!) But suffice to say the Elite of the sport aren’t just strong, fast, physically impressive athletes. They also seemingly have incredible levels of grit, determination, and resilience – and they are using that not just when it comes to race time, but day in day out during training as well.
In summary, reaching the level of the HYROX Elite 15 need an impressive combination of strength, endurance, specificity, and dedication. As the sport continues to evolve, these athletes set the benchmark for aspiring competitors worldwide, and hopefully this article has given you some idea of what it takes.
If you found it useful or interesting, we’d genuinely appreciate it if you shared it with someone who’d enjoy it too. This article — and the work of surveying 30 athletes — takes a lot of time and effort – and a repost on your social media or a quick message to a friend goes a long way. Thank you!
