CROSSFIT VS HYROX (Part 1)

*Pre-Face - I see a lot of discourse between 'Hyrox' athletes and 'CrossFit' athletes. I don't and won't buy  into that and this blog certainly isn't trying to explore which is better. As I have always said, there is no one size fits all and everyone is unique so naturally some people will lean towards one or the other. For me the question will always be… 'Are you enjoying being fit and healthy?'. Any fitness is good fitness in my book!

Part 1 (of 3): What’s the Difference?

There’s a lot of noise right now around CrossFit vs Hyrox. Hot takes. Tribalism. One being positioned as the ‘future’ and the other as outdated or dying.

This isn’t that.

This blog series isn’t about which is better. It’s about understanding what each actually is and why both continue to attract huge numbers of people.

What is CrossFit?

CrossFit is a training methodology.

At its core, it’s designed to develop general physical preparedness: strength, power, stamina, endurance, speed, agility, coordination, balance, and accuracy. It does this through constantly varied training, across a broad range of time domains, loads, and movements. The goal isn’t to be great at one thing – it’s to be hard to kill and useful in as many physical situations as possible.

The Sport of CrossFit

The sport of CrossFit is the competitive expression of that methodology.

Athletes specialise in performing CrossFit at the highest level, across unknown and unknowable tests that reward breadth, adaptability, and resilience. As with any sport, what works for the elite is not automatically appropriate for the general population.

What is Hyrox?

Hyrox is a standardised fitness race.

Every athlete, in every country, completes the same format: running intervals interspersed with set workout stations. The movements are simple, repeatable, and accessible, with clearly defined divisions.

Hyrox isn’t about preparing for the unknown. It’s about preparing for something very specific, and executing it as efficiently as possible.

Accessibility & Perception

I have written before about how, because of how good the elite are at CrossFit and how they get the majority of the media attention, that the sporting side overshadows what CrossFit was really designed to be… A training methodology. The CrossFit Games was never the plan when CrossFit was created but if you think about it logically now, the competitiveness of the people likely to be good at CrossFit was always likely to manifest it's self into what we now know as the Sport of CrossFit. And ultimately, if it is managed well, there is no reason why the sport of CrossFit and the training methodology shouldn't work harmoniously (see previous blog on what counts as success at the games for the funnel theory on this). Unfortunately, for a while, the cohesion between the two has been missing and as a result CrossFit as a whole has suffered. And where CrossFit has suffered, very clearly in that space, Hyrox has grown exponentially.

There is then the perception with CrossFit around safety…. And I have made my feelings on that very clear in the past… CrossFit is safe (see a previous blog for my argument there) but when you combine the perceived difficulty that the sport side creates, alongside the perceived risk and then general cost of a CrossFit membership, there is a perceived barrier to entry to the methodology (or the methodology at an affiliate anyway - sign up to .com and get access to a training programme you can do on your own for free!). Hyrox on the other hand has been able to build (from my perspective) from that lack of a barrier to entry to start with. Lower skill, lower cost and high volume of events means it's easy to get into and as we know from that funnel approach noted in my CrossFit Games blog… once you are competing… you are hooked. And the good news for Hyroxers is that there are plenty of other lower cost events in the market which are slightly different but the same premise… Hybrid Games, Gauntlet, Wild Hybrid, etc. Lowering the barrier to entry further and keeping people in that Hybrid Fitness ecosystem.

The Biggest Difference: Standardisation vs the Unknown

This is the key distinction.

• Hyrox thrives on standardisation, predictability, and mass participation. This makes performance and improvement easily measurable.

• CrossFit thrives on variation, adaptability, and broad capacity. No two, sessions, affiliates or events are the same and improvement can be harder to see, feel & programme for.

Neither is better. They’re simply different meaning people with different personalities, motivations, and goals will thrive in either and sometimes both!

Key takeaway: CrossFit builds capacity for anything. Hyrox rewards preparation for something specific.

In Part 2 we take a deeper look at if and how the training differs between the two…