What changes when you race as a pair
Doubles is the same course as Singles: eight runs of about 1 km, each followed by a station, with the same distances and the same 100 wall balls. The rulebook has each of you run all 8 km, side by side, and sets no shares for the stations, which hyrox.com describes as split as you choose. So the race asks each of you for part of the station work and all of the running.
That splits your training in two. Fitness is individual: nobody can run your kilometres for you. The race skills are shared: running level at one pace, switching inside the hand-over rules, and working in short, hard turns with a standing rest between them. Jake Dearden, an Elite 15 racer, told BOXROX, as quoted by Red Bull, that doubles is “more of an anaerobic event. You're redlining then recovering, redlining then recovering, over and over again.”
How the format works, and how to split the stations on race day, is on how doubles works. If you are still choosing between Singles, Doubles and Relay, start with divisions.
Your individual training
Most of your week is training on your own. Running comes first. In the first physiological study of the race, 11 recreational athletes spent about 60 percent of a simulated race running (51.2 of a median 86.5 minutes), and the faster finishers had a higher VO2max and did more endurance training each week. Grip strength and muscle mass did not correlate with finish time in that small group. That was a Singles race, and doubles takes station work off you, not running.
Ida Mathilde Steensgaard, who races both formats, says in Red Bull's doubles explainer that training for doubles means “more running, and a little less station work” for the average racer, since the event is won on the run. She also calls doubles “mainly lower-body strength endurance”.
- Run on your own, mostly easy. Easy running with some harder work on top builds the engine both of you race on. The detail is in running for HYROX.
- Get strong at your division's loads. Squats, lunges, carries and sled work at the band you race. The loads are on the weights page and the lifts in the strength guide.
- Both of you learn all eight stations. Even if one of you plans to take the sleds, both need every station to standard. On a bad day the split changes, and a partner who has never pulled a sled cannot take over. Standards and technique are in the eight stations.
- Count your other sports. A match or an indoor cycling class tires the same legs as a sled session, so plan them as one week. That is the argument of hybrid training.
Shared sessions: what to rehearse together
Train together for what only a pair can practise: the shared pace and the switches. The sessions below are examples, not a programme. Pick one per meeting, and do the easy run early in your build and the rehearsal later.
| Session | What you do together | What it rehearses |
|---|---|---|
| Easy run together | 30 to 60 minutes side by side at a pace the slower partner can talk at | Running level, with nobody drifting ahead |
| Race-pace kilometres | 4 to 6 x 1 km at the pace the slower partner plans to race, 2 minutes standing rest between | The pace for all eight runs, and saying out loud when it is too fast |
| Switch drills | At race weight, 8 to 10 switches at each station with a hand-over rule | Legal hand-overs until neither of you has to think about them |
| Turns and rests | 3 rounds of a 1,000 m row and 50 wall balls, switching every 250 m and every 10 reps | Short hard turns, recovering on your feet while your partner works |
| Race rehearsal | Four runs of about 1 km together, each into a station done with your planned split | Your split on tired legs, early enough to change it |
Most stations have a hand-over rule, listed in the table on how doubles works. Three of those rules are easy to break on tired legs and end in penalties or no-reps, so drill them at race weight until neither of you has to think, and rehearse the rest rule with them:
- Burpee broad jumps. End each turn with a jump and have the incoming partner start from it: hands on the line of the other's toes, every time.
- Farmers carry and sandbag lunges. Put the bells or the bag down beside or behind you, never ahead, until the habit holds on tired legs.
- Wall balls. Finish each turn with a hand-over or a drop, never a throw your partner catches in the squat.
- Every rest. Stand. The resting partner stays on their feet at every station, so rehearse your rests standing.
Training for the slower runner
The rulebook leaves no room on the run. Both of you run together for the whole of every run, and if one runs ahead the team takes a 1-minute penalty. Every kilometre goes at the slower runner's pace, so that runner's running is the biggest gain the pair has available.
- Slower runner: give spare time to running. An extra easy run does more for the team than an extra station session. Add it gradually: in a study of 874 novice runners, those who raised their weekly distance by more than 30% over two weeks seemed more vulnerable to distance-related injuries, such as runner's knee and shin pain, than those who added under 10%. The authors called it exploratory and advised staying under 30%.
- Faster runner: shared runs are easy runs. If the gap is big, your partner's pace is easy or steady for you, and that is useful work: in most studies of well-trained and elite endurance athletes, the bulk of their training is done at low intensity. Keep your own hard sessions for the days you train apart.
- Both: agree the pace in numbers. Settle on a pace per kilometre for the race runs, hold it in every race-pace session, and let the slower runner say early when it is too fast.
- Let the gap shape your training. The faster runner reaches each station with more in reserve. If your split gives them more of the station work, their own training leans towards stations and the slower runner's towards running. The split itself is on how doubles works.
Mixed doubles: different targets, shared loads
Mixed doubles races the middle band for both of you, and the table below is the kit. The training question is mostly hers: if she usually races Women or Doubles Women, every load is a band heavier, and only the wall-ball target is her own.
| Station | Both partners in Mixed |
|---|---|
| Sled push, including the sled | 152 kg (335.1 lb) |
| Sled pull, including the sled | 103 kg (227.1 lb) |
| Farmers carry, two kettlebells | 2 x 24 kg (2 x 52.9 lb) |
| Sandbag lunges | 20 kg (44.1 lb) |
| Wall ball | 6 kg (13.2 lb) |
Train with the middle-band kit. For a woman used to the light band, that means 2 x 24 kg kettlebells instead of 2 x 16 kg, a 20 kg sandbag instead of 10 kg and a 6 kg ball instead of 4 kg. If that is a grind, build towards it in small steps: the American College of Sports Medicine suggests adding 2 to 10% once you can do one or two reps more than planned. Kettlebells jump too far for that, so make the small steps with dumbbells, or hold the heavier bells for shorter carries and lengthen them.
Throw to your own target. She throws the 6 kg ball to 2.70 m, he throws it to 3.00 m. In a shared session, mark both heights on the wall, or use two targets, and practise the hand-over between them, so neither of you rehearses at the wrong height.
How long a pair needs, and how often to meet
A pair needs as long as the partner with less base needs. SHREDDY's HYROX plans, listed on hyrox.com, run over 12 weeks, and its Doubles plan switches between solo and doubles sessions for training together or apart. If either of you cannot yet run comfortably, add base weeks in front of a block like that. How long to train counts them by starting point.
How often to meet is judgement, not research. A sensible aim is one shared session a week through the race block, or one every two weeks for partners who live apart. Count it as one of each partner's sessions that week, not an extra: the run together replaces one of your easy runs, the station session one of your station or strength sessions. Leave at least one rehearsal of your whole split early enough to change it.
When you cannot meet, train the shared parts alone. Run the agreed pace on your own so it is familiar on race day, and drill the hand-overs with a training partner at your gym.
Two plans, one race date
Your race date is shared; your weeks are not. One of you may play football on Tuesdays while the other works shifts, so each of you needs a plan built around your own week.
Each partner adds the same race. Tap the plus on Home or Agenda, choose Add event and pick HYROX, then fill in the date, your division and Doubles as the format, your experience, whether you are chasing a time or aiming to finish, and how hard you want to commit. Each of you also adds your own sports and classes under SPORTS STACK on You.
With Pro or during your trial, that tells your coach what it is building towards and how long it has, and it plans around your sports instead of on top of them. On the free plan your coach is paused: your race is saved and a sport's own sessions still go on its days, but the rest of your plan stays as it is. More in Races and events and Add a sport or a class.
Trained together off-plan? Tap the plus and log it as a past session: the activity, the day, how long and how hard. It goes into your history and leaves the week ahead alone. See Log a workout you already did.
Your coach plans your training, not the pair's: it does not link your plan to your partner's or split the stations between you.