Hey, how about a podcast guest of the fittest female athlete in the world?

Her name is Lauren Weeks and she is a Hyrox legend and a three-time world champion widely considered to be the most decorated competitor in the sport’s history and the world’s fittest woman. That’s a title you can throw around and argue about, but she has a legitimate claim because Hyrox is an incredible athletic challenge that demands both extreme endurance capability and the strength and power to perform these challenging stations that happen in between one-kilometer runs.

Lauren breaks down the entire Hyrox competition, how this fitness sensation has taken the fitness world by storm, and her journey to becoming a three-time world champion—including winning world championships, competing while eight months pregnant, returning to take second in the world, and eventually breaking the world record in both the pro and open divisions.

You’re also going to learn some really interesting insights about her training. Sneak peek: most of her training is comfortably paced. I want to pound this message into our heads over and over—here is a woman performing at the very highest level ever seen in total athletic, functional fitness, and most of the time she’s training well within her capacity.

Lauren shares how she balances aerobic training, strength work, and specific Hyrox preparation, and why building your aerobic system, staying strong, and training consistently are the foundation for performing at the highest level and staying fit and healthy throughout life.

TIMESTAMPS:

Lauren Weeks, World Champion in Hyrox, is here to give an explanation of the sport and some trips for training. [01:03]

It’s a sport that encourages you to have an aerobic base, but also work on strength, which I think is really important for longevity. Lauren explains the stations. [04:29]

So pacing, no matter what level you’re at, is gonna be incredibly important. [12:18]

If you’re racing full bore for around an hour, that’s pretty much the definition of the anaerobic threshold. [16:01]

The participants in these events vary in their skill level.  There are divisions differing in the weights at the stations. [19:11]

On average, the average time is probably just about 90 minutes, but the range is anywhere from just under an hour to probably just over three hours. [22:31]

Range of motion might be a problem for folks who haven’t trained for these stations. [25:17]

Did it take a long time for Lauren to get to the world champion level? What is it like being a professional these days? [27:04]

How many different events are there on the calendar? [32:48]

What does her daily training regimen look like? [34:54]

How can you be 8 months pregnant and compete in a Hyrox competition? [45:55]

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LINKS:

• Brad Kearns.com
• BradNutrition.com
• B.rad Whey Protein Superfuel – The Best Protein on The Planet!
• Brad’s Shopping Page
• BornToWalkBook.com
• B.rad Podcast – All Episodes
• Peluva Five-Toe Minimalist Shoes
• B.rad Podcast – All Episodes
• Peluva Five-Toe Minimalist Shoes
• High Rocks (Hyrox)
• Wikipedia: Lauren Weeks
• Emom Training
• thehybridengine training

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TRANSCRIPT:

Brad (00:00):
Welcome to the B.rad podcast, where we explore ways to pursue peak performance with passion throughout life. I’m Brad Kearns, New York Times bestselling author, world number one ranked masters age 60 high jumper and former number three world ranked professional triathlete. You’ll learn how to stay fit, strong, and powerful as you age, transform your diet to lose body fat and increase energy. Sort through hype and misinformation to make simple sustainable lifestyle changes and broaden your perspective beyond a fit body to experience healthy relationships, nonstop personal growth, and ultimately a happy, healthy, long life. Let’s explore beyond shortcuts, hacks, and crushing the competition to laugh. Have fun, appreciate the journey, and not take ourselves too seriously. It’s time to be wrapped. It’s time to B.rad!

Lauren (00:51):
There is prize money and it’s grown through the years. Is it NBA money? No, not even close. In the elite circuit, there’s four majors and one World Championship. First place is,

Brad (01:03):
Hey, how about a podcast guest of the fittest female athlete in the world? Her name is Lauren Weeks and she is a Hyrox legend, a three time world champion. Widely considered to be the most decorated competitor in the sports history and world’s fittest woman. That’s a title you can throw around and argue about, but she has a legitimate claim because Hyrox is an incredible athletic challenge that demands both extreme endurance capability and the strength and power to perform on these challenging stations that happen in between one kilometer runs. She’s gonna describe the whole competitive format. If you’re not aware of Hyrox, it’s taken the fitness world by storm in recent years, and there’ll be over 1 million participants in this calendar year. Now Lauren is the world champion from 2020, 2021 and 2023. In 2022, she qualified for the World Championships in her home base of Las Vegas and competed while eight months pregnant and finished ninth in the world.

Brad (02:12):
In 2024, she came back and took second in the world, and in 2025, further cemented her legendary status by breaking the world record in both the pro division and the open division. So she can do the entire Hyrox competition in under an hour. She’s become an inspiration and showing us what’s possible to keep fit and healthy even while pregnant, coming back from having a child and competing at the very highest level. And you’re going to learn some really interesting insights about her training Sneak Peak. Most of her training is comfortably paced. I don’t wanna spoil the thunder from the show, but I want to pound this message into our heads. Over and over and over here is a female performing at the, the very highest level ever seen in total athletic, functional fitness. And most of the time she’s training well within her capacity. It’s a lesson that all of us can take to heart, and you’re gonna learn a lot more about the life of an elite athlete with Hyrox’s Champion Lauren Weeks. Here we go.

Brad (03:18):
Lauren, weeks. I’m so excited to be joined by a three-time world champion, perhaps the fittest woman on earth. I don’t know, would you agree with me? Are you too modest? What do you think? I would

Lauren (03:30):
Definitely not say I’m the fittest woman on earth, but I try very hard to be as fit as I possibly can. Thank you, by the way, so much for having me.

Brad (03:39):
Oh my gosh. So this Hyrox competition, which has become a fitness sensation, and I have to admit, maybe it was a year or a year and a half ago when I first heard the word and I’m like, what does that, what does that mean? And maybe I heard about it from Lance Armstrong doing it, or a friend went to an event or something. And then I, I started looking up this a amazing competitive, you know, scene. And so for the listeners, viewers that might not have total familiarity, I think most people know what CrossFit is by now and CrossFit games, but this seems like a really interesting offshoot. So maybe I can tee you up with a request for an explanation about what the Hyrox competition is all about and we can keep rolling with how you, how you got into it and became three time world champion. Yeah,

Lauren (04:29):
Of course. So I mean, you talk about, yeah, the popularity of it has completely exploded and, and I like, I don’t wanna say whether or not it’s a trend, but not all trends are good. But if this were to be a trend, I would say that it’s a very, it’s a great one to have because it’s, it’s a, it’s a sport that includes both like, or encourages you to have an aerobic base, but also work on strength, which I think is really important for longevity. I think we could all use a little bit more strength in our lives, but yeah, so the sport is, it’s the same thing every single time, which makes it really exciting that you know what you’re training for. So when I, when I was doing CrossFit, I didn’t always know what I was training for. And there’s fun in that too, but I think there’s a lot of fun in having something that you can know exactly the distance of everything you’re doing to be able to go forward. So Hyrox, it’s a total of eight K of running. There’s eight stations. You run a one K before each station and the order of the station stays the same every single time you do it. So if you were to do one in New York, it would be the same as if you were to go to Singapore. If you were to go to Beijing. So the eight stations in order, it’s a one K skier, then you have a 50 meter sled push a 50 meter sled pole, it’s 80 meters,

Brad (05:50):
I bring it back to the starting line <laugh>. Wow. Um, and so just to jump in, like the gun goes off, here’s the race, ready go, and then you run a K and then come to a station. Yes. And do the station, run another K come back to the station. And so the station is like the same location at the, whatever the finish area. And the first one you mentioned Skier, so it’s a machine that measures how much skiing you’re accumulating on the, on the dial so that it it’s energy output to, to travel theoretically one K, is that how that goes?

Lauren (06:24):
That’s correct. So if you’ve seen a rower, so those are, those are horizontal pulling, uh, the Skier is very similar to a rower except it’s upright, so you’re doing more of a downwards pull on it. And it was, I could be incorrect on this, but it was traditionally like made to help like Nordic skiers train indoors. And then it’s just adapted to so many different other like fitness avenues and it really is an amazing training tool. Well, it, it hits many, many body parts. It allows me to like work in so many different, different zones, but so yeah, it’s, it’s like a rower just upright. But yes, so you run a one K and it, and they’re laps. So traditionally they’re in a convention center. And it could be anywhere from, if you’re in a big convention center, it might be two laps.

Lauren (07:17):
If you’re in a small convention center, it might be four laps, but it’s always gonna be a one K run before you go into that station. And then when you finish your, so the Skier being the first station, when you finish that station, you go back out onto the run course and you do however many laps equals a thousand for that course. And then you come back inside to what they call, they call it a Rock Zone. So that’s, that’s the area in between the laps where all the stations are. So you go back into that zone and you find the second station, they always have these like giant big arches and they’re, they’re labeled not only with the station, so like station number two is the Sled Push. So it’ll say Sled Push, but it’ll also have giant number twos on it so that, like you, if you can’t remember the order, which for the longest time I could not remember the order of the stations, it took me a very long time. It didn’t matter because as long as I could, which also becomes hard when you’re working hard, as long as I could count from one to eight, I knew what I was going to next.

Brad (08:22):
So you end up running eight kilometers, which is just about five miles a kilometer, 0.62 miles. For, for listeners around the world, that starts to add up. I mean a five mile run is an endurance competition. And then the stations take what, how many minutes for, for each of these things or the range.

Lauren (08:45):
So some stations will take slightly longer than others. The range will be like, so the faster stations are traditionally something like the Farmer Carry, which could be around two-ish minutes, but could go upwards of, I mean it could take eight, it could take eight minutes depending on like how heavy the kettlebells feel to you where your grip fatigue is at that point. Because I mean, before you get to the kettlebells, you’ll have been doing the Sled Pole, which is gonna affect your grip. You’re gonna do all the ERGs, which is the Skier and the Rower. Those will affect your grip and then you’ll get to the kettlebells so you’re not going in fresh to those. So it could, it could take a little bit longer, but the stations. So yeah, I’d say upwards of eight minutes for the most part. It, it could definitely take longer. And in my earlier years it definitely took me longer on some of the stations. But yeah, on average two to eight minutes per station.

Brad (09:37):
Okay, let’s finish the stations. We started with the Skier Keep going to the, to get to eight.

Lauren (09:43):
Yeah. So station number two is a Sled Push. It’s 50 meters of Sled Push station three is 50 meter Sled Pull. Station four is 80 meters of Burpee Broad Jump. So with the Burpee Broad Jump, you do your traditional burpee, but instead of like either going over an object or jumping straight up, you have to jump forwards. So the further you jump the, the less burpees you get to do. Station number five is a Thousand Meters on the Rower. Station six is the 200 meter Farmer Carry. Station seven is a hundred meters of Sandbag Lunging. And then station number eight is a Hundred Wall Balls.

Brad (10:23):
The Farmer Carry is picking up what kettlebells and walking with

Lauren (10:28):
Yeah, two kettle balls and walking with them for a distance of 200 meters.

Brad (10:33):
And then the next one describe what that is.

Lauren (10:36):
So the next one is a Sandbag Lunge. So they’ll have a hundred meters laid out for you and you have to pick up like a, so some sandbags are round, these are, these sandbags are more elongated so they can fit on your, on your back. The Hyrox like sponsored equipment is done by center and they usually make ’em where there’s like multiple different handles. So if the closer handles don’t fit you, there’s like wider ones that you can also reach out for, but you, so you put it on your back and then you walking lunge for that 100 meters. So I’m a shorter athlete, so it’s gonna take me probably over a hundred steps to do that. But somebody who’s a little bit taller might be able to do it in like maybe just over 80 steps. So it’s just like one step equals one lunge, but we’re not like necessarily counting lunges. But that might be helpful to somebody who, if they know how many steps it takes for them to do a hundred meters just to kind of, it’s encouragement to like know, like, I’ve done this many steps, I know how much further I have to go.

Brad (11:42):
Okay. So these events and the convention centers are mass participation. You can sign up and I imagine you have good turnout, but let’s talk about at the front of the pack are the elites who are racing this thing and then by and large, the vast majority I imagine is signing up and just hoping to finish the freaking thing and still be able to say their name and count to eight. But how does that work when you’re racing it? I mean, what kind of intensity and how are you pacing yourself through the running as well as the stations?

Lauren (12:18):
Yeah, so pacing, no matter what level you’re at, is gonna be incredibly important ’cause as you, as you had mentioned this is, it’s five miles with other stuff and you’ll, you’ll see very often we feel good in the beginning of the race and you wanna go out really hard and, and you might overdo that first run, which happens more often than I can count, but like a bigger, even bigger trap than overdoing. That first run is often in the skier, it’s the first station and you feel so good and people are like ripping on the Skier and it, and because it’s not something technically like as muscularly taxing as a sled, like you think, you think it’s okay and you’re gonna, but I would say that’s like a huge, huge trap finding like a good pace like both in the, in the early runs and that Skier will make the rest of your race significantly more enjoyable and probably a lot faster.

Lauren (13:15):
So yeah, pacing is incredibly important and it’s mindful, like it’s important to be mindful to hold back. I would say especially like on that, that first station with the skier because you are gonna feel really good, but if you’re just, if you just hold it back a little bit there, I promise at the end of the race you will be able to continue to move with urgency. But yeah, no, that’s important for, for at the elite level and for everybody else. And just to quickly touch on the fact that this is a mass participation sport, but there are options. You don’t have to do it individually. There’s doubles options and like a really option as well. So if the sport seems really daunting, like you can sign up and honestly like the doubles is my favorite. I prefer the doubles over the solo. You can sign up with a friend and do the race with them. You both have to do the whole run. So you’re still running five miles, but you get to split up all the stations.

Brad (14:14):
You’re each running five miles, but then you take a break while your partner does one of the stations and then you run again and then you got the next station,

Lauren (14:23):
Right? Which, which one, like it makes it more enjoyable. Two, somebody else is there to help you count laps. You have an option like when you’re tired to take a break on those stations. But also like sometimes we come in and we’re not super confident in maybe just one station. And that’s really a great way to like let your partner take more while you get to dip your toes into at least like practicing it within, within the race, but maybe not needing to take a huge chunk of it.

Brad (14:55):
So in the individual complete event, you’ve set records like you’re, you’re under an hour for, for the entire thing that you just described.

Lauren (15:03):
Yeah. And it’s, it’s, it’s taken a long time to get there for sure. I’ve seen a lot of development over the years, both in myself and like the sport has, has had some changes over the years. So when I first started the Sled lengths it was always 50 meters, but the length was 25 meters by 25 and now it’s four lengths of 12.5 meters. And while you might not think that’s like a huge change, making those sections smaller has actually been a huge change in the sport. One in energy management. ’cause now it’s forced pacing where you’re taking breaks where you might not have, might not have had to. And then also with the Sled Pull, the closer the Sled is and and like the shorter the rope length, the easier it is to pull. So now that it’s half the distance pulling the, the Sled Pull stations has gotten significantly faster just because the Sled is that much closer to you each time.

Brad (16:01):
So if you’re, if you’re racing full bore for around an hour, that’s pretty much the definition of the anaerobic threshold. So are you using perhaps technology or can you confirm like you’re right there at at threshold pace when you’re running as well as doing the, the Sleds in the ERG or how does that work? Is your intensity pretty pretty level across the whole competition in terms of heart rate?

Lauren (16:30):
So I’m gonna speak from personal experience ’cause I think for, for each athlete it’s gonna be different based off of where your strengths are. So for some athletes they might be, they might have to be under threshold for the run because they can hammer those stations ’cause they’re such good strength station. Like at the strength I’ve shifted to like my strength is the run. So, so you’re right. And I do use technology for that. I’m running at my threshold. And I’m, and I’m doing my best to like manage the station. So where I’m pressing is the runs and I’m pretty in training at least I’m very dialed in as to like what that threshold pace is. And I like, we have our own blood lactate meter, like I take and I do like blood lactate test to more figure out what my paces are like should be.

Lauren (17:25):
And, and according to my heart rate, I’m not so dialed that I’m, that I’m testing my threshold and my blood lactate every time I do a threshold session, it’s more like spot checking where I’ll test and I’ll go through of like what those paces and a range of what that should be. I’ll train in that range if I ever feel like I’m out of control, I’ll do some spot checks like in that to see am I running in at the right pace, in the correct range, um, or am I going too hard? Which, which I think is often the case with many athletes we’re running over our threshold and maybe not staying in the zone that we need to be to correctly develop. But, but yeah, so I do use a blood lactate meter to figure out where my paces are and how to stay under my anaerobic threshold. And for me, by hammering that over and over and over in training, I know what that pace feels like when I get into the race. So while I’m not testing mid-race, I know what it feels like to be in that and I know what that pace is for me. So in the runs, yes, I’m saying like just under anaerobic threshold. The stations are hard for me though, and I would say for some of ’em I’m probably pushing over that threshold to get through them.

Brad (18:43):
Oh sure. I imagine since they’re shorted duration and you’re in it, you’re in it to win it, it’s gotta be, it’s gotta be torture. You’re, you’re getting burning muscles and then having to head out for a one K run, it feels like eight triathlons in a row or something.

Lauren (18:58):
Yeah. So some of, and again, this feeling’s gonna be different from person to person, but for me, coming off of the sled push and the row actually is where those, those runs are very challenging.

Brad (19:11):
So I imagine the participation base that shows up has gotta be freaking incredibly fit, unlike the population that shows up to a 10 K or a half marathon where people are gonna walk or shuffle or do whatever. But it doesn’t seem possible to finish this unless you’ve attained a really high level of fitness as well as specific preparation. So what do we see in the rest of the participation pack and how far out does the finishing times extend? Is there a cutoff at four hours or something? Or do they let people stay there all day and push the sSed one inch at a time? I’m, I’m curious about the, the masses.

Lauren (19:52):
Yeah, so they expect to have like over a million finishers this year. So it is, it is de made for the masses as well. But I would say because there’s, there’s different ways to enter into the sport. Like it doesn’t have to be at the heaviest weight. They have multiple, like where they have two different weight divisions and not like body weight divisions, just the Sleds. Like there’s a pro and an open, which the only difference between those two divisions is the weight of the equipment. So the rest of the race is entirely the same. It’s just in the pro the Sleds are heavier, the Sandbag is heavier for the lunges, the Kettlebells are heavier and the Wall Balls are heavier, everything else is completely the same. So in the open division offers a lighter variation of that. And then of course the doubles division makes the barrier to entry even lower because now you get to split that work.

Lauren (20:46):
And there’s also a relay, which is a four person team and in that you only have to do two runs in two stations, so you don’t have to do the whole thing. So there’s a lot of ways to kind of dip your toe into it and, and the barrier of entry is not super high. While saying that this is definitely not a sport that I would say you should go from doing nothing to jumping right into, I think that is probably a recipe for injury. I would highly recommend preparing before going into the sport. But, but anybody listening, I would, I would say you are capable of finishing this race with preparation. Like there’s, there’s absolutely no reason you wouldn’t be able to, I would just, I would highly encourage preparing your body for the demand so you don’t come out, I mean, we’re all gonna come out of the race sore. I come out of the race sore every single time like it Yeah, I’m, I’m every single time like, so we’re all gonna be sore when we finish. It’s just preparing so that like we’re minimizing damage for sure. But yeah, for the masses, it’s really not any different honestly than, than what the elites are are doing. The race is exactly the same. So it’s just, it’s coming in with an understanding that I need to be prepared aerobically and I need to be prepared for the muscular demands.

Brad (22:08):
Yeah, it could be arguably more strenuous because they’re out there for longer. Yes. Maybe didn’t have as much time to train and they’re suffering, you know, more than elite.

Lauren (22:18):
And, and that’s another part of the question I didn’t touch on. So on average, the average time is probably just about 90 minutes, but the range is anywhere from just under an hour to probably just over three hours. So it is a very wide range of finishing times.

Brad (22:34):
Just off the top of my head, I’m thinking like you’re probably, as an elite, you’re probably spending around half your time running if you’re running really fast pace, like six-minute pace or better, and a 90 minute racer maybe is running nine-minute pace per mile, which would put half their time at running and half their time on the challenges.

Lauren (22:54):
Correct, yeah. So as I’ve mentioned a few times, like it is gonna depend on the strength of the athlete in terms of like what they’re probably spending more time on. But it does end up being like if you take all the averages, it’s a, it’s about equal of the amount of time that you’re running versus the amount of time that you’re doing stations. But what’s interesting is if you take like the stations that you would consider more aerobic and then you combine that with the running. So if you think of like the Skier and, and the rowing and the running and you combine all that together now that’s about 70% of the race versus like the strength being about 30 ish percent.

Brad (23:38):
Right. I mean overall it’s an extreme endurance contest like I mentioned on a recent show when I was talking about the 400 meter run being the ultimate marker of longevity because it has so much of an anaerobic power, strength explosive component with also requirement of the endurance base. And it seems like Hyrox is in the same realm where you’re not going to get a power athlete coming in and kicking Lauren’s butt because they’ll be walking for the entire kilometer if they don’t have a tremendous aerobic base. And I think vice versa, I was thinking it would be fun to do a stunt, like let’s get an Olympic runner in there like Faith Kipyegon or something who can run, run a K in three minutes, five times in a row, you’d destroy her because she couldn’t push that Sled. It would take her, take her 15 minutes to push the sled as a, you know, a featherweight Olympic endurance running machine. That’s why the world’s greatest athlete is thrown around with legitimacy to people like you who have all those disparate skills and you can put it together.

Lauren (24:42):
Yeah, it’s, it’s interesting. I think it depends on the marathoner you take too, because I’ve seen just from watching different coaches working with some of the elite marathoners, they’ve incorporated a lot more plyometrics, a lot more Sled work. So while not everybody’s doing that, I also wouldn’t be surprised if we saw some elite level marathoners come in crushing it, because I think a lot of the newer training would cater to that. Like, uh, I mean with the Burpees like being explosive with, with the jumps, you see them working on a lot of like explosivity. I’ve seen a lot of sled work in some of the marathoners training. I think one of the biggest challenges might be range of motion. I think with a ton of running we might get very stiff, so a range of motion might not be exactly where we would want it to be. So things like the wall balls and with a wall ball you’re squatting and throwing a ball. So getting to depth might be really challenging. So I think that might be the biggest barrier for athletes such as that is maybe working on the mobility of it and making sure that they can hit the range of motion.

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Brad (27:04):
You mentioned that it’s taken you a long time to get to this level of world champion and breaking an hour and these incredible milestones. So what’s a long time? And then the second part of the question is now how does it look from the professional aspect? I’m assuming you’re a professional competitor, you’re doing this with great devotion and there’s an opportunity for economic success or the prize money sponsorships. How does that look for taking it to the top.

Lauren (27:31):
So my first Hyrox race was in 2019. So by a long time in this sport, of course I’ve spent a long time developing outside of this sport before I found the sport. But since, yeah, 2019 I was still very much into CrossFit. So I was a more strength-based like explosive athlete, but a CrossFitter that had always run through my CrossFit training. So I was always doing like a lot of endurance work on top of CrossFitting. So for me right now, my strength in the race is the running, but that’s not how I came into the sport. That was actually my weaker part of the race when I came in. When I came in I was doing well because I was good at the stations because of my CrossFit background. And over the years I’ve kept that strength base but maybe not quite to the level of what it was.

Lauren (28:28):
So like I would still say that my relative strength is, is very strong compared to average. It’s just not as strong as it was when I was trying to compete as a CrossFitter. And now I’ve I’ve found a little bit more of a balance of like the strength and the aerobic work and, and because I needed to work on the running in the race, that’s where I’ve spent a lot of time is is developing my aerobic system to kind of be better balanced just because I was I think more strength biased than needed to be for the sport.

Brad (29:04):
And how does it look for competing as a professional these days? Can you make some good prize money? Sponsorship money? You mentioned traveling around a lot, so I imagine you have a schedule of events and are you on like a team or how does all that work?

Lauren (29:20):
So there, there is prize money and it’s, and it’s grown through the years. It’s definitely, I’d say it’s good Now is it like NBA money? No, not even close. It’s uh,

Brad (29:31):
It’s a winner get for like the championship or a a stop on the circuit.

Lauren (29:35):
So, so in the, in the elite circuit there’s four majors and one world championship. The world championship I uh, first place is 50,000 and they will pay. So there’s 15 athletes that will compete in the elite division. They will pay all 15 and then at every major the winner gets, so there’s four majors, the winner gets 15,000 and they pay all 15 at all of the majors as well. So good prize money, like again, not like your football NBA type prize money, but still good prize money. And then on top of that athletes, because the sport has become so popular, you’ll see not even just the elite athletes, you see like age group athletes that are doing really well. Also there’s a lot of sponsors very interested in the sport. So yes, of course the Elite 15 athletes are getting sponsored through through different brands, for being able to be in the Elite 15. But I think what’s cool is you’re seeing actually a lot of the age group athletes be able to benefit from that as well.

Brad (30:42):
So you mentioned it’s the same competitive template, so anyone anywhere who’s got a Hyrox shirt, next time you see someone in the airport you can say, Hey, what’s your time, what’s your division? And you’re very easily able to rank people. So I imagine getting into that top 15 and getting invited to the majors is all about putting up a time at whatever event you decide to try it at.

Lauren (31:05):
So it used to be all about putting up a time, but because like environments are different. Like you’ll see even even with marathons, you see that there’s some fast marathons and some maybe slower course marathons. So Berlin and Chicago are like fast courses where you might see New York as a slower course, you’ll, it’s very similar with Hyrox, while it is an indoor event and the stations are all the same and it’s always the same distance of running, the, temperature changes, the humidity changes based off of where you are. The layout is not the same all the time, which means you might have different, and the arch isn’t a different spot, which means you have mi different 180. So with the 180 you’re cons, you’d be constantly like stopping and going and accelerating which one slows you down, but also is a higher energy output when you do that.

Lauren (31:56):
So not all of the courses will run as fast as some, so the your time will give you a general idea of where you’re at. But, and we’re always trying of course to pr but you can’t, same thing as if, if your current PR is on a Chicago course and then you go run New York, you can’t necessarily expect no matter how well your training is gone to PR that day. And that’s the same thing with, with some of these courses, like some courses are gonna run faster than others. So they’ve switched from qualifying via time for the Elite 15 to qualifying via points in placement. So now you get points based off of where you place in a traditional race and those that point system ranks you to get into the Elite 15.

Brad (32:48):
How many different events are there on the calendar? You said there’s gonna be a million finished churches in a year. So they, are they all over the place?

Lauren (32:55):
Yeah, so they’re, gosh, I don’t know the exact number. There’s well over a hundred events per year. There’s multiple per weekend. Some weekends have upwards of five different cities running a Hyrox in a single weekend and at some of these events. So New York is still going on. It started last weekend, it’s a 10 day event in the first weekend.

Brad (33:19):
Is this because to fit in all the, all the participants it runs for 10 days.

Lauren (33:24):
It’s so popular. Yeah, it’s so popular that to fit in all the participants, it’s running 10 days. So it started last weekend, it’ll end this weekend. The first weekend they had like 40,000 people go through and that’s not counting like the rest of the week and then this weekend coming up.

Brad (33:40):
So they’re going nonstop all day, like in different ways.

Lauren (33:44):
Saw all day in different ways and different divisions. New York is really iconic. I wanna get to one of those really bad because it’s, it’s not like you’re traditional, it’s a, it’s a very unique race, not in a convention center. They do it on one of the peers in Manhattan. So it’s just like a really iconic one that like is very popular people are wanna get into. But yeah, so they’re like, again, like they’re all over Asia. It’s in Australia, it’s all over Europe, it’s in South America and again, they’re running multiple cities every weekend. So that’s how they’ve, they’ve gone with the point system so you get more points the better you do in a specific venue. So like if I went to New York, I would have to try and win New York in my division and that’s overall over the 10 days. So like if I went the first weekend, I wouldn’t necessarily know if I won until the second weekend is over. But I mean a lot of, a lot of venues are just like two day events. So you’ll know that weekend where you placed in your division.

Brad (34:54):
So I imagine you’re training for this in a pretty full-time manner. And so can you tell us about your lifestyle as a pro athlete and what your pattern looks like? If you wanna describe a weekly pattern or a daily a a daily training regimen.

Lauren (35:12):
So mine might look a little bit different than some of the other elite athletes. I have a almost 4-year-old,

Brad (35:19):
Oh, did we hear a cameo in the background for those with good microphones? I think I thought I heard a little daycare action going on.

Lauren (35:26):
Yeah, so she’s, yeah, she’s home right now. Yeah, so I have, I have a 4-year-old and I’m very privileged to have an incredible gym set up at home. When we, we moved back to Vegas, we were in Salt Lake, we moved back to Vegas to be closer to family and we specifically found like a house that would be a good setup for us. So our garage like has a garage door that opens into the backyard so I can like open up the back door and, and she, she has all of her stuff and I can like train and, and she’s there. So while I think my training may look very different in terms of the actual setup of it, it’s very similar in terms of what I’m doing to the other early athletes. So it, it looks like there’s a lot of aerobic work, there’s a lot of low intensity work, like a lot of low intensity work.

Lauren (36:19):
And, and for me, as you had mentioned the beginning of the podcast, that it’s a lot of Z one and Z two work. Um, and that is either easy running, I’m on the bike, I use an elliptical, I use a StairMaster, I am on the ERG so the skier and the rower for that. And then I combine that with strength work and specific applied strength work. So I have like, I have all of the like official Hyrox equipment from center. So like I have their sandbags, I have their sled, their wall ball just to like be familiar. So it just like takes one variable out of the race. And, and I, and I’ll and I’ll do the traditional like barbell work in terms of like squats and deadlifts and bench press. But I also incorporate that with like the specific Walking Lunges and, and Wall Balls and um, the, the kettlebells.

Lauren (37:19):
So like I’ll train specifically as well and then I’ll break that all down because like the best way to get better at Lunges is like, yes, doing Lunges but also breaking that down in terms of like Bulgarian split squats and Romania deadlifts and a lot of like single leg work. And the same thing with Wall Balls. So wall ball is where you take like a medicine ball and you squat and you throw it to a target. So yes, I will do the Wall Balls, but I’ll also break that apart and, and I’ll work on my squat strength and I’ll work on my Push Press strength and then it’s combining that all together. And probably about once a week you’ll see me doing like the combined work where I’m, where I’m, where you would see in a race where I’m running and doing a station and running and doing a station. But outside of that it’s very, very broken down in terms of like the easy aerobic getting tempo runs. In working in threshold, I actually do very little VO two work, but where I do work on power is I make sure to incorporate strides multiple times a week. So I’m getting like that intensity and, and power work with like the quick strides.

Brad (38:28):
So you’re kind of a pioneer in this whole game and there’s not a lot of reference or history to know the best way to train a Hyrox athlete. So it’s fascinating the presentation that you’re sharing with the fact that the vast majority of your training is very low intensity and probably a message that deserves to be heard strongly by many of the million Hyrox participants. ’cause I’m guessing that, you know, people drifting into this amazing new challenge and thinking that it’s about pain and suffering and torture in daily training, but then the world champion here is conveying that you’re out there just kind of cruising most of the time to build that aerobic system without the interruption from the breakdown and the stress and the soreness that happens when you’re pushing it too hard. You’re reserving that for the race as I imagine. I can’t imagine you’re getting sore routinely with your training patterns.

Lauren (39:30):
No, and that’s actually something I really try and, and preach. Like it’s not, not only is it benefiting like my performance, but like physically, it’s huge. I I do not push into the, wall like I’m very much calculated in that. Like I keep things, I keep things easy and, and it is developing my aerobic system and, and it’s not fancy. Like it’s not, it’s it’s very mundane and well,

Brad (40:00):
I’ve heard that one before from elite athletes, including a handful on the show. Sue McDonald, the multiple masters world record holder, she’s, she ran a 61 second 400 meters at age 61 among my goodness, 16 other records so bad. And I said, tell me about your, I said, tell me about your weekly training. And she goes, oh, it’s really boring. And I thought that was one of the greatest takeaway quotes that like, this is what it’s all about is that consistency and just, you know, you described the pattern nicely where you’re breaking down the challenges with doing the split squats and then putting it together now and then, but it’s like a, it’s like a really easy jigsaw puzzle rather than a thousand piece jigsaw puzzle.

Lauren (40:39):
Yeah, it’s, I think we see a lot of these flashy workouts because we have so, and it’s great, there’s, we have access to so much education and information, like it’s great that we get to see that. But that’s often all that’s posted because like that’s what puts attention

Brad (40:55):
<laugh>, here’s here’s Lauren jocking down your, her neighborhood in the morning not posted.

Lauren (41:00):
Yeah, It’s, but that’s like, not those workouts like sure, like you see some flashy workouts and sure they might happen here and there, but that’s not what’s making up like the big majority of my training. At least it’s, it, it is genuinely all like very, very easy and and I feel like sometimes people don’t believe me, like how, how slowly like I’m taking my easy runs and for me, I mean until it doesn’t work, I’m gonna keep doing that. But for me it’s worked, it’s dev like I’ve seen huge development in my aerobic base, like massive development. I think I have, I mean I do a lot of PT work to try and stave off injury, but I really believe that like doing all this easy work has allowed me to keep injuries at bay for as long as I have. And it’s something I for sure encourage others to do as well. And I preach it often. I just don’t know if people believe me that I’m doing that much easy work. <laugh>.

Brad (42:05):
Now if you’re doing a simulated Wall Ball or Sandbag Lunge, can you even do that at a lower intensity or is it inherently pretty challenging? So you’re doing a short set and resting

Lauren (42:20):
The Lunges? I can for sure do at lower intensity. That is possible for me just because it’s like, it’s just the pace of of how quickly I’m moving with it. The Wall Ball is more challenging because there is a target that you have to get to and I have to be

Brad (42:36):
Explosive. Oh, it’s up high. You have to, yeah, I have to be explos a baby

Lauren (42:39):
To hit that target. Um, so for me, when I, when I do wall balls, my heart rate will always accelerate for sure. It’ll always go up when I’m doing wall balls. How you can manage that is the length of your sets. So maybe instead of doing like a set of, of 40 Wall Balls, you might, you could do sets of 15 to 20, um, and then like one, it takes some time for your heart rate to get up to that and then it’ll more quickly, it, it’ll either not reach the higher heart rate because you haven’t been doing it for as long. A set of 15 should take you anywhere from 30 to probably 45 seconds. It could take upwards of a minute if you’re taking breaks. So like having shorter sets could, could allow for that. But yeah, so the, the Wall Ball is very challenging to keep your heart rate down and that would be, but the lunges you can for sure

Brad (43:34):
Or have a shorter duration workout for people listening, trying to figure this out. Like me as I try to compete in Masters track and field and figure out how not to get injured and exhausted. Um, well,

Lauren (43:46):
Yeah, one of the best ways I like to train a Wall Ball and I think, and you can taper how many reps you’re doing with. It is in an Emomand Emom just means Every Minute On the Minute you’re doing something. So I do these every week in my training and I encourage, and I also coach other people to do these. So what that means is instead of doing like 20 reps a minute, take that down to 10 reps. So at the top of every minute for 10 minutes, like set a 10 minute cap, you do 10 Wall Balls and then you rest the remainder of the minute. And then at the top of minute number two you do 10 Wall Balls and then you rest the minute, the remainder of the minute. So at the end of 10 minutes you’ve now accumulated a hundred reps, which is a lot, but you’re also getting a huge amount of rest before you go with each minute. So it’s like, I think a really good way to both train and approach the Wall Balls.

Brad (44:40):
Yep. I learned that new acronym in recent years too, when I visited Thomas DeLauer and he said, Hey, you wanna do some Emom? And I’m like, okay, well what’s that? And it’s really weird when you’re doing a Emom workout, the the minutes come by much faster than in regular normal life. Like, wait, what? That’s not a minute yet. Oh, it is Okay. But a good, good idea to keep that rest in there.

Lauren (45:03):
It’s a sneaky way to accumulate volume, but it also allows you to very calculated, like put in how much you’re doing. Like you get to decide before you start. It’s not like this chaos of like, how much am I gonna get done in 10 minutes? And now you’ve done like way too much and the rest of your week might be ruined because you’re must, you’re like, you’ve completely demanded way too much of yourself muscularly. So it’s, it’s a good way to like keep on track of exactly how many reps you’re doing and, and also allow yourself to get rest within the minute because if 10 reps is not giving you enough reps, you can lower that too. Do eight reps like you and if 10 reps is too much rest you do 12, like you get to decide how long that rest is.

Brad (45:51):
What is this about competing when you’re eight months pregnant? What the heck is that? I I’m reading your bio information, like how is that possible in, in a Hyrox competition especially?

Lauren (46:04):
Yeah, so for me it was a lot of like with check-ins with my doctor and making sure that like one I’m physically able to continue training and two, explaining what the demands of the race are and and what the movements are and, and whether or not I’d be able to do it. So I’d say every person’s situation is different. For me, I was given the green light and, and it was challenging for sure, but the world championships that year, this was in 2022, was actually in Las Vegas, which is where my family is and was drivable for us. So it was, I didn’t have to get on a plane. It was very feasible. I had already qualified obviously, way before I was eight months pregnant and, and I wanted to take my slot to do it. So I went in, I put like a heart rate monitor on to kind of keep track of that while I was going.

Lauren (46:55):
And it was, it was just, it was a lot slower I think than what I would traditionally do. And I had to be much more careful with like movements such as the Burpees. So like the sander for the Burpees, your chest touches the ground and then you have to jump forward. So for me, I would go like down and I would do like a knee pushup until chest touched. And unfortunately my jumps were much smaller, so I had to do a lot, a lot more Burpees. So it was a really incredible experience that I got to kind of share with my family and with the other, like the people there cheering and I was given so much honestly, encouragement from like all the, all the other athletes that were there racing themselves that weekend. Because again, like on these, on these big like elite races, we’re not the only ones racing. It’s, there are weekends where everybody’s racing, so you have like so much support while you’re going and no I’m really glad that I did it and that I have those memories and those photos and kind of the experience to share with others that might be going down the same journey and wondering how much is too much. And my answer to that is it’s all individual, but it’s also like possible

Brad (48:14):
You can share it with your daughter. It’d be interesting little photo album journey. Yeah, maybe you could get like new nickname out of it, like Lauren 38 weeks or something like that.

Lauren (48:24):
Oh, I think I was like 32 or 33. But yeah, <laugh>, I wasn’t, I I couldn’t run at 30 weeks, 38 weeks anymore running. It had ended by then.

Brad (48:35):
Well, I mean it, it really is an inspiration and, and helping us reframe our perspective of, you know, keeping fit despite, you know, whatever other obstacles are happening, like going through a pregnancy and how it, how it benefits pregnancy in many research. So a credit to you to show up in your hometown and represent That’s amazing.

Lauren (48:56):
No, I was, I was excited and, and I agree. I think it did, it really helped me come back like be stronger, like come out of it stronger. I think it allowed my recovery time to be a lot shorter than I think it might’ve been had I not been incorporating a lot of these like strength movements and also the additional like still then like very easy. I did a lot of walking like Z one Z two work,

Brad (49:25):
Getting strong with resistance training 24/7 in that case for sure.

Lauren (49:28):
Yeah,

Brad (49:30):
So well what’s ahead for you and how can we follow you and learn more about Hyrox and all that?

Lauren (49:37):
Yeah, so, um, actually world Championships is really soon. It’s in Stockholm, Sweden. I’ll be racing in two weeks from today. Actually. I leave in a week. Really excited. So at the, at there I am racing my solo. I also am racing doubles, which is my favorite as I had mentioned earlier. I love the doubles races. It’s just a great way to you get to, you get to share in the suffering and the experience and the pain and, and at the end of the weekend I’m also gonna be doing a, hopefully I can walk, but I’ll be doing a real life for Teen USA. So they have like, um, international with the relay team, so it’ll be like USA Canada, they pick 20 teams of like the highest points accumulated throughout the season to finish out the weekend with some national relay teams, which is really cool. But no, I’m super excited for that. It’s in two weeks and you can follow me, @lauren_e_weeks) at Instagram. I also have a coaching platform with my husband, so it’s the hybrid engine. We have a website that’s also our Instagram article.

Brad (50:50):
I love, I got the email, it was like the hybrid engine. That’s brilliant. What? I can’t believe no one took that.

Lauren (50:57):
Love it. No, I was, uh, super excited. So we have build

Brad (51:00):
A hybrid engine.

Lauren (51:01):
We have athletes of all different levels and age groups. I think, our oldest athlete might be 70 and then we have some teenagers with us as well. So like it’s a really wide range that that is with us and it’s kind of super cool to see everybody’s different journeys. And then also of course, like if you are interested in using any of the actual like Hyrox equipment that’s through center, and they have, it’s just at center for them for Instagram.

Brad (51:27):
Great. Lauren, amazing to learn about this fitness phenomenon and yeah, you said some trends are not good, but this is really, it’s a pretty solid idea. It’s caught on wonderfully. I’m glad to learn more about it from you, from the champ and wish you continued success. We’ll be, we’ll be tracking your progress and thanks for all that you do to inspire the athletes and coach them. And everybody follow Lauren Weeks. Good luck. Yeah,

Lauren (51:54):
Thank you so much. And of course, like there’s Hyrox is out there, it’s a really great competition to get into, but I just wanna say that there’s also so many other of these types of events where you get to combine aerobic work with strength work. And yeah, I’d find, I’d find the one that works best for you and it’s just, it gives you like a, a good reason to train like both areas. So yeah, Hyrox is out there, but there’s also so many different events out there that you can explore.

Brad (52:25):
Yeah, that’s a really good point. ’cause you can make up your own and you don’t have to feel intimidated or that you have to jump into this thing that might be overwhelming right now. So, you know, on your next casual endurance outing, you can stop at the park bench and do some squats and then get back on your bicycle or, you know, back to jogging and just sprinkle in more of this strength and power type of training from a pure endurance starting point, which I feel like so many people are locked into that pattern for whatever reason, and they’re missing out on a giant slice of what it means to be really fit and promote longevity. So it’s good to promote those types of behaviors.

Lauren (53:05):
Awesome. Thank you so much for helping. Thanks Lauren. We really appreciate it.

Brad (53:09):
All right. Thank you so much for listening to the B.rad Podcast. We appreciate all feedback and suggestions. Email podcast@bradventures.com and visit brad kearns.com to download five free eBooks and learn some great long cuts to a longer life. How to optimize testosterone naturally, become a dark chocolate connoisseur and transition to a barefoot and minimalist shoe lifestyle.