The single most underrated decision on Hyrox race day isn't your fuelling, your kit, or your pacing strategy. It's how you spend the 90 minutes between arrival and the start gun. A bad warm-up costs you 3-5 minutes of race time, your first kilometre runs slower, your first sled push grinds because cold muscles can't generate horizontal force, and your heart rate spikes erratically through the early stations.
A good warm-up costs you nothing. You arrive at the start gun with elevated core temperature, primed motor patterns, hydrated, mentally settled. This piece is the exact protocol Suth Performance athletes use, minute-by-minute. It works for first-timers and Sub-90 chasers alike, adjust the run primer pace, keep the structure.
Before arrival: the night before
The warm-up starts 12 hours before the gun.
- Sleep. Eight hours minimum. Going to bed at 9 PM and lying awake until 12 because of nerves is normal, you can still get 6 productive hours. The pre-race night never matters as much as the two nights before, so sleep priority is on the nights of Thursday and Friday for a Saturday race.
- Last big meal. Eat your usual carb-rich dinner 3-4 hours before bed. Don't try something new. The race-day breakfast is the variable, never the night-before meal.
- Kit laid out. Race kit, race bib, timing chip, fuel for during the race (if any), spare socks. The morning is for warming up, not for hunting down a sock.
The 90 minutes: minute by minute
90-75 min before gun: arrival + setup
Park, walk to the venue, find the bag drop. The walk from car to venue is your first warm-up movement, make it brisk if the parking is far, easy if it's close. Aim to be physically inside the venue with kit sorted at the 75-minute mark.
What you should be drinking:
- 250-500 ml of water with electrolytes (200-400 mg sodium).
- One last sip of your usual breakfast caffeine (coffee, tea, gel).
What you should NOT be doing:
- Heavy foam rolling. Lying on a foam roller for 10 minutes drops your sympathetic drive and can leave you flat at the start.
- Eating a substantial meal. Your race breakfast was 2-3 hours ago.
75-65 min before gun: mobility (10 min)
A short mobility flow, in this order:
- Cat-cow × 10 reps. Reset spine.
- World's greatest stretch × 5 each side. Hip mobility + thoracic rotation.
- 90/90 hip rotations × 5 each side. Hip internal/external rotation.
- Calf wall stretch × 30 sec each side. Important for the sled push.
- Shoulder pass-throughs with a band × 10 reps. Primes the wall balls and farmers carry posture.
- Glute bridges × 15 reps. Activates the posterior chain.
This is mobility, not flexibility. The goal is to open up restrictions that would limit your race patterns, not to touch your toes. Eight to ten minutes total. Stop before you feel tired.
65-50 min before gun: run primer (15 min)
The single most important block of the warm-up. A progressive run, on a treadmill if available or in the venue corridor / outside if not.
Structure:
- 0-3 min: Walking pace. Pure heart-rate elevation.
- 3-7 min: Easy jog (Zone 2, conversational).
- 7-11 min: Steady (Zone 3, breathing audible but controlled).
- 11-13 min: Race pace (Zone 4, the pace you plan to run the race kilometres).
- 13-14 min: 30 seconds above race pace.
- 14-15 min: Cool jog. Easy.
Why this works: each progression step preps a different system. Walking primes circulation. Easy jogging primes ventilation. Steady primes the aerobic engine at sub-threshold. Race pace primes the neuromuscular pattern of the actual pace you'll run. The 30-second over-pace creates a feeling of "ah, this is easier" when you actually start at race pace on the floor.
50-35 min before gun: station rehearsal (15 min)
Most venues have a designated warm-up area with sleds, wall ball targets, and floor space. Use it.
The protocol:
- Sled push: 1-2 reps at race weight × 10 metres. Calibrate the friction, the lane width, your foot strike. Do NOT do a full 25 metres, burns too much.
- Sled pull: 1-2 reps at race weight × 10 metres. Same logic.
- Burpee broad jump: 5 reps. Calibrate the rhythm and the jump distance.
- Wall balls: 5-8 reps. Check the target height, the kettlebell-style ball if it's the harder one. Get the breathing pattern dialled.
- Farmers carry: 30-50 metres at race weight. Set the grip, the stride, the breathing.
Total: about 15 minutes including rest between each.
What you're doing: calibrating, not training. The goal is to walk to the start line knowing exactly what every piece of race equipment will feel like under your hands. The number-one cause of slow first stations is sleds that feel heavier than the ones you trained on, and that surprise is the difference between a 90-second sled push and a 3-minute sled push.
35-25 min before gun: refuel + sit (10 min)
This is the most counterintuitive block. Sit down. Eat your final pre-race fuel. Stay calm.
What to eat:
- A small carb-only snack: half a banana, a rice cake, 20-30g of dextrose powder in water.
- 200 ml of water + electrolytes.
- NO solid protein, NO fat. Both slow gastric emptying, bad if you're racing within 30 minutes.
Why sit: your nervous system needs a 5-10 minute parasympathetic dip before the start. If you're moving for the full 90 minutes, your heart rate is elevated and your sympathetic drive is high, but you're also pre-fatigued. A controlled 10-minute sit (or light walking + sit) reactivates the parasympathetic system. When the gun goes, your sympathetic surge is genuine, not just continuation of the pre-race adrenaline.
25-10 min before gun: skip + activate (15 min)
A short activation block to take the rust off the sit.
- Skipping rope or pogo hops: 90 seconds.
- Glute activation (lateral band walks): 2 sets × 10 each side.
- High knees and butt kicks: 30 seconds each.
- One race-pace 200 m repeat. Just one. Calibrates the engine.
- Mental rehearsal: Visualise the first three minutes of the race. Run-1, sled push, run-2. Where you'll position yourself. How you'll breathe.
You should arrive at the 10-minute mark feeling warm, primed, and ready. Not exhausted, not over-warmed.
10-0 min before gun: line up + breathe
The last 10 minutes are mental.
- Get to your wave start area.
- Drink one last small sip of water, not a chug.
- Breathing exercise: box breathing (4 in, 4 hold, 4 out, 4 hold) for 90 seconds. Drops your heart rate from the pre-race adrenaline spike to a controlled baseline.
- Final cue rehearsal. Three words you say to yourself in your head: yours, not borrowed. Mine are "patience, posture, breath", pick yours.
The athletes who execute on race day are the ones who get to the start line bored. Not numb, settled. They've done everything they can do. Their warm-up was rehearsed in training. Their nervous system isn't surprised by the gun.
What not to do
Three race-day warm-up mistakes that cost minutes:
- The hero run. Doing a 5 km run as a "shake-out" 90 minutes before. Burns glycogen, pre-fatigues legs, achieves nothing. Keep the run primer to 15 minutes maximum.
- The over-stretch. Static stretching for 20+ minutes. Reduces power output for the next 30-45 minutes, exactly when you need power on the sled.
- The kit fiddle. Spending 20 minutes adjusting your race kit, lacing shoes, re-pinning the bib. Settle the kit at home; lace and pin during the 75-65 minute arrival block.
How Suth Performance programmes the warm-up
The Suth Performance programmes include a race-week section that walks through this exact 90-minute warm-up, and rehearses it in week 11. You do the full sequence one Saturday before your race week, treating it as a dress rehearsal. By race day, the protocol is muscle memory.
For first-timers, the warm-up is the most valuable 90 minutes of your race day. Worth investing in like any other technique.
On race day
Ninety minutes. Five blocks: arrival, mobility, run primer, station rehearsal, refuel + sit, activate, line up. The first time you do it, it'll feel structured and unfamiliar. By race day three or four, it'll be automatic. Race day mistakes that cost minutes are easy to make. This protocol prevents most of them.
[ FAQ ]
Frequently asked
How long should I warm up for a Hyrox?
Ninety minutes from arrival to start gun is the sweet spot. Too short and your body isn't ready for the first sled push. Too long and you've already burned glycogen before the gun. The protocol below splits the time into specific blocks.
Should I do a full run warm-up?
A 10-15 minute progressive run is right. Anything more eats glycogen you'll need on race day. Anything less and your aerobic system isn't primed. The key is the progression, start at very easy, finish at goal race pace for the final 30 seconds.
Do I need to rehearse the stations before the race?
Yes, but lightly. One or two reps at each station you can access in the warm-up area, at race weight. The point is calibration (does this sled feel like the sled I trained on?), not capacity. Save the engine.
Written by
The Suth Performance teamCoaches and editors
The Suth Performance programming team, led by HYROX Elite 15 athlete Ben Sutherland.
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