Hyrox training in Longton,
built around your race.

Where to train in Longton

20 gyms and sports centres sit within a few miles of the centre of Longton. That is enough to choose on what the floor actually holds rather than on which is nearest.

Closest to the centre you have Florence Park, Awesome Walls Stoke and Base Body Fitness, the nearest of them about 1 km out. Ring before you join and ask two questions: is there floor space to push a sled, and can you throw a ball at a wall. Those answers decide more than any membership tier.

Florence Park and Awesome Walls Stoke are listed as sports centres rather than gyms. Multi-use sites are usually where the floor space is, which tends to be where the sled and carry work ends up happening.

Awesome Walls, JD Gyms and Nuffield Health Fitness & Wellbeing have sites here, so an existing membership may already cover you. If you are joining from scratch, a rolling monthly contract is worth the few extra pounds while you work out which sessions you actually turn up for.

Where to run around Longton

You are well served for measured running around Longton. 4 parkrun courses sit within reach: Hanley parkrun, Trentham Gardens parkrun and The Wammy parkrun are the closest three, Hanley parkrun being about 4.3 km out. Use one as your fixed benchmark and run it in the same conditions each time, or the number tells you nothing.

All of them sit within about 8 km of each other, so you can rotate courses without the travel changing, which makes the times comparable.

Racing from Longton

Manchester Central Convention Complex is roughly 55 km from Longton, close enough to be a normal morning rather than a trip. That is the one to build towards for a first race: no hotel, no unfamiliar bed, no early train.

Between the race and the 20 places to train listed here, the constraint is rarely equipment. It is the calendar, which is why the programme is dated to a day rather than numbered by week.