The weekend saw HYROX dominate the fitness racing algorithms with events in Acapulco, Athens, Tenerife and Washington D.C. In London however, one of the sport’s newer races was making its mark as the Deadly Dozen World Championships went down.
In the men’s race, Fabian Eisenlauer finished first ahead of Ben Sheppard and David Parkin while in the women’s race Rachel Hodgkinson took the title, with Jennifer Nikolaus and Alexia Yannaros completing the podium.
Taking 4th spot overall in the men’s race was Jude Reynolds. That was good enough for 1st place in his age group, giving him the possibly unique distinction of being an age group world champion in HYROX, DEKA and Deadly Dozen. As one of the biggest rising stars in all forms of fitness racing we were keen to find out how the race unfolded, how Deadly Dozen compares to HYROX, and just how far Jude believes he can go.
Going into the race, did you genuinely expect to win, or were there people in the field you were worried about?
I wasn’t exactly sure who was in my AG for this race because it’s a large range from 16-29 so all I was thinking about was running my own race and slowly picking off the guys ahead of me.
I knew who the favourites were, what their strengths are and where I can make up time. I let the likes of Fabi, Dave and… literally everyone else in the Elite wave shoot off ahead of me and trusted my fitness to claw me back into the race.
Fabi is an E15 athlete and Dave Parkin was (going into the race) the only undefeated athlete in the world. You also had the likes of Ben Sheppard, Peter Schiller who’s ex-E15 and many other incredible athletes. With this roster in-mind I just wanted to control my own race from the start and push on when the upper body-dominant movements and the heat started taking their victims.
How was the race? Was there a particular point where you realised you had it under control?
The race was fun, that’s the first word I’d use to describe it. It was hot by UK standards which I like but that isn’t always beneficial for a quick race. The good thing about the weather is that it’s not like sleds – it’s the same temperature, the same atmosphere and the same humidity for everyone. That’s why I never worry about it.
I knew from the start that because running has always been the weakest part of my game that I wasn’t going to blow up so I saw the likes of Mick. S and Afan. H (another ex-E15 athlete) leaving station after station almost a minute ahead of me but it didn’t phase me too much to be honest.
I caught both of them by Labour 7/12 I believe and stretched my lead from that point onwards arriving at Labour 12 (Devil’s Press) with 2nd and 3rd in sight.
Although I built well throughout the race and stayed consistent on all my runs, I knew coming into the race that although my muscular endurance is very good, my levers (anatomically-speaking) are very long and so it would be hard to make up any ground if any, even on a very tired Dave Parkin at the end.
How much of your HYROX fitness transfers directly to Deadly Dozen, and where are the biggest differences?
The holistic part of my fitness that I really believe transfers well is my overall ability to pace races well by running my own race, to stay disciplined, but on a biological level to run consistently immediately after muscularly fatiguing movements. Muscular endurance is a massive part of HYROX and so that overall ability comes in handy across all Hybrid Races I’ve competed in.
That being said, each race has its own unique movements and Deadly Dozen’s stations aren’t too similar to HYROX at all from Labour 7 onwards. That’s where most HYROX athletes fall apart and lose time. It becomes very upper body dominant from Labours 7-12 but I have a background in (albeit recreational level) strength training and so I feel ‘comfortable’ on those Labours compared to most despite my long arms and legs doing their best to slow my cycle speed on most movements.
If you took the best HYROX athletes and dropped them into Deadly Dozen, who do you think would be particularly good at it? And who might struggle?
I would love to see Hunter, Dylan and Luke have a go at Deadly Dozen if I had to pick three E15 athletes. They are all very different athletes with very different skill sets so how they pace and execute the runs and movements would be very interesting.
The likes of Dexter and Jeremy might struggle for the same reasons I do – they’re both quite big guys and this is definitely a small-man’s game.
Having now raced a Deadly Dozen World Championship, where do you think the format fits into the wider fitness-racing landscape? Does it offer something genuinely different from HYROX?
I think Deadly Dozen will attract a large plethora of athletes and I really hope Jason and the team continue to grow. It has yet another amazing community and the race itself is the most unique of any Hybrid Fitness Race I’ve ever done.
I think it will attract a lot of the Everyday athletes because of how accessible the race as a whole is – only requiring DBs, KBs and WPs. It may also as I mentioned earlier favour the shorter athletes with most of the movements being based on lever lengths and cycle speed. If you have a short, quick athlete with great muscular endurance who focuses on the specificity of this sport – they’ll be tough to beat.
My training and my focus has definitely been on HYROX since I started training for Hybrid Racing, but races like these are always a great stimulus and a great experience. I absolutely love racing so it’s always fun competing.
Which AG World title means the most?
Finishing the race as the U29 World Champion is an awesome feeling and it means so much as it’s the third World Championship I’ve been to and the third AG World Title I’ve won.
If I had to pick, the HYROX world title means the most to me simply because it’s what I put all my energy and time into but I would also love to continue competing at the top level in these other sports as long as I’m able.
My ultimate goal is to become World Champion in HYROX and so upgrading my AG win for an overall win would be a dream come true.
For more from Jude, check out his podcast with his father, Paul Reynolds. Each week they break down all the latest news and share their opinions on everything competitive fitness.
