Competition Reveals — It Doesn’t Create — Weakness

Last Friday I competed at HYROX Perth. It was my fourth HYROX race — I did the solo event back in 2024, I've now done three doubles events and, this year, added a relay as well.

Our doubles race went pretty well. We finished in 1:20:33, went well in our division and, generally speaking, walked away pretty happy with how we'd performed.

A few days later though, once the legs had recovered and I had a chance to look through the race results properly, I wasn't particularly interested in where we'd finished.

I wanted to know what the race had told me.

Because one of the best things about competition is that it gives you information. Sometimes it confirms that the work you've been doing is paying off. Sometimes it shows you something that needs attention. And sometimes it tells you something you probably already knew but had managed to ignore.

Competition Tells You the Truth

Training can be a pretty comfortable place. Even when the workout itself is hard, you know the environment, you know the equipment and you know the people around you. Whether you realise it or not, you also get pretty good at playing to your strengths.

Competition changes that. There's a clock running, there are people around you and there's adrenaline. You probably start a little harder than you planned and eventually you reach the point where you can't hide from the things you're not particularly good at anymore.

Competition didn't suddenly create those weaknesses. They were already there. It just turned the lights on.

I've experienced that pretty clearly with HYROX before. When I did my first solo event in 2024, I thought I was ready. I was training four or five times every week and was genuinely fit. The problem was that I wasn't doing much running. I'd get out every couple of weeks and convince myself that was probably enough.

Then I raced.

For the first few kilometres everything was fine. Then somewhere around the fourth or fifth run, the race started telling me something I probably should have already known. Being fit and being ready for HYROX weren't the same thing.

The race hadn't suddenly made me a poor runner. It had simply exposed a hole in my preparation.

So What Did Perth Tell Me This Time?

This year's numbers were interesting. Our total running time was 41:54, which ranked 84th overall. More importantly, the running held together.

After the opening sections, our kilometre splits sat around 5:30, 5:36, 5:40 and 5:39 before actually getting quicker again with a 5:20 and then a 4:57 to finish. There was no massive collapse and no kilometre where everything suddenly went horribly wrong.

For someone whose first HYROX experience had exposed running as a pretty obvious weakness, that's actually quite satisfying. We trained differently, we did more running and when competition tested it again, it held up.

That's useful information.

But competition doesn't just confirm the things you've improved. It also shows you where to look next.

Our station rankings told a slightly different story. The SkiErg was 157th, burpees were 158th, the row was 170th and farmers carry was 173rd. The lunges? 184th.

Now, there are obviously some complications when looking at doubles results. They're team numbers rather than individual numbers. How you divide the work matters, transitions matter and the strengths and weaknesses of both athletes matter.

But you don't need to be a sports scientist to look at those numbers and realise there's information there.

Our running ranked considerably better against the field than most of our station work.

So now the question becomes: Why?

Was it simply how we divided the stations? Was it muscular endurance? Were we losing time during transitions? Did the station work deteriorate as fatigue accumulated? Were there movements where we simply weren't efficient enough?

I don't necessarily have all of those answers yet.

But I know where to start looking.

The Result Isn't the Review

I think this is where competition becomes genuinely valuable.

It's really easy to look at a finishing position or a time and decide whether the day was good or bad. If the number is better than you expected, you're happy. If it's worse, you're disappointed.

But the result and the review aren't the same thing.

You can have a great result and still uncover things that need work. You can also have a disappointing result and discover that several things you've been working on actually held together really well.

Maybe your running was better than it's ever been. Maybe you finally got through the wall balls without breaking. Maybe the sled that terrified you six months ago wasn't a problem. Maybe you stuck to your pacing plan perfectly and simply discovered that your current fitness isn't quite where you want it to be.

That's all useful information.

Competition reveals strengths as well as weaknesses. The trick is being willing to look at both.

Don't Explain the Result Away

After competition, there are always explanations available. The sled was heavy. I was tired. I went out too hard. The running course was long. I didn't sleep well. My legs were cooked.

And sometimes those things are completely true. But if your immediate response to every disappointing part of your performance is to explain why it happened rather than investigate why it happened, you throw away one of the biggest benefits of competing.

Instead of explaining the weakness away, get curious about it.

Was it preparation, pacing or technique? Was it strength or muscular endurance? Did you make a poor decision early in the race that you paid for later? Or was there simply something you hadn't trained enough?

That's where competition becomes valuable. It gives your next block of training some direction.

Training Builds Capacity. Competition Audits It.

You don't have to do HYROX for this to apply. It might be a boxing bout, a footy game, a fun run or a lifting competition. It might simply be one of those days in the gym when you decide to chase someone who's normally a little faster than you.

Pressure changes things. The comfortable pace gets uncomfortable. Technique gets tested under fatigue. Decisions have consequences. Things that seem fine in training suddenly aren't quite as solid as you thought.

But competition didn't create those problems.

It revealed them.

My first HYROX told me I needed to become a better runner, so I worked on it. This HYROX gave me some pretty good evidence that the running work has made a difference. It also gave me a few strong hints about what might need some attention next.

That's what I want from competition.

Once the race is over, the finishing position isn't going to change. But what you do with the information you've been given absolutely can.

So enjoy the result, whatever it was. Then have a look underneath it.

What held up? What didn't? What did you learn?

And then get back to work.