Station 7 of 8
HYROX Sandbag Lunges: Complete Station Guide
100m of walking lunges with a sandbag on your shoulders
One hundred meters of loaded walking lunges, roughly 55–65 reps, as station 7 — after everything else has already emptied your legs. The sandbag lunge is HYROX's quad executioner, and it's the station with the strictest movement standard: trailing knee touches the floor on every rep, feet stay behind the line, stand fully between reps when required. Judges no-rep more athletes here than anywhere except wall balls.
How long should the Sandbag Lunges take?
- Beginner: 5:30–7:00
- Average: 4:30–5:30
- Competitive: 3:45–4:30
- Elite: 3:00–3:45
The last place in the race to buy time with strength. Athletes with a real lunge base routinely pass 10+ people on this station — nothing about it can be improvised on race day.
Official weights & standards
- Open Men: 20 kg sandbag
- Open Women: 10 kg
- Pro Men: 30 kg
- Pro Women: 20 kg
- Doubles: Same bag as equivalent singles, distance shared
- Rep standard: Back knee touches floor each rep; full hip extension between reps
Technique
- Bag position first: centered across both shoulders behind your neck, hands clamping it — a sliding bag doubles the difficulty.
- Moderate stride length with your torso tall; overstriding shifts load to the knee and shortens your balance base.
- Touch the back knee softly and drive through the front heel — banging the knee 60 times bruises, and pushing off the back toe drains calves you need for the final run.
- Find a metronome rhythm and keep the legs moving — continuous slow beats broken fast.
- Use a stagger-stop to rest if needed: pause standing between reps rather than mid-lunge.
Where athletes lose time
- No loaded-lunge volume in training — race day is the wrong place to discover 100m is far.
- Overstriding for 'bigger steps', which torches balance and knees.
- Letting the bag slide to one shoulder and fighting it for 80m.
- Sprinting the row/carry and arriving with legs that can't stabilize a single rep.
Race-day pacing
One continuous rhythm you can hold for the full 100m, even if it looks slow. Every stop-and-restart costs balance, time, and a spike in heart rate you'll carry into wall balls. Exit heart rate matters: wall balls immediately follow.
How to train it
- Progressive loaded lunges: start at 50m at half race weight, add distance weekly to 120m at race weight by Peak phase.
- Compromised: 500m run → 40m loaded lunges × 4.
- Volume floor: by race week you should have done 100m at race weight, unbroken, at least twice.
- Quad strength: front squats and step-ups in your strength sessions carry over directly.
FAQs
How many lunges is 100m in HYROX?
Around 55–65 reps for most athletes. The count matters less than the standard: back knee to floor, full stand between reps, feet behind the start line, bag on shoulders. Train to the standard — no-reps here are brutally expensive.
How do I stop the sandbag sliding during lunges?
Center it across the meat of your traps (not your neck), grip both ends and pull down slightly, and keep your torso tall. Most sliding starts when athletes lean forward under fatigue — the fix is usually posture, not grip.