In the world of elite HYROX racing, the gap between a world record and the next best time can be vanishingly small.
As of today, the men’s world record stands at a blistering 53:22, set by the phenomenal Hunter McIntyre. In a stunning display of power and endurance at HYROX Glasgow, competitor James Kelly finished with a time of 53:23.
The difference is one second.
That single second isn't a story of a dramatic, career-defining failure. It's something more important: it is the ultimate, data-driven proof that at the highest level of this sport, every single moment matters.
When athletes are this closely matched, victory is no longer found in raw power or endurance alone. It’s found in the margins, strategy, efficiency, and the tiny optimizations that add up over the course of an hour.
While most of us aren't chasing a 53-minute finish, we are all in a race against our own clock. We analyze our running splits, we work on our transition speeds, and we strategize how to attack each station. But what if one of the most significant and easily achievable time savings has been overlooked, dismissed by old-school gym culture?
This brings us to a crucial element of race strategy: your hands. The debate between using traditional chalk and modern training gloves is often framed as a matter of comfort or personal preference. We argue it’s a matter of mathematics.
This analysis will dissect that choice, using the one-second margin at the elite level as our guide, to show you how a simple equipment decision could unlock a massive performance advantage in your own race.
The Unseen Cost of "Real Lifting"
The culture of strength has long celebrated a minimalist, gritty approach. The story is that true strength is built with nothing but your hands and the iron. This philosophy is perfectly valid in sports like powerlifting or Olympic lifting, where the goal is to execute one maximal lift with perfect form. There, the direct, tactile feedback from the bar is crucial, and the time between lifts is irrelevant.
HYROX flips this dynamic on its head. It's a continuous event. The primary opponent isn't the weight on the sled or the sandbag in your arms; it's the relentlessly ticking clock.
Every single second you aren't actively completing work or running to the next station is a second lost forever. This introduces a concept that every competitive hybrid athlete must master: minimizing "transition friction."
Transition friction is the cumulative time and energy lost between different movements. It's the moment you stop to catch your breath, the time it takes to set up for your next station, and, most critically, the time you spend on logistical tasks like managing your grip. And this is where chalk becomes a liability.
Quantifying the Chalk Penalty
Let's break down the staggering time cost of using chalk in a HYROX race. The event consists of eight workout stations interspersed with 1km runs. Many of these stations are brutally demanding on your grip, especially as fatigue sets in:
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1000m SkiErg: Your first test of pulling endurance.
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50m Sled Push: Less about grip, but the fatigue begins.
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50m Sled Pull: The first major grip challenge.
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80m Burpee Broad Jumps: No grip, but a huge drain on your energy.
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1000m Row: Another massive pulling effort.
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200m Farmer's Carry: A pure test of supporting grip strength.
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100m Sandbag Lunges: The awkward shape and weight taxes your entire system, including your hold.
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100 Wall Balls: A final test of grip and endurance as you catch and throw the ball.
To maintain a secure hold through sweat and fatigue, a chalk user will almost certainly need to reapply before most of these stations.
What does a "chalk stop" actually cost? Let’s be conservative. You have to run to the designated chalk bucket, dip your hands, clap off the excess, and run back to your station. This entire process can easily take 7 to 10 seconds.
It feels insignificant in the moment. But let’s use an average of 7.5 seconds and multiply it by only 3 of the 8 stations.
3 stations × 7.5 seconds/station = 22.5 seconds.
You read that right. Over the course of a race, you could be spending over 20secs of your total time on the simple act of applying chalk. This isn't a minor inefficiency; it's a self-imposed 20-second penalty.
For an elite athlete like James Kelly, that 20 secs is the entire difference between his personal best and a world record. For you, it could be the difference between hitting your goal time and missing it.
**The Case for Gloves.
This is where training gloves enter the conversation, not as a comfort item, but as a piece of high-performance racing equipment.
The primary and most powerful advantage is the elimination of the 20-second chalk penalty. You put them on once at the start line and you don’t think about them again. There are no chalk stops. There is no transition friction. You move from running to lifting with zero delay.
The benefit goes even deeper than the time on the clock. It’s about mental energy, or what psychologists call cognitive load. Your brain has a finite amount of bandwidth, especially when you’re in a state of extreme physical duress. Every task you have to manage (pacing, breathing, form, counting reps) consumes some of that bandwidth.
Using chalk adds another task to that list. It’s a "noisy" process. Your brain is constantly monitoring your grip, sending alarm signals when it starts to slip, and forcing you to think about the logistics of the next chalk stop.
Gloves create a "quiet" grip. Because the surface is consistent, you remove that entire stream of worry. You free up precious mental energy to focus on the things that truly matter: executing your race strategy and pushing through the pain barrier.
A Smarter Strategy
This doesn't mean you should throw out your chalk and wear gloves for every single workout, year-round.
The smartest athletes think in seasons. The choice between gloves and chalk shouldn't be a permanent one, but a tactical decision that changes with your training goals.
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Off-Season / General Prep Phase: This is the time to build raw, foundational strength. Here, training with chalk or even bare-handed is highly beneficial. You expose your hands to the full stress of the load, forcing them to adapt and building the strongest possible unassisted grip.
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Pre-Competition / Peaking Phase: As you get closer to race day, your focus shifts from building strength tonoptimizing performance. In this phase, you should switch to consistently training with the lightweight, performance-oriented gloves you plan to wear on race day. This allows your nervous system to adapt to the feel and ensures you arrive at the starting line healthy and ready.
Choosing the Right Gloves for HYROX
When selecting gloves for racing, less is more. Look for models that are lightweight, breathable, and have minimal padding. The goal is not to cushion your hands, but to provide a consistent, non-slip surface that doesn't add unnecessary bulk. The good news is you don’t have to look far because we’ve actually built the perfect gloves for Hyrox. They’re the fruits of extensive research and labor.
It's Not All About Strength amd Speed, It's About Execution
We will never know for sure if a pair of gloves would have given James Kelly that world record. But the evidence is compelling. The math of the 20-second penalty and the undeniable benefit of reduced cognitive load suggest it was a very real possibility.
For any serious hybrid athlete, this analysis should force you to ask a critical question. Are you training to be strong, fast or effective? Ideally you want all three. But in the world of HYROX, they are not always the same thing. True competitive excellence comes from challenging old assumptions and finding every possible advantage. Sometimes, the biggest advantage comes from the smallest change in strategy.