HyroXCX is Brat
Charli, gymcore, and the 3-6-5 weights girls
Charli XCX gyrated her way around the stage in Hackney wearing cheek-baring leather hotpants, a sports bra and sunglasses last night. Women screamed whenever she shook her ass. It reminded me in a way of the gym girls on Instagram. Wearing teeny 2” scrunch-seam shorts, they posture their sculpted peaches towards the camera — showing off the fruits of their labour; a lot of squats and steps via the stairmaster — and other women flood their posts with admiration and appreciation. If you think about it, Charli’s on-stage look is not just clubby, but gymcore.
While she’s been headlining, girls have been making headlines. Strength training has risen 558% among women, according to a survey by Harrison Co; in 2024, Strava reported a 25% rise of strength workouts logged, making it the fastest-growing sport for women on the app. Not only that, almost 50% of Hyrox competitors are women globally.
Some might say this is entirely unrelated. What’s Charlie XCX got to do with Hyrox? Actually, quite a bit. For a start, they are both on sell-out world tours, with Hyrox’s world championships taking place in Chicago as I type. (Sports tours are the new band tours.) Hyrox is the fastest-growing sport in the world; Brat is one of the most influential albums of the past few years.
Hy-rockstars etc.
Each has changed the popular culture they are in. Hyrox, founded by two former athletes, created a movement — a new format of competitive exercise for those who go to the gym. Functional fitness became a globally mainstream idea. Charli also created a movement — one which infiltrated American politics. One of her contributions to culture that became globally mainstream was an ugly shade of acid green.
Both also demanded we rethink the concept of femininity. With Hyrox, it’s in strength. With Charli, it’s in duality and messy contradictions. It’s women simultaneously in sexy mode and goblin mode; in mini skirts as well as doing squats. It’s womanhood within a typically masculine space. Etc, etc, etc.
Hyrox created a new word, and Charli turned brat — a noun — into a verb. Hyrox and Charli are both about power and performance. And female strength. And strength in numbers.
I’ve been going to functional fitness classes in my gym recently. The other day, a woman who had a cool vibe turned up with her own whiteboard to pen the workout on — the latest must-have accessory. Sorry, but what’s more Brat than that?
Girl, so confusing STRONG
Women’s weights are on the up. And, like Brat, which defined an entire summer and looks set to have a second season — how many albums/artists can truly claim that? — girl strength is not a trend. It too is a movement. For the first time, the strong vs skinny debate which has perpetuated conversations in popular culture in recent years is really taking root. Even Pilates has co-opted strength, with many workouts now mixing dumbbells into reformer and mat routines. Some might say the Ozempic noise is undermining it. But Ozempic-takers need to do weights work in order to prevent muscle loss. The kettlebell becomes even more relevant.
Big brands, from Lululemon to Adidas, are focusing on women’s strength training too. Lululemon even released a new shoe, the Chargefeel 3, which is designed specifically for the female foot and built for agility in plyometrics. (All sports shoes are generally designed for men’s feet.) Lulu’s footwear offering is nascent, but creating a shoe and an accompanying line of leggings and compressive tops for gym work shows that it’s not a trend. (It takes around $250k to develop a shoe to market.) The Lulu execs are backing women’s training as a growth category moving forwards.
Back to Charli, and this week, Adidas’ headline campaign on its website was a training collection. Its new shoe, the Dropset 3, was unveiled in Brat-adjacent green.
Sport and It’s Completely Different but Also Still Sport
Confident, rebellious, non-conformist… Hyrox offers men and women the chance to compete on the same team; equality not just within the participants, but actually within the race format. Some 50% of Hyrox entries are in the doubles category. Prize money for elites ($99,500) is also equal. Until last year, elite women received a smaller payout for winning the London marathon than elite men. (Both are now matched at £40k, after much campaigning).
At the worlds in Chicago, and there were more entries for Hyrox doubles (same gender teams of two) in women’s than there were men’s. By industry standards, Hyrox (founded 2017) is relatively new. To be reaching equality in the metrics and out-subscribing men in some categories is pretty major.
What r u wearing?
It’s usually considered quite embarrassing to turn up somewhere in the exact same outfit as your friend. But women competing in Hyrox doubles intentionally opt for matching, colourful kits. At Charli, women also adopted the XCX uniform. There were a lot of hot pants, a LOT of lime green, a lot of fishnet material and many, many pairs of Oakley-style sunglasses. I even saw one guy wearing lime green Nike Alphafly. Cosplay at a gig is fast-becoming commonplace; for Beyonce, who I also went to see this week, everyone dressed like a cowboy. For a Pitbull concert, many wear a bald cap.
Charli’s fangirl costuming is interesting to me because of the sports crossover.
Brat is garish, but you don’t care, you love it
Brat green kit is on the rise. From Satisfy to Sweaty Betty, On, Represent 247 and Gymshark — all have released spandexy assortments in this distinctive shade. It’s a very hard colour to pull off. Two years ago, there’s no way brands would have gambled on producing collections in this shade. It would have been deemed too uncommercial as it’s an abrasive colour that few actually suit; an automatic end of season sale bin assortment. But the proliferation of Brat changed that.
Last year, I read an interesting interview with Brent David Freaney, the creator of the Brat artwork, about that exacting shade in the New York Times. It’s worth a re-read here. They went through 50 shades of green to find the exact one; Charli’s missive was that it should be tasteless and off-putting. Clearly no-one would be wearing it, or making a sports kit out of it, if it wasn’t for Brat.
Hyrox forever <3
Lots of gyms around the world now do dedicated Hyrox classes; I’ve done them in Dubai, Brussels and London so far. They’re actually really fun. For me, it’s a good switch-up from the monotony of running. I find the dynamism of the workouts means I have to stay mentally present; with running, I often zone out. I’ve noticed a lot of marathon runners, perhaps fatigued with the boom, competing in Hyrox. Strength for runners is also a growing focus for injury prevention, so it makes sense that they’d flirt with it.
I still hate burpees, and I’m terrible at sled pull and push. But I do really enjoy a wall ball, which surprised me. It also made me think I need some squat-proof shorts. Not sure how different they really are to typical bike shorts. But I do know it’s definitely not OK to wear baggy, flappy shorts for a functional fitness class unless you really want your ass cheeks on show (Charli would approve).
It’s not over yet
What’s exciting about the women’s space in Hyrox is the opportunity for new brands to come in and own the aesthetic. Currently, it’s dominated by brands like LSKD, Gymshark and Oner or even MyProtein—brands which have no real presence beyond the gym sector—while independent footwear offerings come via RAD. Puma is Hyrox’s official partner, but it’s refreshing that there’s an entire market segment that isn’t dominated by Nike or Adidas.
The Hyrox look exists — I wrote about the new, independent training brands for the FT earlier this year — but there remains a space for real design, beyond bold white lettering on cut-off tank tops, colourful bras and and matching, seamless, high-waisted bike shorts.
I quite like a lot of the shades and shapes them, but I’ve not bought any yet as they don’t have pockets. I guess there’s need for pockets in the gym… Maybe it’s time for my 3-6-5 weights girl era? <3