A New York City member shares how Missions by Equinox helped her complete her first HYROX.
When Gloria Nguyen decided to commit to her fitness last year, the motive was simple: to look “so hot,” she recalls with a laugh.
“But I think in my mind, it's hard to sort of gauge progress with just being, like, ‘Oh, you look hotter,’” she adds. “So I was like, ‘OK, I need a tangible goal.’”
A late-night TikTok scroll introduced her to HYROX, a race combining one-kilometer runs and functional workout stations. “I'm the type of person who's just, like, full-send,” she says. “So I was like, ‘This is my new goal. It's not to look different. It's just to complete this because I'm sure that I would have to change essentially everything — my mindset and how much I exercise. Everything else will come with it.’”
In August, the New York City-based teacher signed up for Athlete Mode, a five-week Mission by Equinox that combines elite coaching, expert nutrition guidance, and Bodywork to fuel performance. At Equinox East 85th Street, she began training twice a week with COACH Johnny Soto, building endurance, speed, and power.
To mimic the high-intensity nature of the race, Soto kept breaks to a minimum and incorporated wall balls, lunges, and other HYROX exercises into their sessions. They supplemented this race-specific work with battle ropes training and combo moves that utilize similar movement patterns, like a squat into shoulder press. Over time and with progressive overload, Soto noticed Nguyen’s wall ball height improving. She wasn’t getting burnt out as quickly, he says.
RELATED: Do More With: Battle Ropes
The Mission was so successful, Nguyen completed it twice more.
“He [was] forcing me to do things that I really wouldn't think about doing on my own, nor would I choose to do on my own,” Nguyen recalls. “But I think through that, my endurance was built, my strength was built. So toward the end, it got, like, a lot easier, even though we were doing the same things at heavier weights.” Her push-ups got easier, too; in four months, Nguyen went from being able to complete three push-ups to 13, Soto adds.
With each Mission, Nguyen also received two 30-minute nutrition consultations that helped her fine-tune her diet, like prioritizing protein and being more conscious of portion sizes (without giving up french fries), she explains. The included Bodywork session helped “smooth things out” on particularly sore days, she says.
After 15 weeks of holistic wellness support, she was ready to conquer the race. In December, Nguyen and her partner finished the Anaheim mixed doubles HYROX in 1:45:48. The one training element that had notable payoff? “The fact that Johnny never let me have long breaks,” Nguyen says. “I was like, ‘Just keep going.’ In my mind, I was like, ‘The faster you get this done, the faster you can rest.’”
RELATED: Crush Your First HYROX with These Training Tips
Today, Nguyen is continuing to train with Soto. Soon, she’ll be competing alongside him, too. In June, the duo will take on the mixed doubles HYROX in New York City, his first time participating in the race. “After we signed up for HYROX, I was like, ‘OK, hot is out. HYROX is back in,’” she says. (But, as Soto puts it, why not both?)
Through the experience, Nguyen says, “I feel like my whole mentality around health and fitness is really different.” She remembers “dreading” her initial sessions with Soto, and now she comes to the Club by herself simply because it makes her feel good. She’s more mindful of her nutrition choices, too.
“I would always tell Johnny that the fittest I've ever been was 10 years ago, and then I kind of, like, was very on and off with my fitness,” she says. “...But now I would say the fittest I've probably been in my life is now.”
