The recent news of HYROX co-founders Christian Toetzke and Moritz Fürste buying back a majority ownership of the company they launched has been overshadowed by Joanna Wietrzyk’s fecal incontinence in Beijing. But last week a consortium led by L Catterton completed the purchase from Infront Sports & Media.
The transaction marks the third ownership structure change in the company’s nine year history and brings the co-founders back into a majority ownership position.
2017
HYROX was founded by Toetzke and Fürste in 2017. The inaugural race was held in Germany the following year with 650 participants.
2019
A year into hosting HYROX events, the co-founders sold a minority stake of HYROX to Infront Sports & Media.
Infront Sports & Media is a Swiss-based sports marketing agency owned by the Wanda Group, a Chinese conglomerate. Specific terms of the deal were not disclosed.
2022
Three years later, Wanda and Infront came back for another bite at the apple. In October 2022, Infront increased its investment to a controlling 60% majority. Toetzke and Fürste retained the remaining 40% of HYROX.
Again, specific deal terms were not announced.
2026
While HYROX had grown from 2019 to 2022, it pales into comparison the growth over the past four years. HYROX now hosts more than 100 events annually with over 1.4 million participants and current projections show over 2 million participants will take on a HYROX race in 2027. There are also 5,000 affiliated HYROX training clubs.
Then on September 8, the co-founders took back their company. Led by L Catterton, the largest consumer-focused private equity firm, Infront Sports & Media sold their 60% ownership in HYROX to a group of investors.
Rather than cashing out, Toetzke and Fürste staying in the deal. In fact, the co-founders increased their stake in HYROX.
While no price was officially announced, Bloomberg reported that the company might have been valued around $700 million. Others, however, have estimated the company was valued as high as $1 billion.
New Ownership
With the new transaction, Toetzke and Fürste increased their ownership stake from 40% to 51%. The duo did not invest with cash. Instead, they personally took on debt to return to majority owners in the company.
Following the transaction, Furste said, “You will not get rid of us anytime soon.”
As for the remaining 49%? That belongs to L Catterton and WndrCo, a private equity firm founded by Jeffrey Katzenberg, co-founder of DreamWorks, and Sujay Jaswa.
If you recall, WndrCo was one of the initial investors of XENOM, CrossFit’s version of HYROX. Fürste (and possibly Toetzke) are also investors in XENOM.
L Catterton manages about $40 billion of equity capital. The PE-firm invested in Peloton in 2015 and has invested (and divested) numerous large fitness brands such as SoulCycle, Equinox, Pure Barre, Tonal, iFIT/NordicTrack and ClassPass. In 2024, it acquired a majority stake in Solidcore, a Pilates chain, for $600-700 million.
HYROX Future
This recent transaction has many expecting to see even more growth in the coming years. L Catterton’s business model is to scale gyms. It’s not a surprise that this entry into HYROX has the same goal.
Unfortunately, that growth might also come with some added costs. Like any PE-backed venture, financial returns are the goal. Don’t be surprised in HYROX entry fees begin to increase. The same thing happened when Ironman was sold to a private-equity firm.
The good news is that there will be more HYROX events in more cities, making it more accessible to more people.
Of course, before HYROX can focus on its growth, it has to deal with the PR nightmare of what happened in Beijing.
