Hyrox Co-Founder Issues Apology After Winning Athlete Pooped Themselves During Beijing Competition But Wasn’t DQ’d

Hyrox Beijing was anything but uneventful. It took place last weekend and in the women’s division, Australian athlete Joanna Wietrzyk won the Women’s Pro division with a time of 1:01.23, beating American athlete Alyssa McElheny by 45 seconds.

This morning, Hyrox co-founder Mo Fuerste issued an apology following Hyrox Beijing (China). That is because the winning women’s pro athlete, Joanna Wietrzyk, pooped her pants during the race and turned the entire race course into a biological hazard. Inexplicably, Hyrox did not follow their own rules and automatically disqualify the competitor despite racers in the past having been DQ’d for ‘snot rockets’ or spitting.

Hyrox Co-Founder Issues Apology After Pro Athlete Joanna Wietrzyk Pooped Herself On The Course

For those unfamiliar with Hyrox, it is one of the fastest-growing events in sports. The competitions sell out within minutes all across the globe with over 1.5 million participants in the past year.

The competition is a mixture of strength and endurance, blending an 8KM run in with 8 fitness stations. So the typical format would go Run 1 Kilometer -> 1,000 meter Ski Erg -> Run 1 Kilometer -> 50 Meter Sled Push -> Run 1 Kilometer -> 50 Meter Sled Pull -> Run 1 Kilometer -> 80 Meter Burpee Broad Jumps -> Run 1 Kilometer -> 1,000 Meter Row -> Run 1 Kilometer -> 200 Meter Farmer Carry -> Run 1 Kilometer -> 100 Meter Sandbag Lunges -> Run 1 Kilometer -> 100 Wall Balls.

That would be tiring for any athlete! It requires both endurance and strength. And competitors train hard at gyms all around the world for competitions and they all compete with the same set of rules. So when Women’s Pro division winner Joanna Wietrzyk was not disqualified for pooping herself and smearing it across the course which every other athlete shared, Hyrox competitors around the globe were furious.

That ultimately led to this statement from Hyrox co-founder Mo Fuerste, a former Germany field hockey 2x Olympic Gold Medalist. Here is what he shared on Instagram following Beijing:

The statement is important. Letting everyone know they made a mistake and are taking ownership of it matters. But it stops quite short of making things right for everyone else involved.

The athlete who soiled themselves, Joanna Wietrzyk, is still listed as the winner for 2026 Hyrox Beijing. Looking at the Hyrox competition rules, they specifically named ‘faeces’ as a reason an athlete would be removed by a Race Director and awarded a ‘DNF’ (Did not Finish) for the competition.

Of course, their rules actually state ‘a Race Director may withdraw…’ and in this instance there is A LOT of emphasis on ‘MAY’ in this Hyrox controversy. If it was any regular competitor/athlete who had soiled themselves they would have almost certainly received an automatic DNF and been pulled off the course. But since it was the women’s pro division winner, the optics are not great.

This Hyrox controversy also comes hot on the heels of private equity firm L Catterton buying a majority stake in Hyrox for $700 million. With that much money exchanging hands the spotlight is greater than ever on the growing hybrid sports competition and for this controversy to hit Hyrox Beijing, the timing could not be worse for the sport.

You might have noticed by now that I never included images of Australian athlete Joanna Wietrzyk’s unfortunate accident. That is because I saw so many clips flooding social media on Sunday following the Hyrox Beijing incident that I stopped opening Threads and X for hours because every time I would open one of the apps the first thing I’d see was this athlete who had pooped her pants and smeared it all over the Hyrox Beijing course. Enough was enough.

So if you want to actually see the damage you can find it very easily on social media. The images are also all over Getty Images if you are so inclined to look there. There’s also this video where the excrement has been blurred which makes it safe for viewing:

Should Hyrox disqualify her and follow their own protocols? Let us know what you think below in the comments.