Double trouble
David Magida and Eric Williams are elite hybrid competitors and coaches at Elevate Interval Fitness in Washington DC. At Elevate, a Hyrox and Deka affiliate gym, they have prepared countless athletes for their first races and helped more experienced racers to PRs and podiums.
David Magida is the 2023 North American Hyrox Champion and a member of the Elite 15. At Dallas Hyrox in November, he recorded the third-fastest doubles time in history with Dylan Scott and broke the team relay world record. Eric Williams has finished second and first in his last two Hyrox Pro races, breaking the 60-minute barrier at Hyrox Chicago last month. David and Eric joined forces at the Deka World Championships in December, winning the team competition in Deka Fit and Deka Mile. They set the world record in both races.
The Hybrid Letter sat down with David and Eric to talk about doubles strategy, the value of humility, and their mental approach during a race’s most difficult moments.
The interview has been edited for length and clarity.
The Hybrid Letter: You both compete individually with a lot of success. So why doubles?
David Magida: The big thing about doubles is you get to feel like you’re part of a team. It is such an individual sport. Did I train enough? Did I push hard enough? Did I do the things necessary to win? In doubles, all of a sudden, you’re in a situation where you have someone else who’s relying on you. You can lean on each other, and there is this bond formed as a result of the teamwork required. There’s an extra added extrinsic motivation. You want to win for them as much as you want to win for yourself.
Eric Williams: I think the team aspect of it is also very interesting from a spectator standpoint. I think there’s been a lot of focus on individuals, and if you’re not familiar with the sport, and the people in the space, you can maybe get a little lost. But I think that’s what makes the energy in doubles so incredible. Team racing, when you see people in matching kits or like us in Elevate tanks, you can identify with the team and really cheer them on.
THL: What is your approach to training for doubles when you get closer to races?
DM: I will say that we didn’t do a ton of doubles training together. But what’s unique for Eric and I is that we have been training together for almost nine years and so we know each other’s fitness. I know exactly what numbers he’s going to hit on every machine. I know where he’s quicker than me and where I’m quicker than him. I can recognize in his body language if he needs recovery or if he can handle more. It’s about being aware of each other, then understanding your teammate and knowing their strengths and weaknesses. You need to know when it is time to shoulder the load and when it’s time to trust them to do the same for you.
In terms of training, while we didn’t do a ton of very specific partner workouts in preparation, what we did was a lot of work that translated well. You’re going to raise your intensity levels significantly higher than you would training for individual races. It’s a lot more peaks and valleys as opposed to this sustained aerobic effort. It’s a lot more Zone 5 and dropping back down. The training for that requires getting a little more specificity to get that kind of intensity.
EW: I think that awareness about where you are and where the other person is physically and mentally goes a long way. When we ran [at Deka Fit] Philly [in August] David was much closer to his [back] injury. So, his ability was a little different at that point. He’s come a long way physically, so he could take on more for [Deka Fit World Championships in December]. But then he was also running so many races during World Championship weekend that I knew I would need to do more running. So going into my training, I did more speed work and shorter runs than I would need for a solo Hyrox or Deka.
THL: Hyrox is coming to a lot of new cities and doubles tends to be the most approachable race for first-timers. When people are looking at their strategy for a doubles race, how should they approach it specifically for Hyrox?
DM: In Hyrox, you have to be smarter with your splits. It’s about taking away some of the brutality of that event. At the sleds, maybe I’m not going to do a straight down, and my partner comes back. Instead, we're gonna split every down and back so we don’t get really lactic and blow up. maybe we're going to switch every 25 wall balls instead of doing 50 and 50.
EW: It is not just identifying how you can do the most work; it’s how you can do the most work without negative consequences for the team. There is a very critical point in a race where you have to be honest with yourself. Sometimes the most selfish thing you can do, if you’re really trying to compete, is to split everything 50/50. You also have to have some flexibility and be willing to change it up. Humility is actually. I can do 15 calories on the assault bike, but it’s probably better if I only do 10. Because David can crank more on the bike. One of the most painful things to do as a competitor is to do nothing. You want to jump in and help. But when you see your teammate absolutely go to town for you at that station, you need to adjust.
THL: As elite racers, what is your mental strategy? Where does your mind go at the shittiest part of the race to keep your effort high?
DM: I spend the first part of the race trying to stay relaxed and stay calm and stay out of the fray. You see guys that go out pretty hard, and it gets away from them. They burn a little too hot. It’s happened to me before, and I learned from that mistake.
I spend the early portions of the race running it like it’s a workout and staying within the work rate that I am capable of sustaining. A lot of people in the field go backward in the second half of the race. I want to be putting out the same kind of effort that I was putting out in the beginning when I’m on the last run.
When it’s time to focus on those other people, you study them; you sense their weakness; you look at their body language. Once I sense a little bit of weakness, I want to pass, and I want to pass with authority. I have a hunter's mindset. I talk about this with our athletes all the time: we are out there hunting. But hunters don’t just go out and kill everything right? You are waiting for your moment and stalking.
If you can avoid putting yourself in a situation where you are trying to race everybody that’s around you the entire time and just start racing when it’s crunch time, so to speak, that’s when you’re going to put yourself in a situation where you can win.
EW: I got into Hyrox over the last two years. I wasn’t sure if I could find my competitiveness again. I was trying to initially to figure out what I was capable of again. It was sort of tunnel vision and staying within yourself. And then those key moments where it really gets tough, I like to go back and replay my training in my head to try and draw from that. Because especially here at Elevate, the stuff that we do is harder than the toughest moments of the race. So if you can remember that workout where you thought, “Oh my god, how am I going to be able to get through 100 meters of lunges or that seventh run?” A lot of the time for me, as I go through my training, I’m sort of building my greatest hits, my playlist, that I can call back to in those moments.
DW: You just need to find something to grasp onto and just let that be one of your life rafts. And if you can find that one thing, and it can be different for every race, it’s magic.
EW: That’s why when we’re at Elevate, and we’re coaching, I encourage people not to look at the clock. On race day, that clock is only counting up. So there isn’t a countdown to zero to save you. So in training, find the actual fight. Then you will be capable of amazing things.
You can follow David and Eric on Instagram and train with them at Elevate Interval Fitness in Washington DC.
Hybrid Athlete of the Week: Vic Purcell
Name: Victor Purcell
Age: 40
Hometown: Hartford, CT
When did you start hybrid training? I started adding more running into my training in 2020, but I'd say I didn't officially start training for Hybrid until after my first Hybrid race in April 2021. You don't really know what you need to do until you actually race.
Favorite race to date and why: It's a tie between the World Championship in Las Vegas 2022 and NYC in March 2022. In NYC, I podiumed in the Pro Division in my age group with my Mom and girlfriend in attendance. That's where I qualified for Vegas. It was also a great experience and accomplishment to represent the US in the first Hyrox World Championship held on US soil.
Do you have a race goal? My goal is the development of my base aerobic system for this Hyrox season. At a minimum, I'll race Pro in LA and Open in DC this season to track progress. Patience will be necessary to realistically be competitive in my age group as the field gets faster.
Favorite station: Sled push. All the stations suck while you're actively engaged, but there's nothing like a good heavy sled hero workout!
Least favorite station: Burpee broad jumps. When you weigh 205+ lbs (muscle or not), that last 40 meters is nasty work!
Things you wish you knew when you started racing? I wish I knew how beneficial cross-training would be a bit earlier. Cycling and rowing have been a game changer. It's easy to get injured as a heavier runner. The thing is, you don't know your limits until you push yourself to that point. My 22/23 season ended pretty early due to a hip injury. Now that I'm back, I've found a good balance for the 23/24 season in terms of how to increase training volume appropriately.
Podcast rec: The mindset of Camille Herron, the world’s best ultrarunner
Camille Herron is a phenomenally successful ultrarunner, holding world records 50 miles, 100 kilometers, 100 miles, 24 hours, 48 hours, and many other distances. In this interview with the 80/20 Endurance podcast, Herron talks about what fuels her success. Of particular interest to hybrid competitors will be Herron’s mental approach. One thing that stuck with us is Herron’s race mantra: “There is only one way to eat an elephant: one bite at a time.” (The phrase was coined by the late South African theologian Desmond Tutu.)
