The incident occurred last week during the indoor fitness competition, when Wietrzyk lost control of her bowels and continued running, rowing and lunging as diarrhea streamed down her legs. Her initial reaction on social media was defiant: “Go hard or go home they say … a win is a win,” she declared before deleting the post as outrage mounted over her decision to stay in the race.
The fallout also put Hyrox officials under scrutiny for allowing the event to continue despite what some described as a public safety hazard. Social media users and fellow athletes complained that other competitors were left navigating a dangerous, slippery track and potentially a biohazard after fecal matter ended up smeared across shared equipment. Photos and video from the remainder of the race showed feces covering Wietrzyk’s legs as she powered through another run, a seated row, a farmer’s carry, a sandbag lunge and wall ball exercises.
Chinese officials said staff swiftly cordoned off the affected areas, disinfected the site through the end of the day, removed contaminated equipment and arranged to replace the carpet once the event was over. Still, participants and spectators said the cleanup did not happen quickly enough, with reports of fecal matter smeared across equipment and the track.
Through the chaos, Wietrzyk still took the top spot, finishing the indoor fitness competition in 1 hour, 1 minute and 23 seconds. She now concedes that she should have hung up her diarrhea-splattered sneakers. “I am learning from this experience and will carry those lessons with me, including remembering that there is more to life than racing and knowing when it is right to step away,” she wrote. “On reflection, I have decided to retroactively withdraw from the race and forfeit the points I earned.”
Wietrzyk’s decision means her win, finish time and season ranking points from Hyrox Beijing will be completely erased from the official leaderboards and will not be applied to her season standings or championship qualifications.
Wietrzyk, who received fierce online hate, harassment and death threats over the incident, thanked those who stood by her and offered kindness amid the fallout. “It means more to me than I can properly express right now,” she said. “I will be taking some time to recover, reflect and look after myself and my family away from the noise.”
Her statement came days after her coach, Chris Bayens, spoke out about the online abuse his star student had faced over her decision to remain in the competition. Bayens described what unfolded as “an extraordinary set of circumstances that were unforeseen, rapidly evolving and almost impossible to fully comprehend in real time.” Pointing to the decision by the organization during the competition to allow the world record holder to continue, Bayens argued that hindsight has a way of making split-second decisions look far simpler than they were. “It is very easy to construct the perfect response once the moment has passed. Those decisions can be reviewed and lessons can be taken from them,” he wrote on Instagram. But his biggest objection was reserved for the “hatred” directed at Wietrzyk, which he called “ugly.” “Judging someone’s intent, character or morality through the clarity of hindsight is neither fair nor honest,” he said. “Discussion is legitimate. The hatred and personal attacks that followed are not.”
For its part, Hyrox took several days to address the situation, eventually issuing a statement about the “increasingly complex situations” arising at its competitions. “We ask our athletes to push themselves to the highest levels. At times, they will go beyond what even we thought was possible,” they wrote in a since-deleted Instagram post. “That courage, resilience and refusal to give in are precisely what makes elite athletes so extraordinary.”
The athletic brand’s co-founder, Moritz Fürste, later issued his own statement, apologizing “to all that were directly or indirectly affected, as well as to everyone who felt like we did not handle the situation like we should have.” “HYROX made a mistake by not reacting immediately during the race,” he wrote. “In the end it is my job to foresee these potential incidents — and I did not.” Fürste said Hyrox has since changed its rules and procedures as a result of the incident. “As of this moment, there are new rules and procedures in place to prevent situations like this from happening again,” he said.