Puma’s $260 Hyrox Deviate Nitro Elite 4 Is Finally Back in Stock. I Put It Through the Gauntlet to See If It’s Actually Purpose-Built
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Puma just unveiled the Puma x Hyrox Deviate Nitro Elite 4, the second iteration of the brand’s premium, highly awaited Hyrox shoe. While the Hyrox community always has a massive appetite for branded gear, they were especially excited for this drop because the previous version—the Deviate Nitro Elite 3—was really just a standard Puma runner wrapped in a Hyrox logo. And Hyrox, of course, is about more than just running.
As expected, tons of sizes sold out immediately. Luckily, I was able to get my hands on an advanced pair, which I’ve been testing for the past few weeks. And with the Puma x Hyrox Deviate Nitro Elite 4 finally back in stock, I wanted to take this opportunity to report back from the field on what’s new and notable. From laps around the track to more trips up and down the turf than I’d care to count, there’s a lot to unpack here.
Whether you’re considering signing up for your first Hyrox event or you’re running out of room for race patches on your Puma x Hyrox backpack, here’s everything I think you should know about these shoes.
Puma x Hyrox Deviate Nitro Elite 4: A Head-Turning New Design That Makes a Splash
The Puma x Hyrox Deviate Nitro Elite 4 looks like it’s moving fast before you even take it out of the box. The launch colorway, a neon pink bright enough to raise your blood sugar just by glancing in its general direction, blends into a familiar purple towards the back of the midsole—that is, the same purple used in the Deviate Nitro Elite 3, as if to depict a shoe shedding its prior paint job by sheer velocity.
This idea of the 4 emerging as a stripped-down version of its predecessor plays out on the shoe’s upper, too, with a single, generously perforated piece of mesh wrapping the shoe while also serving as a palpable upgrade to airflow and flexibility. And while the tongue may appear thinner and decidedly sportier than its predecessor, it features considerably more cushioning directly beneath the laces, with padding running its full length.
Perhaps the most striking feature of the shoe, aside from the color, of course, is the midsole—carved with streamlined striations that give the lower half of the shoe a fluid quality that almost allows you to forget that this is a max-cushioned trainer sitting on a 40mm slab of foam. And to complete the effect: three tapered accents at the back of the heel, making the Puma x Hyrox Deviate Nitro Elite 4 appear to be outpacing not just its predecessor, but itself.
Made for Hyrox—or Adapted to It?
Dean Stattmann
That said, is Puma actually getting ahead of itself—again?
The previous iteration of this shoe, the Deviate Nitro Elite 3, was marketed as the brand’s official Hyrox shoe and was even offered in a special Hyrox colorway featuring the race’s branding. But when the Deviate Nitro Elite 3 first came out, before it got wrapped in a giant Hyrox logo, it was positioned as a marathon shoe.
This time around, the brand is doubling down, claiming that the Puma x Hyrox Deviate Nitro Elite 4 is engineered specifically for Hyrox. But, once again, it's virtually the exact same shoe as Puma’s new Deviate Nitro Elite 4, which is categorized as a road running shoe—just with a slightly different outsole. (The standard Deviate Nitro Elite 4’s outsole is mostly an exposed midsole foam with some PumaGrip rubber distributed sparingly beneath the heel and forefoot, while the entire underside of the Hyrox version is dotted with grippy lugs.)
It’s not necessarily a bad thing that Puma’s new Hyrox shoe is effectively a regular Deviate Nitro Elite 4—an absolute warp-speed racing shoe. Hyrox is, after all, predominantly a running race. But as I’ve learned from putting dozens of road-running trainers through Hyrox testing, not all racing shoes can handle the specific demands of certain stations. So, naturally, I had to put the new Puma x Hyrox Deviate Nitro Elite 4 through the full gauntlet.
Station-by-Station Breakdown
Here is how the Puma x Hyrox Deviate Nitro Elite 4 performed in each of the eight Hyrox stations, including runs.
Running
Without a doubt, the run portion is where this shoe feels most in its element. As mentioned above, this model is basically a regular Deviate Nitro Elite 4—but that’s not to say the Deviate Nitro Elite 4 is a regular shoe. The Deviate Nitro Elite 3 was a banger of a racing shoe, and the 4 is an exciting upgrade. The carbon plate is stiffer than the one used in the previous model, providing even better energy return, and Puma has widened the toe box slightly to allow for a more natural toe splay. The midsole has also been updated with an all-new foam that is considerably bouncier than before. No notes.
SkiErg
Almost any pair of shoes is going to be decent enough for the SkiErg, since you’re basically standing with your feet planted the whole time. That said, when you’re racing for a new PR and every second counts, even the smallest missteps can add up. Most athletes are used to putting their weight in their heels during certain exercises, like squats and lunges, or the bottom portion of a skierg pull. With this shoe, the cut-away design of the heel had me tipping slightly backwards a couple of times. While it didn't cause me to fall over, it did make me take a beat to reset my center of gravity. On the plus side, if you like to rise onto your toes at the top of each pull, the forefoot’s rocker shape effectively puts this part of the movement on autopilot for you.
Sled Push
You can tell that the Puma x Hyrox Deviate Nitro Elite 4 was developed with the sled push in mind. While the previous model had virtually non-existent traction in the forefoot (it had the exact same outsole as the road-running version of the shoe), the 4’s outsole is peppered with tiny circular lugs that claw into the turf with great effect. And unlike the road version of the Deviate Nitro Elite 4, the outsole extends up and around the center of the toe box to ensure you maintain traction regardless of how you position your body against the sled, whether you’re pushing from the balls of your feet in a more upright position or further up towards your toes, which is more likely to be the case if you’re grabbing the sled in a lower stance.
Sled Pull
The Puma x Hyrox Deviate Nitro Elite 4 handles the sled pull with ease. The fully-lugged outsole is a game-changer, compared not only to the previous model but pretty much any other shoe I’ve tested in a Hyrox setting. Because this version of the shoe—or, more accurately, the outsole—was designed specifically for Hyrox, the tread is optimized not for road or trail but for turf. You can see this in the shape of the lugs—small and circular, designed to penetrate gaps in the textiled surface—and the sheer quantity of them, vastly outnumbering the number of lugs you’d find on other athletic shoes. This latest model also thickens up the medial side of the outsole in the midfoot, creating more surface area and therefore even greater contact with the ground.
Burpee Broad Jumps
In the context of an actual Hyrox race, this is where I saw the biggest improvement from the Deviate Nitro Elite 3. When I competed in that shoe, I’ll be honest, it ruined my race. The lack of traction under the heel caused me to completely slip out whenever I tried to land a lengthy broad jump. (And I’m all about jumping far, because I truly hate burpees.) As a result, I had to drastically shorten my jumps, and it resulted in me doing about 12 more burpees than I should have, causing me to narrowly miss my race time target. This shoe fixes that. With toothier lugs over more surface area, the Puma x Hyrox Deviate Nitro Elite 4 lets me jump as far as I want and stick the landing every time.
Rower
This is where the Puma x Hyrox Deviate Nitro Elite 4 might start causing some genuine frustration. I cannot, for the life of me, understand how the heels don't stay put (at all) in the stirrups of a rower, especially given the apparent purpose of the shoe. But the shape simply prohibits it. Some people probably won’t mind (looking at you, maniacs who race Hyrox in Nike AlphaFlys), but there’s just no way of securing your feet to the foot platforms while wearing these, regardless of foot setting or strap tightness. And the reason is simple: Half of the heel is missing. Sure, that’s how Puma created the cool cut-away design, but do we really need that particular piece of visual flair if it’s going to impede performance in the race that this shoe was supposedly designed specifically for?
Farmer’s Carry
The updated foam in the Puma x Hyrox Deviate Nitro Elite 4 is somewhat of a double-edged sword during a Hyrox event. On the runs, it’s a massive advantage and something you’ll actually find yourself looking forward to as you peel out of the Roxzone for each run. But certain stations that introduce heavy downward load—specifically, the farmer’s carry and, to a greater extent, the sandbag lunges—have a way of turning this plush platform against you. Basically, the moment you pick up those kettlebells, the foam squishes like a dollop of pancake batter, and all support goes out the window. This is somewhat counteracted by the updated, more rigid carbon plate and widened toe box, but it certainly feels like a more dense foam would go a long way here. That said, the farmer’s carry is probably the shortest and least consequential station of the entire race.
Sandbag Lunges
This station is my case in point for why Puma’s next Hyrox shoe should be designed, from the ground up, specifically for Hyrox—and not a carbon copy of a road-running supershoe with a reworked outsole. While the farmer’s carry will give you your first taste of what happens to 40 millimeters of foam when you load it up with weight, you’re at least spending most of that time with the weight generally distributed between both feet, and turnover is fast. But when you’re piling 20 kilograms onto a single-leg lunge, there’s nowhere for instability to hide. This shoe has a really tall stack. At 40 millimeters, it’s technically a max-cushioned shoe, and max-cushioned shoes are not meant for weighted lunges—or weighted anything, really. The combination of this shoe’s high platform and squishy foam had me wobbling all over the place during walking lunges, and spending way too much time and energy managing my balance.
Wall Balls
The wide toe box of the Puma x Hyrox Deviate Nitro Elite 4 is a nice change of pace from other running shoes when it comes to setting up for the final station of a Hyrox race. But, again, most coaches will teach you to squat with a focus on three points of contact under each foot—one being your heel—and these shoes just don’t have much of a heel, thanks to the cut-away design. So, when you’re coming down after each throw, you have to consciously avoid sitting too far back into your squat, or risk tipping backwards. The issue is exacerbated by the loosey-goosey structure of the foam under the heel, which no doubt reduces the shoe’s heel-to-toe drop from the advertised 8mm to something probably closer to 4mm, which isn’t doing you any favors for squatting to depth and avoiding no-reps.
Dean Stattmann
The Verdict: Is the Puma x Hyrox Deviate Nitro Elite 4 Worth It?
The Puma x Hyrox Deviate Nitro Elite 4 is a big step towards a purpose-built Hyrox shoe. But even with this second shot at a Hyrox-branded shoe, Puma, for some reason—despite being the racing series’ loudest sponsor—still seems hesitant to sever the umbilical cord from its running division and attempt to create the ultimate Hyrox shoe from scratch.
Instead, the Puma x Hyrox Deviate Nitro Elite 4 borrows 98 percent of its design from the standard-issue Deviate Nitro Elite 4, which, although an outstanding racing shoe, was not engineered for Hyrox, and therefore comes with some major weaknesses when tasked with muscling through the event’s various stations—particularly the farmer’s carry, weighted lunges, and wall balls.
It’s also perplexing that Puma went with a max-cushioned design for its premium Hyrox footwear offering, given that max-cushioned shoes are not for everyone. After all, we’re talking about what is supposed to be the ultimate shoe for a race with the slogan “The fitness competition for everybody.”
Ultimately, Hyrox is, more than anything else, a running race. So, some athletes—particularly those who don’t mind powering through lunges and wall balls in sky-scraping supershoes like the Nike AlphaFly or On Cloudboom—will find the Puma x Hyrox Deviate Nitro Elite 4 to be an excellent option, and possibly an upgrade, particularly given the brilliant traction provided by its purpose-built outsole. But for the average person looking to invest in a specialty Hyrox shoe that will add value at every step along the way (and at $260 a pair, these shoes are an investment), the Puma x Hyrox Deviate Nitro Elite 4 is a step in the right direction, but ultimately still a running shoe that’s okay, but not ideal, for Hyrox racing.