This week on the WHOOP Podcast, World No. 1 Golfer, Nelly Korda, returns to the WHOOP Podcast to reflect on her incredible career at the top of professional golf and the lessons she’s learned through both the wins and the setbacks. From betting on herself as a 17-year-old to becoming World No. 1 and a multiple major champion, Nelly shares how the highs and lows have shaped the athlete and person she is today.

Nelly joins WHOOP Founder & CEO Will Ahmed to discuss the routines, recovery strategies, and mindset that help her perform under pressure. Nelly opens up navigating the pressure of being the face of women’s golf, learning to tune out outside expectations, and making a conscious decision to show up more authentically as herself. On the green, that means trusting her instincts, accepting that she won’t always have her best game, moving on from mistakes, and finding the resilience to give the next shot everything she has.

From prioritizing habits around sleep and listening to her body to knowing when to lock in and when to step away, Nelly highlights the power in trusting your own process and staying on your own course. 

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On this week’s episode of the WHOOP Podcast, WHOOP Global Head of Human Performance and Principal Scientist Dr. Kristen Holmes and WHOOP SVP of Research, Algorithms, and Data Emily Capodilupo take a deep dive into the science of women’s health. The two define the importance of understanding how a woman’s physiology changes across the lifespan. Dr. Holmes and Emily define the various phases of the menstrual cycle and how each influences sleep, recovery, thermoregulation, fueling, and exercise performance. This episode challenges the idea that women need to completely restructure their training around their cycle. Instead, Dr. Holmes and Emily explain how understanding your individual patterns can help you make small, informed adjustments to strain, sleep, and recovery that better support your body.

The conversation examines the menstrual cycle as an important signal of overall health, establishing your own physiological baseline, and how changes in those patterns can provide useful information throughout different stages of life. Dr. Holmes and Emily discuss the extensive research WHOOP has conducted across women’s health, including pregnancy, fertility, and menopause, exploring how wearable data can help reveal changes that might otherwise be difficult to recognize. Ultimately, this episode highlights how better data, more research, and a more personalized understanding of female physiology can give women greater agency over their health and performance at every stage of life.

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(00:00) Trailer

(01:02) WHOOP Research: The Importance of Studying Women’s Health

(03:23) Recovery Through The Menstrual Cycle

(06:01) Using Science-Back Research to Develop WHOOP Features

(09:12) Menstrual Cycle Variability Insights

(12:16) Fuelling Tips for High Performing Women

(19:27) Viewing Your Menstrual Cycle as a Vital Sign

(21:49) Signs of RED-S and Misalignment

(24:17) Early Signs of PMOS and How To Screen For It

(28:28) What Your Body Is Trying To Tell You

(29:49) What Women Need To Know About Tracking Their Cycle

(20:10) How To Advocate For Care

(30:56) Importance of Knowing Your Normal 

(31:22) Early Warning Signs of Perimenopause

(32:54) WHOOP For Symptom Tracking

(40:26) Sleep Hormone Feedback Loop

(43:11) What Male Partners Need To Know

(46:44) Pregnancy Research Gaps: What We Know About Pre-Natal Training

(53:32) Maternal Care & Recovery

(56:12) Exciting New Leads in Women’s Health

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On this week’s episode of the WHOOP Podcast, WHOOP Founder and CEO Will Ahmed sits down with WHOOP Global Head of Human Performance and Principal Scientist Dr. Kristen Holmes to discuss her new book, Aligned, and what it takes to build a more resilient nervous system. Drawing on her journey from elite athlete to championship-winning coach, researcher, and human performance expert, Dr. Holmes shares what she’s learned about the connection between recovery, resilience, and sustained performance. Will and Dr. Holmes explore why the time spent away from your craft can be just as important as the work itself, how sleep consistency and HRV can provide insight into the health of your nervous system, and why balancing stress with adequate recovery is critical for performing at your best. Dr. Holmes also breaks down her HEAL framework, explores how trauma and an outcome-driven mindset can shape our behaviors, and shares practical strategies for building greater agency, resilience, and alignment in everyday life.

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(00:00) Trailer 

(00:55) Introduction to Aligned by Dr. Kristen Holmes

(02:25) How A Healthy Nervous System Promotes Healthy Aging

(05:31) Impact of Childhood Trauma on High Performers

(08:22) 70% of Americans Experience Trauma

(10:15) Why Recovery Matters More Than You Think

(16:17) Kristen’s Collegiate Coaching Experience

(22:07) What Overworking and Overtraining Looks Like

(26:44) Importance of Sleep Consistency

(30:17) The HEAL Framework

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Metabolic health is far more nuanced than conventional nutrition advice suggests. On this week’s episode of the WHOOP Podcast, WHOOP Global Head of Human Performance and Principal Scientist Dr. Kristen Holmes sits down with Metabolic Health Expert Dr. Nick Norwitz MD PhD to discuss why curiosity is one of the most powerful tools for improving long-term health. Dr. Nick Norwitz shares how a ketogenic diet unexpectedly put his inflammatory bowel disease into remission after numerous conventional treatments had failed. This experimentation sparked a career dedicated to challenging assumptions with rigorous science and thoughtful self-experimentation. Together, Dr. Nick Norwitz and Dr. Kristen Holmes unpack the difference between "evidence-based" and truly individualized care. This episode continues to explore why muscle, sleep, and visceral fat play central roles in brain, heart, and metabolic health. From discussions on protein, the microbiome, and emerging therapies to Nick's famous Oreo-versus-statin experiment, the conversation encourages listeners to move beyond one-size-fits-all health advice, and partner with their healthcare providers to embrace safe, data-informed experimentation for a better understanding of their biology.

Shownotes:

(00:00) Trailer Intro

(00:43) Who Is Dr. Nick Norwitz?

(03:07) Nick’s Personal Health Journey

(08:29) Nutrition as a Medical Intervention

(12:41) What Does “Evidence-Based” Care Really Mean?

(16:42) The Key to Optimizing Your Health

(19:17) Debunking Metabolic Health Myths

(20:46) The Benefits of Training and Exercise

(26:29) How Metabolism Affects Strength, Cardio, and Brain Health

(30:03) How Does Sleep Impact Inflammation?

(32:35) GLP-1s and Your Metabolism: What’s Really Happening?

(34:47) Nick’s Take on Self-Experimentation

(35:43) The Oreo vs. Statin Study

(45:19) How to Burn Fat

(49:43) Do We Really Need to Focus on Protein?

(51:25) What Is Visceral Fat—and How Do You Lose It?

(56:08) Why You Should Stay Curious About Your Health

Resources:

Fitness and aging (Nature Aging 2026); https://www.nature.com/articles/s43587-026-01150-x  

Visceral fat and resistant starch: (Nature Metabolism 2024): https://www.nature.com/articles/s42255-024-00988-y 

Visceral fat and resistant starch, **YouTube Breakdown: https://youtu.be/wnEApLnKDRI   

Visceral fat and brain volume: (Nature Comm 2026): https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-026-71141-4 

Leg power and longevity (twin study): https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26551663/ 

600-calorie exercise burn study (Nature Metabolism 2025): https://www.nature.com/articles/s42255-025-01236-7 

Microbiome and beige fat study (Nature 2026): https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-026-10205-3 

Oreo versus statin study: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38276308/

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Heart rate variability (HRV) is one of the most powerful metrics for understanding your recovery and resilience. In this week’s episode of the WHOOP Podcast, WHOOP Global Head of Human Performance and Principal Scientist Dr. Kristen Holmes and WHOOP Staff Research Scientist Dr. Greg Grosicki explain what HRV actually measures and what it indicates about the health of your autonomic nervous system. They unpack the biggest factors that influence HRV, including sleep consistency, hydration, training load, psychological stress, alcohol, and illness. You'll learn how to use HRV as a practical guide to balance stress and recovery, identify which habits are helping or hurting your physiology, and make small, consistent lifestyle changes that support better performance, healthier aging, and greater resilience over time.

(00:00) Cold Open

(00:35) What is Heart Rate Variability (HRV)?

(01:48) Why HRV Matters For Recovery

(03:20) How WHOOP Measures HRV

(04:44) Why You Shouldn’t Compare Your HRV to Others

(05:43) Understanding the Autonomic Nervous System

(11:28) Why WHOOP Measures HRV During Sleep 

(12:36) How Your Behaviors Impact HRV

(21:30) Impact of Sleep Consistency on HRV

(23:19) The Relationship Between High Stress and HRV

(26:54) How to Improve Your HRV

(30:33) The Habits Negatively Impacting HRV

(36:26) Why You Shouldn’t Obsess Over HRV

(37:51) HRV-CV: Understanding Weekly HRV Trends

(41:49) How HRV Changes Over Time

Listen to Our Episode on Heart Rate Variability Coefficient of Variation (HRV-CV)
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Women's health has long been underserved by research, leaving many women without the information they need to understand their own bodies. On this week’s episode of the WHOOP Podcast, WHOOP Global Head of Human Performance and Principal Scientist Dr. Kristen Holmes sits down with Dr. Elina Berglund Scherwitzl, Co-Founder & CEO of Natural Cycles° and Nobel Prize-winning particle physicist. The conversation explores how data is transforming women's reproductive health.

After helping discover the Higgs boson, Dr. Berglund Scherwitzl turned her expertise in physics and data science toward her own health journey by creating the world's first and only FDA-cleared birth control app. Together, Dr. Holmes and Dr. Berglund Scherwitzl discuss how wearable technology and physiological data are giving women unprecedented insight into fertility, pregnancy planning, menstrual health, and perimenopause.

The conversation explores the new WHOOP and Natural Cycles° integration, designed to make women's health feel less overwhelming and more intuitive by combining continuous wearable data with advanced insights on fertility, hormonal health, and perimenopause. Dr. Holmes and Dr. Berglund Scherwitzl discuss how body temperature and other biomarkers reveal hormonal changes, why perimenopause often begins earlier than many women realize, and how passive, personalized insights can reduce uncertainty, ease mental load, and empower women to make informed decisions about their health at every stage of life.

(00:00) Cold Open 

(00:37) Meet The Scientist Behind Natural Cycles°

(01:00) Why Dr. Berglund Scherwitzl Started Natural Cycles°

(04:35) The Only FDA-Cleared Birth Control App

(05:54) The WHOOP x Natural Cycles° Partnership

(07:51) The Early Signs of Perimenopause (And How To Track Them)

(13:08) What Really Happens To Your Hormones Over Time

(17:34) Why Understanding Your Body Changes Everything

(19:09) Your Sleep Could Reveal Early Signs of Perimenopause

(22:03) The Small Habits That Make A Big Difference

(24:14) The Most Common Menstrual Cycle Myths

(26:09) What Your Wearable Can Tell You About Your Hormones

(27:07) The Truth About Fertility Timing

(29:16) Knowing Which Symptoms Matter Most

(31:36) HRT: What Women Should Know

(34:10) What You Can Expect From The WHOOP x Natural Cycles° Partnership

(37:05) The Future of Women’s Health

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After reaching nearly 300 pounds, WHOOP Member Daniel Day committed to changing his life, turning WHOOP to give him the guidance he needed. On this week’s episode of the WHOOP Podcast WHOOP Staff Research Scientist Dr. Greg Grosicki sits down with Daniel to discuss his unique journey to optimize his health using WHOOP. After ultimately losing more than 125 pounds through sustainable lifestyle changes, endurance training, and a relentless focus on long-term health, Daniel decided to challenge himself to complete a Half Ironman. Daniel shares how WHOOP became an essential part of that transformation, providing the accountability, and daily insights that helped him build better habits and stay motivated through every stage of his journey. 

(00:00) Cold Open

(00:44) Daniel’s Weight Loss Journey and Life Motto

(07:43) Daniel’s Motivation, Family History, and Journey to WHOOP

(10:02) Finding Your “Why”

(12:29) Breakthrough Moments: Daniel on Running His First Mile

(14:44) The WHOOP Metrics Driving Behavior Change

(16:56) Impact of Strain Coach

(19:20) Daily Tracking and Daniel’s Biggest Wins

(28:23) WHOOP Advanced Labs and Healthspan

(33:06) Picking Up New, Active Hobbies and Habits

(33:40) Improving Energy and Mindset

(35:53) Training For A Triathlon

(37:04) First Open Swim Sprint Anxieties and Lessons

(39:59) Building Resilience for Half Ironman

(44:04) Daniel’s Half Ironman Race Day Experience

(46:41) Impact of Strength Training on Race Day Results

(52:03) Daniel’s Reflection on His Journey

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On this episode, WHOOP Global Head of Human Performance and Principal Scientist, Dr. Kristen Holmes sits down with exercise scientist Dr. Lauren Colenso-Semple for a refreshing, evidence-based conversation that cuts through some common myths in fitness. Together, Dr. Holmes and Dr. Colenso-Semple unpack how social media has fueled misinformation around hormones, menopause, menstrual cycles, strength training, and recovery.

Dr. Colenso-Semple challenges popular narratives around cycle syncing, hormone optimization, and sex-specific training. The episode makes the case that while men and women are biologically different, the fundamental principles of building strength, improving fitness, and maintaining health are remarkably similar. The discussion also explores hormone therapy, hormonal birth control, testosterone, Zone 2 training, and why consistency is the true path to long-term results.

Whether you're new to exercise or a seasoned athlete, this conversation offers practical, empowering advice rooted in high-quality human research rather than hype. If you've ever wondered whether you're "doing it wrong" because of your hormones, this episode will leave you feeling informed, confident, and ready to focus on what actually matters.

(00:41) Who is Dr. Lauren Colenso-Semple

(01:24) The Misinformation Around Fitness

(03:48) Understanding Fitness Facts

(06:50) The 3 Biggest Fitness Myths

(08:29) Addressing Fears Around Training in Perimenopause

(17:36) What Habits Work and What's Just Marketing?

(19:19) Improving Bone Health and Avoiding Fracture Risk

(23:26) Does Hormonal Birth Control Affect Your Training? 

(29:23) "Women Are Not Small Men"

(32:56) Should You Be Cycle Syncing Your Training

(38:49) The Secret To Strength Gains & Achieving Body Composition Goals

(44:06) Is Resistance Training The Key To Longevity? 

(46:05) How To Fit Movement Into Your Busy Schedule

(48:55) The Important Role of Recovery on Fitness Gains

(55:02) Should You Be Cycle Syncing Your Training?

(01:01:35) Risks of High Testosterone For Training

(01:10:24) Are There Any Fitness Shortcuts?

(01:15:40) Combatting Misinformation Onlines

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Welcome back to the WHOOP Podcast’s Science of Human Performance Series! On this week’s episode, WHOOP Global Head of Human Performance and Principal Scientist, Dr. Kristen Holmes, sits down with WHOOP SVP of Research, Algorithms, and Data, Emily Capodilupo, to explore the science behind the WHOOP Recovery Score. Emily explains the progression of the recovery algorithm, from the company’s origin to the supporting research that supports it today. Dr. Holmes and Emily identify the key metrics, like heart rate variability, resting heart rate, and sleep performance, that impact your recovery the most. Each physiological signal tracked by WHOOP helps to predict your body’s readiness to adapt to the stressors of the day, boosting injury prevention, immune health, and decision-making. This episode is your essential guide to improving and understanding your recovery. 

(00:00) Recovery 101: How WHOOP Looks At Recovery

(00:58) The Origin of The WHOOP Recovery Score

(01:32) What Is The Overtraining Curve?

(05:08) Adaptive versus Maladaptive Stress

(07:49) Balancing Strain and Recovery 

(08:18) Recovery for Everyone

(10:48) How Recovery Improves Sleep, Immunity, and Mood

(15:44) HRV: How Recovery Impacts The Nervous System

(21:04) Why Your Recovery Is Low

(28:45) Why Recovery Matters For Performance

(29:53) The Relationship Between Sleep and Recovery

(31:50) Treating Recovery as a Lifestyle

(33:21) Strain Coach Explained

(40:26) Is A Solid Recovery Routine The Secret To Muscle Growth? 

(47:07) How Your Recovery Is Measured

(49:52) The Correlation Between Recovery, HRV, and Mental Health

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Welcome Back to the WHOOP Podcast's Science of Human Performance Series! This week, WHOOP Global Head of Human Performance and Principal Scientist Dr. Kristen Holmes sits down with WHOOP SVP of Research, Algorithms, and Data Emily Capodilupo for a deep dive into the science behind the WHOOP Sleep Score and the habits that have the biggest impact on restorative sleep.

Emily explains why sleep consistency is one of the strongest predictors of performance, recovery, and long-term health, and walks through the four metrics that make up your WHOOP Sleep Score: sleep duration, consistency, efficiency, and sleep stress. Together, Dr. Holmes and Emily unpack how nutrition, exercise, alcohol, stress, and your daily routines influence sleep quality, share practical strategies for falling asleep and staying asleep, and discuss how poor sleep can sometimes be an early signal of underlying health issues.

Whether you're looking to better understand your WHOOP data or simply wake up feeling more rested, this episode offers a science-backed framework for building healthier sleep habits that last.

01:11 How WHOOP Built The Sleep Algorithm

02:17 The 4 Pillars of Sleep: Duration, Consistency, Efficiency, & Stress

03:20 The Secret To You Best Night’s Sleep: Sleep Consistency

08:06 Sleep Efficiency Explained

11:38 Impact of Alcohol on Sleep Quality

18:01: How Your Day Shapes Your Night

19:34: Exclusive Offer For WHOOP Podcast Listeners

20:07: How Sleep Stress Impacts How Rested You Feel

24:08: Is Your Sleep Normal?

25:48: Why Sedatives Don’t Actually Make You Sleep Better

26:59: Defining and Combatting The 2 Types of Insomnia

28:57: Light Timing: Benefits of Red Light Therapy on Sleep 

30:57: Winding Down Before Sleep: Breathwork & Stress Reduction

34:07: Understand Your Health with WHOOP Advanced Labs

34:41: Impact of Exercise on Your Ability to Fall Asleep 

42:40: How to Prepare for Sleep & Stay Asleep

44:28: What Your Lab Results Can Tell You About Sleep 

53:40: Creating Contrast Between Day and Night

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