WHOOP Podcast - Angela Ruggiero, 4-Time Olympian, Hockey Hall-of-Famer & Sports Innovation Lab Co-Founder on training and recovery during her time as a pro, plus the various ways technology is reshaping sports.

Episode Date: February 5, 2019

Angela Ruggiero, 4-time Olympian and Sports Innovation Lab Co-Founder, discusses winning a Gold Medal while still in high school (5:42), carrying the 9/11 flag at the Salt Lake City Games (10:21), using heart rate recovery (14:36) and other biometric data (18:28) to improve her performance long before it was the norm, pregame naps (24:27), visualization and meditation (30:06), playing in a men's pro game (38:08), what's holding back women's sports (43:25), being a contestant on The Apprentice (49:28), her time as a member of the IOC (53:02), technology's impact on sports and the role her business plays in it (1:01:44), and what it means that Netflix says it's biggest competitor is Fortnite (1:13:11). Support the showFollow WHOOP: www.whoop.com Trial WHOOP for Free Instagram TikTok YouTube X Facebook LinkedIn Follow Will Ahmed: Instagram X LinkedIn Follow Kristen Holmes: Instagram LinkedIn Follow Emily Capodilupo: LinkedIn

We discovered that there were secrets that your body was trying to tell you that could really help you optimize performance, but no one could monitor those things. And that's when we set out to build the technology that we thought could really change the world. Welcome to the WOOP podcast. I'm your host, Will Ahmed, founder and CEO of WOOP, where we are on a mission to unlock human performance. At WOOP, we measure the body 24-7 and provide analytics to our members to help improve performance. This includes strain, recovery, and sleep. Our clients range for the best professional athletes in the world,

to Navy SEALs, to fitness enthusiasts, to Fortune 500 CEOs and executives. The common thread among WOOP members is a passion to improve. What does it take to optimize performance for athletes, for humans, really anyone? We're launching a podcast today. deeper. We'll interview experts and industry leaders across sports, data, technology, physiology, athletic achievement, you name it. My hope is that you'll leave these conversations with some new ideas and a greater passion for performance. With that in mind, I welcome you to the Whoop podcast. One of the things I'm most proud of is that I've played longer than any other

man or woman in a USA Hockey jersey. Which is amazing, but I'm I just, it's like, for me, I had to understand my body and get better. But to have that long of a career, I, again, was obsessed with any data I could get my hands on, any information, any feedback. And this is pre-real tech era. On the show today, we've got Angela Ruggiero, one of the greatest female hockey players of all time. Angela is a four-time Olympic medal winner with Team USA, including a goal. in Nagano in 1998 when she was still a senior in high school. She's a long-time member of the International Olympic Committee and one of the co-founders of the Sports Innovation Lab. Angela and I

discuss her long and spectacular career, the time she became the first female ever to play in a men's pro hockey game, and her appearance on Donald Trump's TV show The Apprentice in 2007. We also take a deep dive into human performance. She elaborates on her training and recovery during a decade and a half as a pro, how the team she played on could have benefited from WOOB, and the various ways technology is reshaping the game of hockey and sports as a whole. Angela and I originally met back when I was first founding Woop, and it was great to have a chance to catch up with her today. I hope you enjoy the conversation. Angela, thank you for doing this.

My pleasure. There is so much I'm excited to talk to you about, especially all the work that you're doing today around sports and technology and data, where we've had some interesting collaboration so far. But I wanted to start just by talking about your career as an incredible, incredible women's hockey player. How did you get into hockey in the first place? I fell in love right away, but it was really my father who signed up my brother, who was six. He wanted my brother to follow in his footsteps. He played recreationally in New Haven, Connecticut. But we were grown up in L.A. So there was no hockey in the 80s when my dad signed up my brother. And so when he went to go sign him up, the guy at the rink basically said,

do you have any other kids? We're desperate for bodies because we need to fill a full roster. And he said, oh, I got a couple girls at home. And the guy at the rink said, we'll give you a discount if you sign them off. So it was a discount deal. It was a discount that got me into hockey. So my brother was six, I was seven, and my sister was eight, and the three of us played on the same team for a few years. And it just became a family sport. But I, from day one. I mean, actually, to be truthful, the first time I stepped on the ice, I started crying because I was scared. And, you know, you're seven and you're slipping around. And I just remember by the end of that, I could let go of the boards. And I just felt this, like, freedom. And I

remember that at a young age. Like, I could, like, learning how to skate and move, it's just such a joy at that age. Well, reading through your bio from a, from a hockey perspective is amazing. But I thought one of the coolest things is that at age 50, you became the youngest player on the U.S. women's national hockey team. I mean, that's only eight years after the first time you stepped on the ice. Was it just that obvious that you had just clicked with this sport, or were you still doing other things and you were just a gifted athlete? No, I think because, well, I played basically boys hockey.

My sister played two years, and then she stopped, and that was the only girl in the state of California in my age. Representing all of L.A. Yeah, I was trying. So I got pushed a lot as a kid, and I almost had a chip on my shoulder, at times, being the only girl on the ice, you know, getting called names. Right. So, one, I loved hockey.

And two, I always felt like I had something to prove when I was out there. So I think that combination of enjoying what you do and having, like, intent and focus every time he stepped on the ice even as, like, a nine-year-old, it allowed me to almost take those eight years or whatever it was and make them very meaningful. So it was a, I played other sports for sure. I loved sports growing up, basketball, and I did track, and I did lacrosse and soccer, and I tried a lot, particularly in high school. But at that young age, hockey was definitely the number one sport. And your experience then, so fast forward two years later, you're a senior at Choate, and you're the youngest member of the gold medal Olympic team.

How crazy is that? That was crazy. So what are you? 17? I was 18. 18. Yeah, I was taking my SATs on the road and trying to apply for schools. And Choate, my prep school was incredibly generous. They let me obviously take a couple semesters off and graduate in time. And I had to, you know, take some extra courses when I got back. But, yeah, being a senior in high school and getting to go to the Olympics, and that was the first time women's hockey was in the Olympics. So it was a massive deal for the sport. Oh, that's so cool. So we, you know, we got the first ever goal. And I was, I mean, I was a kid. I was, like, you could see even in the photos when we won. I grabbed a flag by myself that was on this pole, and I started skating around our zone

in, like, circles by myself, like waving this flag and just what you would think a typical 18-year-old would do. And what was the average age of the team? Mid-20s. We were up to 30. 18 to 30 was the range, but I'd say mid-20s was about the average. And did you feel like you had a good, like, camaraderie? with the rest of the women, or were you kind of like the little girl on the team?

Yeah, you know, I like to think I had a good camaraderie, but they definitely true to me like I was younger. But it was a great experience for me because then fast forward for Olympics. Now, I'm the 30-year-old veteran. True. Looking at these young rookies, and my job was to make sure they felt welcome and, like, a part of the team and to get the most out of them. And I remember being in their shoes, like, intimidated and scared and, you know,

not knowing what you don't know. And so it was a great experience to remember what it was like to kind of feel like you're part of the team, but you're also like definitely the kid. Right. I was, I think the example I used is I was reading 17 magazine and everyone else was reading like Cosmo. But it was great. I had incredible role models that taught me what it was, you know, how to be a great

teammate and how to work together. And to win at that age, those lessons are like, they absolutely stick with you. And so they were basically like my older sisters, you know, not best friends, but they brought me along and showed me the way. And I'll always be grateful to them for that. What do you think were some of the lessons that you learned from being on that first Olympic team as a young woman? Well, I talk about it a lot. To be, to win a gold medal is encouraging. incredibly hard, and I wasn't able to do it afterwards. I mean, I got two silvers and a bronze after and four world championship gold medals. But to reach the peak of your sport with other people is incredibly hard, and the lesson I learned, honestly, in that team, was what teamwork really is.

And I think a lot about that now as I'm building my company and business thinks about it and talks about it all the time, but to actually see it work where people check their egos at the door and they, you know, they stay in their swimming, so to speak, they play their role on the team and they believe in the goal and they work towards it collectively. I mean, all those lessons that we actually learned and we struggled, obviously, but we weren't supposed to win, by the way. We were the underdogs going into that tournament. So it's even more powerful, like, we did it together.

And some of the later teams that you were on, Were you guys the favorites to win when you won a silver? It was a, we were definitely the favorites in 2002. And again, I- This is in Salt Lake City. This is Salt Lake City. Four years later, we were 33 and O against Canada that year, heading into the gold medal game.

Oh my gosh. So talk about an upset. But again, lessons learned, you could be the best team on paper. And if you don't show up together and have each other's backs and be able to work through adversity, we choked basically that game. And that's hard. I mean, to this day, that was probably the hardest loss I've ever had, knowing we were the better team that year. But we didn't show up when it counted. And still incredibly proud of a silver. I don't ever want to belittle winning a silver medal. But, you know, you can see the difference between the underdog winning and the

favorite losing. And what I always do as an athlete is like look back and reflect on what do we do right, what do we do wrong, and how do you get better the next time? That's really interesting. And you were one of eight athletes selected to carry the U.S. flag, a tattered flag found in the World Trade Center after 9-11. That must have been a pretty incredible honor. Yeah, it was completely silent in the stadium. I mean, this is, you know, six, five, six months after September 11th. And I had to represent, you know, one of my teammates who lost her father and in general it was a it wasn't an American moment it was a moment where the world could come together through that symbolism of you know fighting terror and and that was

yeah it was powerful for me I mean that's what I love about the Olympics it's never about you it's never about your sport it's not even about sport in general it's about the collective power of you know sport and how it could bring the world together and and that was a one very real example for me of the power of the Olympics and why I obviously loved competing in them and went on to, you know, be on the Olympic board for eight years. Well, I want to talk about that too. So the, I want to go back for a second, though. So you end up going to Harvard, Harvard undergrad, and then later you go on to Harvard Business School. Like, as someone who had already played in the Olympics, was it underwhelming being a college

athlete or did you still enjoy that experience? Yeah, I loved it. Well, the difference is when you're on the national teams, as I mentioned, you're 18 to 30-year-old from all over the U.S., very different personalities. Whenever you go to university, more or less you're the same age going through similar experiences. And you've selected that school because you probably care about what the values and whatever. So Harvard was great because I could be a kid. I was with people my own age, and I was pushed to think about things outside. of sport, which I loved about Harvard. It really opened my aperture and showed me the world in a new way. So maybe the hockey wasn't Olympic level, but it was certainly I had a bigger

role, maybe relatively speaking, to play on that team. And I could enjoy it with some of my best friends to this day. Well, you had an amazing career at Harvard. I mean, these stats are pretty amazing. Most goals by defensive player in a single game, most goals by defensive in season, most goals in career. You won the award for Best Women's Collegiate Player. Were there other athletes at Harvard or coaches there that you were inspired by? Well, I was lucky because my freshman year at Harvard, we had two U.S. players, myself and A.J. Malesco, and we had two Canadians. Jen Botrell, who was the youngest, player on the Canadian team. She actually ended up being my roommate for one year. And Tammy

Chuchok, so we had four Olympic athletes at Harvard. Oh, that's so cool. And we won the, you know, the NCAAs that year or the nationals that year. So they were my teammates, but having two Canadians, honestly, was such a great thing for me because I got pushed every day. I felt like I was not only training for Harvard, but I was training for Team USA. That's cool. So even I mean, we were great friends. Like I mentioned, Jen was my roommate one year. It was fun. It was a blend of people.

And, again, great teammates, great coaches, great captains. I'm so happy I was able to go to Harvard and play hockey. But also what it gave me outside of sports, which is one thing I'm a huge advocate for is just the value of education. And something I think a lot of athletes tend to overlook or their entourage, quite frankly, dissuades them from really focusing on because they're really good at sports, it doesn't always become front and center. So I was lucky I got to do both. Well, you and I met actually because I was a lowly entrepreneur working out of the Harvard Innovation

Lab. It was awesome. And at the time you were at Harvard Business School. Well, you had a spark in your eye and a hell of an idea. So I remember that. I definitely remember our first meeting. Yeah. And I remember one of the interesting things that you told me in that. meeting was how when you were on, I think, one of the more recent Olympics teams, you guys would wear heart re monitors and chest straps and you would measure the heart rate recovery of women when they came off the ice. Talk a little bit about that. Yeah, I'm super jealous of athletes now that get to use whoop or some of these products because I was obsessed with like prolongating my career and being at my peak and that's, you know, as an athlete, that's all you have.

ever want to do is just get better. So we use heart rate monitors, and it was the first time I actually got to see in real time, or not in real time, but, you know, when I get off the ice, my coach would pull something up and show me how quickly I could recover and be ready to go back out. And in hockey, that is everything. I mean, typically in hockey you've got three sets of forward lines and three, sorry, four sets of forward lines and three sets of deep pairs. And you were a defensive line.

I was a defense of, yeah, defenseman or defense person. So there's every third, you know, go, basically you're up. Now, if you start in, if you're a star forward or defenseman, you're going to play more on the power play and on the penalty kill, or your shifts might be longer. So I always had tons of ice time. And it was really a lot of times the coaches would manually look at me. Does she look like she's breathing hard?

Is she sitting down or standing up? Is she, like, you know, heaved over, or is she watching the gameplay? And that was basically their indication I was ready to go back out. And not only that, you've got to think about, is your D-partner ready to go? Because I could be ready to go, but if my D-partner wasn't, then we shouldn't be out there. We have to be both on, you know, full cylinders. And I learned through those early heart rate analysis that I should be with a different D-partner. like I was actually with someone that had a lower lung capacity and couldn't recover as quickly as I have massive lungs I realized that too my brother is genetic so I have massive lungs and I was in crazy shape I remember that year I've trained with Mark for Stagin and exos down in southern California and I was just like ready to go um so the real think about that in a hockey team if you have three people now in your forward line and two are ready to go and one isn't or two aren't ready to go and

heart rate for the first time to me showed in that recovery really could play a meaningful role in not only figuring out who's most likely to recover at the same time but also like in that critical moment who should we put out yeah I think the the fascinating thing now is that we have hockey teams that wear whoop 24-7 yeah and I and so we can see I put it on for practice and that was it and I went home and yeah I'm jealous but that's specific point. I was resonating for you because I thought it was so interesting how different sports can use technology. And in the case of whoop, we're measuring heart rate 24-7, among other things, like the ability to see how fast your heart rate drops right after you come off the ice,

you know, your heart rate was probably dropping from 180 to 100, and maybe your benchmate was dropping from, you know, 180 to 140. And so you're like ready to go and, you know, maybe she needs another 10, 20, 30 seconds, maybe a minute. That makes all the difference, though, in matching you guys on the ice. So it's fascinating now working with teams that are trying to implement this type of analysis. Now, on the other half of the equation, right, which is a lot of the reason why I founded Whoop, what for you were things that you started thinking about outside of the game, outside of practice? Like, you know, when it comes to recovery and sleep, what were the things that you started doing?

And you can even think about it over the course of your career. Yeah. One of the things I'm most proud of is that I played longer than any other man or woman in a U.S. Hockey Jersey. Which is amazing, by that. It's like, for me, I had to understand my body and get better and enjoy, obviously, what I was doing. That's half the battle. But to have that long of a career, I, again, was obsessed with any data I could get my hands on, any information, any feedback, and this is pre-real tech era. I wish I had a whoop. So I journaled a lot, or I would take my heart rate in the morning to see if you're you're resting heart rate and see is it off

two or three beats maybe I'm getting tired or I'm getting sick and I would look at you know before the Vancouver Olympics I actually did a whole blood analysis for my diet and I completely changed my diet around because I realized I was sensitive to foods like cherries and beans and things that pepper yeah or and the usual is the eggs and flowers and things we're all know Food sensitivity tests, by the way, that's something that, like, everyone should just be required to do at the beginning of the year. It's a no-brainer. And then you've flush your system out. Yeah, and you feel like a million bucks.

And so you get leaner and you feel great and you don't have these weird irritations that you've been putting up with your whole life. They just go away. I'm like, huh, well, that was easy. Right. So I was, you know, we, the thing, the technology that's out there today, like, you know, we'd weigh in and weigh out after practice. That was the best indication we had of. Sweat loss. Yeah.

Today you can wear a patch maybe or you could. So we were piecemilling it together through qualitative like journaling. Yeah. Some early, you know, heart rate monitoring. And then little tricks like taking your resting heart rate in the morning with your finger and putting in a piece of paper. So I, you know, had great trainers. The other thing I love about what you guys are doing is there was, I was on four different Olympic teams. Obviously, I played collegiate hockey. I played some pro hockey. I trained on my own,

and I have no idea where my date is. It's everywhere. Yeah, that's so frustrating, right? People, I know have it locked up somewhere, or it's in a journal, or it's in their paper, and I would love to have had that ongoing analysis of, like, improvement or maybe I'm not improving. And even today, I'd love to know where I was, because I know I'm out of shape, but I'd like to see how badly I had she been. Well, that for me was always a core thesis early on, was that every athlete or every individual should own their data. And wherever you go, that data goes with you.

Totally. And then over the course of your life, you can look back on these different periods of time and see what's changed or what's improved or what maybe hasn't improved. Yeah. Yeah. Because I think that's so interesting, right? I agree.

I love that that's an issue that you're tackling because having that, consistency for your own, it's your own, it's your data. But I believe you, you own it. And it's health. It's, it's not just what's going to happen with your next team. It's going to, what's going to happen in your life. I mean, if you're 30 or 40 and you're retired and you realize there's a sharp decline summer, maybe you could catch it earlier. You could catch an injury or you could catch an illness or just literally could show you how badly out of shape you are. get back to the gym.

Yeah. But that was one of my biggest frustrations is I'd record at least what I did in the gym on a pen and a piece of paper. And I have no idea where any of that stuff is today. I used to be strong. I know. I just want to show, I want to prove it. Well, it's also, I think, the difference between some of the older technology and modern technology. Because technology today, like Woop, for example, we wanted to build everything through smartphones,

where the primary form of communication was from an individual. is whoopstrap to an individual's smartphone. So just by default, you're already interacting directly with the product or directly with your information. Whereas if you look at products like Caterpult or even going back further, where there's a chest strap system or something that's involving coaches and laptops, the default system then becomes the laptop to collect data from all these different sources. So you, the individual, aren't directly accessing that.

Yeah. Yeah, I love the idea of athlete first. I mean, if you're giving them an interface that they own and can. potentially control it takes it you know and that is the biggest thing even just the perception right I see this a lot in professional sports where athletes they're fearful where I mean you see this every day yeah right who's going to use that data and how do I trust that it's not going to get into the wrong hands and so even just the perception that you you own it and you can control it you know even if they're not doing it anything bad with it even if

They're doing the coaches and the trainers, knowing sharing. Great intentions. It still causes anxiety. So I love, you know, you guys have this interface where I know I can own it and see it and interact with it because one frustration again I had when I was competing is I had to make time with our strength coach to get into her laptop, to have the time for her to analyze my information. and what if I wanted to know every single day, and I was that pest, like, hey, open your laptop, hey, what's happening? Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, right, right.

I would have, I'm sure, on the weekends and at nights and when I had free time, like, been playing with my day to, you know, if it's actually going to give me. Yeah, because it's fun, especially if you're thinking about performance all the time. That's exactly all athletes ever do. I mean, if you're an elite athlete, you're obsessed with performance. You're obsessed with how do I get better. And we talked about food sensitivity. That's one way. but if there's other windows into how to perform and, you know, you talk about sleep all the time, which is great.

If I could just know the exact amount of time I needed the night before and my pregame nap, I mean, I guesstimated how much time I needed my pregame. Maybe I needed more. So you would nap before games? Oh, yeah. Every game? I was religion on that. Oh, cool. Oh, yeah.

So you were about 15 years ahead of that trend. Oh, I was just now today. They're installing sleep pods in every, like, every. like gym, you know. Well, to. At pro level, I mean. I wish I had one at my work now. I do it every day because I know how great I felt with, and I wouldn't sleep too long.

I remember sleeping an hour. It was way too much. You'd be groggy. Interesting. But that 30 to 45 minute range was perfect. And it was like team meal. Everyone would go nap. You wake up.

You go for a walk. You get a little snack. And then you go to our, you know, you're five, five, six o'clock. You're at the rank for a 730 puck drop. So it was definitely this routine I had, and it was always a nap. If I didn't have a nap, I was not happy. Oh, wow, that's so interesting. And was that a common thing for your teammates, or were you kind of on an island?

No, it was pretty common. Not everyone, but I'd say three quarters of the team would do a nap. Sometimes they'd just sit in bed and relax, but I shut the lights off. It's interesting how different things works for different athletes. It's like I was just with Mark Gassal last week on the podcast, and he was saying how he can't take a nap before again. He refuses to take naps ever. Well, one thing that I love sleeping.

And I didn't feel guilty about sleeping when I trained. That's cool. It's a good, healthy mindset. Yeah, I felt great, and I slept a lot. And now I feel guilty because, you know, you're a working person. You're like, I don't need as much sleep. I know my body actually does because I played sports. What stands out for you in your career?

What are some of the moments where you just think back on? You're like, God, that was so special. Yeah. I mean, obviously you have so many different things to think about. You know, there's one world championships in 2008 that no one knows about, which is by far one of my favorite hockey moments. We're in Harbing, China, which is freezing. It's the northern part of China.

And they hosted the world championships that year. And we weren't very good that year. we went into that tournament usually what happens for the world's outside of the Olympics years is you fly in a week early you train you know a week or two to prep and then you play in the tournament and then which by the way doesn't seem like a ton of practice as a it is as a fresh team right no you have to assemble a team and pick lines and get chemistry overnight and it's so usually the best just on paper team wins right just skill versus when you have a longer period of time

where you could really figure out the nuances of the team and the chemistry and all that. So it's a compressed timeline, but most teams, if not all of them, have roughly the same timeline. So it's fair, I guess. And this year, we weren't that good. We had a ton of rookies, a lot of youth, happy just to be there kind of mentality. And I'd seen it over and over. You're like, oh, I made the team, great. I'm like, no, we need to win this.

So long story short We lost to Finland in one of the preliminary games Which wasn't heard of for our team Right It was just I remember having my head in the locker It was kind of looking around How did this happen? And we could have

We had to play Canada then in the semi-final Which meant if we lost to Canada in that game And we hadn't beaten them in three years So if we lost to them We would be playing for bronze medal And I was like 20 at this point. I'm like, all right, I'm done.

You've won enough medals. You don't need a third place qualifier. This is not what I'm playing for. I'm playing a win. And we had this amazing psych up with, you know, our captains. And I was one of the caps in the time. And we brought everyone together. And it was the power of the mind to overcome any obstacle.

And we got into a circle. We all had pillows. And we were screaming. And basically we, we did. It was like, literally, and these are like adult women. It was, it was, we took what was our biggest liability, which was our youth, and we turned it into our biggest strength. And what we basically did is said, we're young and we're strong and we're fast.

And we just kept repeating, we're fast, we've got legs, we've got legs, you know. And suddenly this perceived weakness was the biggest strength we had. and I've never been in a game before where not a single person sits the entire game and I don't know if you've ever seen a hockey game where people don't literally sit but no one sat at that entire game we played Canada, we came out

they just looked at us you could see them looking across going what the heck are they are they on drugs but we beat them in the crossover and then had we couldn't quite get to the same peak in energy, but we got close to it and beat them in the final and won those worlds that era. It's amazing.

And it was like, that was all on our heads that we created that amount of energy and the willingness to come together despite of, you know, what we had on paper. It's fascinating how many examples there are of like mind over matter in sports. Like for you, what kind of things did you do from a visualization standpoint or meditation standpoint to get your head right for games. Yeah, I was lucky that I had a great mental coach on the 98 team. Peter Harborough, he worked with our whole team and taught me what mental imagery was. And it's harder in hockey because it's so dynamic.

You can't, you know, like squash or football or, you know, there's certain sports where you have to read and react. So I had to learn how to think about situational plays in my head. and the idea is you'd be ready for if it happened or what happened. Like you've got the puck at the top of the key. It's a power play and it's like pass or shoot kind of thing. Yeah, and you're constantly visualizing like different situations and what you would do.

But really what it taught me is just to be mindful. And I ended up learning how to meditate a couple years later. I think I was like 20. And it's the same idea. I mean, when we talk about being in the flow, right? In sports, it's about everything slows down. And you remember when that happens. Like I can clearly remember where time was so slow and I had 10,000 options.

Such a cool concept. And I just knew, I'm like, all right, where am I going to do with this puck? And you look at the replay and it's super fast. Yeah, really fast. So I think mental imagery and meditation and just this whole idea of like being mindful, it's easier to do in sports than in real life in a way because you can like manufacture the different situation. but it's the same thing. It's just being aware and present. So I tried to learn those techniques early on and continue to meditate throughout my career. Now, when you visualize, do you see

yourself in the third person or in the first person? That's a really good question. Like, do you see it through your own eyes? Or are you looking down on Angela? No, I think I see it through my own eyes. It's interesting. That's so weird. I've never been asked that. Well, I've now talked to enough athletes. What if people say? It varies. Like, I actually see it in the third person. Like, when I picture myself playing squash, I see my whole body. Oh, interesting, yeah.

No, I think it's, I'm first person looking through my own eyes, like scanning the... Yeah. Huh. That, to me, seems more effective, but it just varies completely by athlete. It's weird that there's a default that we don't even know we're doing. Yeah, you don't even realize, yeah. And what kind of meditation do you practice and do you still do it? I've got some apps on my phone.

So you stick to that. Yeah, I try. Any kind of breathing technique, doesn't it? Just, you know, focus on the breath. Use a breath. You can meditate anywhere even with a nap. Just think about your breath. I mean, the hardest thing for me is finding quiet time to do it.

I do it a lot when I commute now. I'll throw in my headphones and shut my eyes and try to. I'm on the train in the mornings. Oh, okay, good. Not when I'm driving. Yeah. But it's amazing when I actually do it as a habit. Because, you know, I'll go weak sometimes.

I won't do it. I'll just be too busy or I forget. And when I actually choose to, the rest of my day is so much more, like, so much more present. Like, I'm like, then I see myself in the third person. Yeah. Which is weird. I'll go, I'm in this room right now with Will and we're talking about while I'm having this conversation. I'll remember I'm actually here.

And it's, yeah, it's good. It's just a great. I've, so many athletes. so many successful people I've met, like do it on a regular basis that I'm really trying to to keep to that. I got into Transcendental Meditation maybe four years ago. Has it been crazy? And I've just been addicted to it.

I mean, I have a somewhat addictive personality, but I think it's one of those things that once you start doing, it just seems like a superpower. And another weird thing is that you start to have conversations with people who are successful and you realize everyone meditates and no one talks about it really. It's like everyone's a little secret. code and they like don't want to well i don't know if they don't want to publicize it it's just that it's not something that you meet someone and know they do yeah right there's nothing about yeah i was at uh bridgewater i don't if you've heard of the head yeah ray dalio big yeah i was there a few

years ago working and um and he provided it a class for everyone in the company if you wanted he's obsessed with transcendent meditation yeah yeah and like what you were describing about how things slow down. That's what I found, like, I distinctly remember the period of time right before I started meditating and then right after and how different interactions felt. Like, whereas previously I would be getting angry or happy or sad, like, and not realize it until I was well into the emotion. Whereas I think meditation lets you kind of look at yourself in the third person and be like,

oh, Will's about to get angry. Yeah. Let's see what Will does. Yeah, yeah. You know, and it's almost like this little voice that's testing you. Well, it wakes you up that you're in that conversation. You're thinking this particular way. Yeah, exactly.

Make a conscious decision of which direction you want to go versus just reacting without realizing you're reacting. And I still think in sports today it's probably underutilized. The concepts of meditation and visualization. You might know better than I, but... Yeah, it depends on the team, honestly, and the coach and the organization. It's very cultural. Yeah, for sure.

But the idea that you can learn how to get in the flow, like you can get, you can feel flow without knowing that you're, like, practicing. You could get there so much quicker if you knew what you were doing and how you got there, which is, to me, meditation and mindfulness. Okay, so you retire at age 31, which actually sounds young relative to today's athletes. Yeah, Tom Brady is making me look like a baby, huh? Yeah, but your career also technically started when you were, 15, which is a lot younger than most people's professional career.

16 years is long. Like, do you think you might have played longer in today's environment, or it's a lot of it, maybe you're more emotional than physical? I couldn't agree more. I was still good enough to play. I think I was just mentally tapped out. Yeah. And I, when you're younger, you don't know what you don't know.

When you're older, you know, like, what is required to be. successful. So by my fourth Olympics, I knew the amount of work and the time and dedication and sacrifices I would have to make to compete in Sochi four years later. And I think I had this weird, like, not premonition, but we won the World Championships in 2011. I'm gliding off the ice. And I still thought I was playing through 2014. And I look up and I see a Sierra U.S. flag. Switzerland at the time and I just I felt content I just felt like you're at peace felt totally at peace Swiss flag it's like I was like okay we're back on top I didn't have anything to prove right and I knew the amount of work that would go in and I you know took the

summer off I was training but had to have shoulder surgery so it allowed me to take a little bit of time off the ice and I went back to HBS to one of these classes like to learn about what I always thought I was going to go back to business school and I remember my mind just like blew up and I got so excited to go back to school oh cool and so my motivation on the ice versus off the ice was like completely different at that point so physically yeah to stay at my peak especially as I was getting older it would have I knew what it took and my but my mind wasn't there wasn't I don't think it was willing to do that and business school just seems so much more interesting at that point in my life so in 2005 you joined your brother bill's minor league

men's team uh for one game and you became the first woman to play in a pro men's game not as a goalie what was that like uh it was awesome it was intimidating it was uh it was hockey i mean now you were you were subject to all the same rules obviously as men's kind of and and you would get checked and Oh, it was the same. So how it happened was my, I grew up playing hockey with my brother. Right. He was the goalie. I was, you know, played D. And he goes one year, he's playing minor pro for Tulsa. Hey, Ann, you know, one of our D players got hurt.

You should come up and skate with us. And this was over the holidays, and there was, you know, he had to play on Christmas, and so he wasn't going to be with the family. And I thought, oh, it would be fun. I could spend Christmas with him. get to see him play and I went down there brought my gear and it was honestly it was a joke it was fun it was go skate with my brother the coach at the end of practice said oh you're pretty good like do you actually want to come back and play in a real game so it wasn't planned it was go down and play with

them and just putts around on a practice ice um and so I said yes of course because I hadn't played with my brother in 15 years at least yeah it would be cool oh so cool it was like my childhood you know relived as adults but what I didn't realize it turned into like a media circus where it'd be about you know can women play hockey and the whole um gender thing and and at the end of the day I I I said yes because I what I realized was hockey was hockey and I didn't want to be treated differently I wanted I was put on the calf shield whatever the rules were great um the blue lines were not moving like I knew how to play hockey that was so for me I had to just get over this, you know, fear that people were going to judge women's hockey

based on my performance. And once I did that, and I just realized it's just the sport that I know and love and my brother's out there, and this will be fun. It was awesome. And I actually got a point in that first game. An assist. Yeah, and that was cool. I got a little hockey card now with my half shield from the Tulsa Oilers.

That's awesome. My brother and I think to this day, we're definitely. the only professional brothers sister duo in hockey and i swear i need someone to go do some research if there's any other sport you've got a team to figure that out yeah all right maybe i i'm sure mixed doubles and tennis has a has a sibling pair at some point i don't know for sure but i was trying to think of another sport that you know brother sister could potentially even play together well you know the media circus thing's interesting about um like can women compete with men because i think I think around that time, wasn't that the whole, I think it was Annika Sorenstum or Michelle

Wee were playing in like a men's golf tournament? Yeah, Michelle We had. And then I forget the timing as well, but Danica Patrick, the NASCAR racer, or she was trying to compete in a men's race, right? Yeah, totally. You're right. Yeah, no, and it's interesting because that's not why I was playing. It wasn't to prove something.

It was just to have fun, but that's what got all the attention. And I was proud, honestly, to take that on my shoulders because if it provided some visibility, which it did to young girls, to say, like, you can play whatever sport you love, don't let whatever society's views of you and what's right or wrong to impact your love of whatever sport it is.

Like, you should be a race car driver or a hockey player or a golfer or whatever you love. So I was loved to be, I love that I, have always been able to play that role in ice hockey and and one thing why i love sports is you know you can it transcends so many things right it when i i'll never forget this i came back from the 98 olympics i was 18 and you could ask to go do these motivational talks all over there and one of my friends said can you come talk to my boy scout troop and of course i got asked to do girls scouts or girls hockey schools or or schools in general but to talk to young just boys

I realized right there that these young men would have a woman that they looked up to and they would maybe look at women differently yeah because they saw a hero or they saw a role model in a woman and that would you know maybe some tiny tiny piece play some impact in like how they perceived women and we see that now with female CEOs and and female politicians, and we're still trying to break the glass ceiling in every area. But if I could play a tiny, tiny role in sport, I was like, huh, that's what I want to do. And I'm not going to shy away from it because I'm maybe a little intimidated that I'm going to fall on the opening puck drop, which I didn't. Thank God.

I threw a few hits. The crowd love that. Oh, good. Well, do you feel like women are given a fair shake in sports? Well, we're constantly compared to men, which I don't love, because it's, in some sports like tennis you see now, where that's, we're past that, people can appreciate women's tennis for women's tennis. Right, it doesn't matter that Serena Williams might lose to a not that well-ring. No, you could say, wow, look how dominant she is and look at her style and her sport. Yeah, exactly.

But the thing that I now having sort of an MBA and looking at the business of sports, I get frustrated is we don't talk about women's sports enough and we don't invest enough for women's sports to be successful. So if you're thinking about any company, if you're going to invest and you run out of capital, well then obviously you shut the league down, you shut the company down. In men's sports, we invest year over year over year at a loss until we come out of it. In women's sports, we invest, and then we say, oh, they didn't want it. The crowd didn't like it. But we're not investing in the right things. Maybe we're not investing in the long term, but we're not investing in the infrastructure that's going to actually engage with those fans.

And a local example is two of my teammates actually coach at BC. Cool. You can't get a soda or buy a hot dog during their games. And I think, well, any rational person would rather go to a men's event where you can buy popcorn and hang out with the band and watch hockey versus one that you can't do those things. And so we handicap women's sports in so many ways, again, thinking about sports as a form of entertainment. And so those are the things I get frustrated about now.

I'm like, of course women's sports is failing because we're not investing in it. We're not giving fans the same options. And rational people pick the better option, which is where the investment is going. So I see a future, certainly in women's sports, because of the amount of grassroots participation, the fact that fathers are looking at their sons and daughters saying, well, of course I want my girls to have the same opportunities. Of course I want my girls to play sports, maybe not to be professional athlete, but to learn how to be healthy individuals for life. I mean, really at the end of the day, isn't that what we're trying to do in the sports industry? so I see a push towards getting more girls to play and they'll obviously turn into fans

and there's so many more options for them now to see versions of themselves which makes me happy what are some other female athletes that inspire you well I love what Serena Williams is doing right now she's just crushing it and owning her brand and like dominating on the court and off the court. Bill Eugene King was always a big role model of mine. I was the president of the Women's Sports Foundation for two years and learned about what she did to launch women's professional tennis and stand up for women's rights there. I look at some of the leagues.

I mean, I'm still very bullish on the WMBA. Yeah. They're coming out of like, okay, they're not, maybe they don't need to fill a 10,000-seat arena, but they're figuring out what works for them. And fans are passionate. I mean, if that league has been around a lot of. long time and the NBA is still behind it and um and it's a it's engaging content i think you're right and i think that it's it's i mean it's a hard thing too because there's so much

infrastructure already built around men's sports and so it's a little bit of the rich get richer where you've got the history and you've got the tradition and all these things and the longer that compounds for the same way you're describing with premier leagues it's the same thing it's you have to convince someone that who's going to buy tickets for themselves and their family and their friends to find an alternative option and why would you just why would you go from the NBA to soccer as an example or to a women's league if you don't have that history and I think if you can make it really engaging and different you might have that chance well a good example that I think women's sports has a good chance is that if you look at the Olympics where I feel like at least

personally as a fan, I've always gravitated to men's and women's sports somewhat equally. And I think that the ratings would back that up, right? You see things like women's soccer does really well. You know, we talked about ice hockey. We talked about gymnastics potentially, right? Like those are sports that doesn't really seem to matter if you're watching men or women. Yeah, and the Olympics figured this out a few years ago. I mean, definitely track and field. Yeah, we're almost 50% participation. So they actually put, in full. front of you, almost half men and half women. And NBC, who owns those rights, has actively gone after both men and women. What I love what they do is they take the same content,

sports content, but tell it very differently. It's the stories. It's like you get into the nationalism or you get into that athlete's struggles, you get into that personal appeal. And they actually have more women watching the Olympics than men, which is crazy. If you think about it, ESPN and a lot of other outlets, they're like, oh, we should put more stats. We should do more analytics. Well, because the 18 to 34-year-old male demographic likes stats. And so we're almost pushing women away those consumers in a way. But to me, both are true. Both are right. You can attract both men and women with the same content if you just tell it differently, if you show it differently, if you provide different distribution platforms that they're on, right?

So you can reach all these different demographics if you just take the same content and do something different with it. Now, I have to ask you about this because I thought it was really interesting. You were on NBC's The Apprentice with Donald Trump. I've done that up somewhere, man. Yeah. I've never heard you talk about that experience, Angela. I don't bring it up a lot, you know, the last few years.

Massachusetts isn't the best state to talk about it. Yeah, I got, so I got onto the Apprentice in the 2006 Olympics. NBC, you know, has the rights to the Games. So they got to know you, obviously. So they came up with basically a plan to put an Olympian into the show. This is when it was the regular apprentice. right? It was the sixth season.

And so fans during the Olympics could vote for their favorite Olympic athlete to be a contestant on the apprentice. Angela. And so I was on the ballot. There were like 12, 13 of us. And I got a call for my agent after the Olympics saying, you got the most votes. Do you want to do this? And I thought, what the hell?

I mean, why not? Yeah, why not? Sure, it would be great. And went on. I was on 10 episodes. and almost made it to the end and got a job offer before I got fired officially. Okay.

So you almost, it's like technically winning. Yeah, I went and I met, you know, Mr. Trump and all that and tried to figure out if it would be a good fit and realized. I was going to keep playing. So it wasn't, uh, timing obviously wasn't. Any impressions of Trump at that point that maybe don't get talked about today? Did he was going to run for president? I had no idea.

He was a huge sports fan. I mean, I think some people know that. But he used to own a football team, and he loves athletes. He obviously loves the sports world. So we talk sports a lot more than anything. Oh, cool. Yeah. Yeah, but that's a, yeah, he fired me.

That's all. You got the, you're fired. I got the famous firing, and I'm happy I went back and played the Olympics, for sure. But his Ivanka was actually in Pianchang recently, representing the administration and I had to help host them in Piontang which was interesting what's that experience like

helping to host the the well every Olympics the presidential the president sends a delegation it's usually not the president it's usually like the vice president or someone else okay but I went to high school with Ivanka so I knew her so it was less stressful but

the whole politics I try to stay out of it. It's, you know, I, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the preface was a great experience and I learned, and I learned a lot, honestly, it was fun. Yeah. I just don't trust reality shows now. Anytime I watch reality show, I'm like, they're not telling the full story. Oh, because behind the scenes, there were all sorts of things going on. Yeah, and they pick, you, right? You've got a hundred hours of footage, and you, you, you air maybe 40 minutes of it. Right. So, any given show, you look like a star, or you look like you completely, you were horrible, and so they kind of knew, you kind of knew, you kind of knew how far

you were going to get early on in the you don't you know well you just don't know how you're going to get portrayed are you going to be the villain this season or are you going to be the star are you going to be the like quirky kid or you're going to so that was kind of fun to see like you know because they try to exaggerate

all those things too no one's actually that much of a villain so when I watch these shows now I'm going okay that person probably was taken out of context they're not that crazy so what's it been like recently being a member of the International Olympic Committee,

because you helped L.A. land the Olympics, right? And that's, what, 2028? That was 2028, yeah. So, Boston bid, and I'm on the board of the U.S.O.C. We decided Boston, then Boston basically gave those rights back, and then we gave them to Los Angeles. Because Boston didn't want to do it, right? Yeah, I mean, this is a very common thing happening now,

where cities, you know, democratic cities are having referendums and they're debating the merits of hosting a games, particularly from a financial impact standpoint or, you know, the capital spent on infrastructure. And I think Boston had just had a major snowstorm and people couldn't get to work on the T. And everyone's going, oh, I don't think, how can we even, how can we run an Olympics if we can't get to work? But ironically, like now L.A.'s got it. Yeah. I mean, and the flip side of that is, well, if you can't, you're going to, this will accelerate spending in your public infrastructure and keep it on target, like on a timeline so that you'll get that development quicker for the game. So, you know, two sides of the coin, but LA has it and they're, you know, they already earmarked like $80 billion for their public infrastructure.

I mean, they already had all this stuff in place prior to getting the games. and they successfully won them from the IOC. And my role there was, honestly, I spent eight years on the IOC. I got elected in Vancouver as an athlete rep, and I rose to be on the executive board there. And having the context of the people and the processes and having voted, I actually vote as a member for games. That's cool.

And I'd been on coordination commissions where once a game is awarded, There's basically a seven-year project plan in place that they need representatives from the IFC to sit on as well. So I'd been in the thick of it for the last seven years, and so when I started with L.A., I was trying to help them really understand that context and those nuances as they thought about their plan, what to present, who to talk to, you know, really how to put their best foot forward. Now, is Squash ever going to be in the Olympics? I love Squash, by the way. It's a super international game. It's the glass box that they showed us that they did the worlds in and the fact that you can pop up an arena in the middle of that.

Yeah, they've done it next to the pyramids. The pyramids. I saw that. Oh my God, blew my mind. They just said the tournament of champions in Grand Central. By the way, you need to give me a squash lesson. I would happily give you a squash lesson. I just started playing because I was thinking about what sport do I want to play post-hockey.

And squash is dynamic, right? And you're playing against someone and it's like, the peaks of your heart rate all, it's very like, it's great, hand-eye coordination. So I love squash. I just, but I'm not good at it yet. So, but I don't actually fundamentally understand the process for a sport becoming an Olympic sport. So golf recently became an Olympic sport. We've got some of these legacy sports that, you know, don't actually seem that.

Modern pentathlon, you mean? Well, they don't just, yeah, they don't seem particularly every day, right? Like curling is an Olympic sport. Yeah. So I'll break it down. On the winter side, there's seven sports federations, but there's a bunch of sports. Like skiing has a ton of different disciplines underneath. Sure.

If you're a winter sport, you have to be on ice or snow. So that's why curling is in the Olympics, because we have room to grow. We've only got about 3,500 athletes on the summer side, seven sports or federations. So you can add more sports or disciplines on the, winter side. But the criteria is you have to be snow or ice. Well, what if you put a squash court on top of the, you know, like a snow-like environment? I don't think it'll go. Like outside. So it's not the venue. The sport actually has to be played on snow or ice. Okay. So I misunderstood. So it's much, much easier to get on the winter side. On the summer side, there's an actual cap. And the reason

there's a cap is right now we're at roughly 10,500 athletes. Plus you add 8,000 or 9,000 support staff, and you have to physically build a village that can hold 18, 19,000 people. So that's an incredible burden on a host city to not only build the village, but also provide, be in one location where you have all those different venues. And that's been really what I think has hurt the Olympics over the years is you're building these massive either apartments or sports venues that then, get underutilized after the games what we call white elephants there's no post legacy plan so the olympics has said we're going to cap it and the sports and the federations have to jockey for position on who's on the Olympic platform and who isn't so it's really hard to get on the platform because you have to basically push someone off and that's really hard to do given that the iFC is really a political

body with sports i mean there's it there's a 205 national olympic committees and you know, dozens of federations from all of the world trying to stay on. So, one, it's just a physical, like, we can't add more people. So that's why it's hard to get on. Two, you have to upend someone that, like wrestling, they almost got pushed off because they were very archaic in some of their governance, and they fixed that very quickly because they knew they were at risk. But e-sports, right?

Everyone's looking at e-sports and saying that should be on the Olympic platform. Oh, interesting. because of the appeal to youth, and we've got to stay relevant if we're... So do you think that'll happen? Not today, but they're studying it very, very closely because they're going, why are people moving away from traditional sports to e-sports? And if so, we need to understand if this is something we should incorporate or not. I mean, obviously having violent video games is against the Olympic ideals.

But Squash is... I am a huge advocate for it because you're not really adding that many players because of individual sport, team sport. You're not building a lot. You can pop up one of these squash courts in the middle of anywhere. But it's honestly, what's your strategy then to take another sport off of the platform? And you're not going to do that, but you have to be so compelling that they're willing to take one off. So you could be like surfing and sport climbing.

There's a few sports that are on temporarily from games. to games. Kind of to test them. To test them, and maybe the local region loves it. Tokyo, Japan, loves baseball and softball, so they're both on. And those are team sports. They're big, a lot of numbers. But they already had baseball and softball stadiums, so they don't have to build a lot.

So they basically vied to say, we want baseball and softball on the platform because the public loves these two sports. And the IFC said that's fine. But it doesn't guarantee it's going to be on in 2024. Well, it's fascinating all the people I can imagine you've worked with and interacted with through this program. Yeah, I had to learn the whole customs of, you know, when you meet someone, is it a kiss on one cheek or two cheeks?

Is it a handshake? Is it a hug? Because I'm dealing with, you know, the Prince of Monaco and the Princess Anne of England and these, literally you're the king of Greece. I mean, there's... What's the most ridiculous person you find yourself? in a room with, and you kind of had to pinch yourself. Probably Prince Albert of Monaco, and he was a five-time Olympian.

Like, he's one of us, but I'm always like, I went to his wedding. I'm like, oh my God, you were literally the prince of Monaco, and I'm just chumming up with you, like, hey, Albert, how's it gone? I'm going, where am I right now? It's incredibly intimidating, but also have been an amazing life experience for me, you know, getting to go to the UN and present there or fly over the world. and see how sport is done differently. And that honestly helped lead me to my company today

of getting this global perspective of things are done differently all over the world, and people are trying to get better and improve on the court as well as off the court. And what does that look like? Well, it's a great transition because I would love to ask you more about the sports innovation lab, and I'm excited now that we get to do a little bit of work together too. Yeah, me too.

Yeah, we're a market intelligence company for the sports technology community. And I can't think of a better person, by the way, to start that company. No, I'm excited. I see the power of technology and how it's both helping athletes but also helping the business of sports get better. And technology is improving venues. It's changing the way sponsors engage with brands and fans. It's completely changing the way that you have. engage with content, if you're talking about it from a media perspective. Obviously, WOOP

and others are helping athletes get better through data and technology. Now you talk about betting, right? Sports betting. You talk about blockchain. Changes the landscape. So we're sitting at the middle of that market, really trying to objectively analyze it and provide advice and insights for our clients. And we do that through our software, which is our main, you know, bread and butter, it allows us to digest lots of information, but also services to help our clients take that information and, you know, really make actual insights from it. So I'm, I love it because one, I get to stay in sports, the industry that I love has changed my life forever, and then I've been able to get this like great global perspective on. And then

two, the fact that I'm in a space that's so dynamic right now, the technology space, And there's so many amazing providers out there that I want the demand side of the market. I want the teams and leagues and the federations to adopt, but they just don't get it in some cases. They don't understand it. And so to be a trusted resource is really what we're vying to do is to be out there helping them make these better decisions and move forward and lean into adoption of the tech that's, you know, changing everything. Well, one thing that I've been really excited about, about, you know, your business and what you're doing is that you're now going to help really explain what a lot of these different companies or even products do. You know, especially for WOOP, which sits in this world of wearable technology, quantified self, you know, I think there's a lot of snake oil out there or there's even this perception that there's so many devices and da-da-da-da-da. But in reality, athletes actually aren't wearing that many things.

So I think the power that you have for Woop, and I'm sure. sure you're doing this in all these other verticals is to explain, hey, this is what this is what this company actually does. And even though there's other names out there, this is what's being used, this is what actually isn't being used, this is what's validated, this isn't what's validated, right? Some of that, I think, to have, you know, just stakes in the ground and come from a trusted resource, obviously you and your colleagues, I think it's quite valuable for the market. Yeah, thank you.

Yeah, we're excited because, again, we find solutions on the market. that should be adopted. And a lot of times it's the, you know, the onus is on the CEO, the onus is on the company to explain what they do to an audience that can't differentiate the competitors. So they might make a poor decision or in some cases it might be, the decision might be driven by sponsor dollars and you're left with a subpar solution.

And so we're trying to suss out the snake oil, right? like this solution is not what they say they do. Do not trust. Versus this solution is fantastic. And, you know, if a company comes to us and is looking to understand, say, the wearable market, to have our grasp on that space and to be able to say, here's what exists, here's what they do, here's so you can trust, and to have data to support that. So our analysts obviously do a bit of this.

But to be able to objectively do it is really that. the end game here because I want companies look if if whoop is changing the game and there's companies like yours that are actually materially helping performance we want those companies to succeed we want yeah I appreciate that right it's like to me if if marketing or you know hey I know a guy like the old way of doing business like succeeds then ultimately the athletes lose out the fans lose out and sport at the end will lose out so to try to sit in the middle of that market and help explain it, which is a very, I mean, look, I was on the other side. I was on all these boards and I'm making these decisions as a business person without really

understanding the tech underneath it. I mean, it drove me to help, you know, co-found this with my co-founder, Josh Walker, who worked at Forrester Research. Perfect. People that know Forrester, Gartner, they go, oh, yeah, the Magic Quadron every year. We point to that to say, or the Forrester Wave, look, we're vetted by these big companies. And sport doesn't have that. So we're looking for that.

Can we be that validator so that, again, the market moves efficiently and adopts the right products. So keep up the great work. I mean, we love what you guys are doing. And every athlete that's able to learn more about themselves and trust the data that's coming off of your product are only going to be better athletes at the end of the day. Well, I appreciate that. And I'm excited because I just joined the athlete data leadership board that you put together as the sports innovation lab. Talk a little bit about what the vision is for our board and what we're working on. Yeah, I'm excited.

And this was just announced a few weeks ago. So we launched what we call leadership boards, and the first of them are in the athlete data space. And through years of research, what we did is try to identify the most pressing problem. that these different leaders were facing. And in your case, and in this market's case, the idea of, like, who owns the athlete data, what are the standards that we should all agree upon? Where are the different outlets that could test the speeds and feeds and the hardware that we trust? What we found is if you can get a group of, you know, roughly 15 leaders in the market

from different points with different perspectives to talk about one of these, you know, these pressing problems, we would facilitate the conversation, do the background research, and help produce the output that the leaders decide on. So, Athlete Data Leadership Board, I'm excited. We have, you know, yourself, we've got the NFL, we've got UFC, we've got MGM, which is a betting platform. Yeah, I thought that was a cool representation. You were going, huh, why are they on there?

We'll get into that. from a fan engagement perspective, we've got Kinduct, we've got all these groups that are really trying to accelerate data, but we need common standards. We need common terminology. We need some things that we can all agree upon rather than what we saw, which is everyone was trying to do in a silo. So yeah, the MBA's got a group and FIFA's got a group and everyone has their own group that they're spending money on trying to decide. But at the end of the day, you have to build a product that meets the requirements of all these different stakeholders. So we're trying to, again, through leadership like yourself and through these board members, bring that

perspective and produce something that will ultimately drive where this industry heads in the future. So I'm really excited. Again, we're doing this across all of our coverage area, smart venue, and immersive media and all the topics that we cover as a company. I'm just like, what are the pressing questions that we can solve through research, and that's really what we're tackling? Well, it's a compliment to you, obviously, that you got all these stakeholders in a room together because otherwise I think a lot of us may not ever, you know, necessarily interact with one another in that kind of a setting.

And, you know, I'm excited to be part of it because I think the – there's a lot of conversations that are happening one-on-one that may not actually address the larger issues. So, for example, one hope that I have with Whoop is that over time, we will have individual professional athletes data broadcasted, right? Like, I haven't kept this a secret. This is something I want to do, right? How do you empower a professional athlete to broadcast things about his recovery and his sleep before game that then has implications for the fan experience or has implications for the commentators talking about that game or has implications for gambling, right? And then if you think about it, well, okay, who are all the key stakeholders in what I just described? You've got the players and the teams, right?

Because they've got a skin in the game if this data is being public. You've got potentially the broadcasters or the fans who are engaging with that information. You've got gambling institutions. You've got leagues and players associations who need to be comfortable with what's out there. So there's a lot of different – my point is it's a super dynamic space that you're trying to create from the ground up when you say something like, oh, I want athlete data on television, right? There's just, all of a sudden, you just hit 10 different groups right across the face. Very complicated.

So, you know, for me, I think it's interesting to be in that kind of a dynamic setting where you hear from the guy from MGM and you hear from the NFL and you hear from the NFL PA who we're partners with it. And it's like, okay, well, if I could get these three guys in a room, maybe there's a deal there. Yep. Yeah, and that's the biggest, I think, aha for us is leadership boards exist in other industries. They're called Corporate Executive Board.

And the idea that, you know, you might be going to conferences around data and performance, you know, the MGMs are going to something around betting and the NFL's going to league types of conferences. But it changes the game when you can actually come to the same room in a dynamic way and talk about the things that at the end of the day you all have to agree on. So I'm glad you're already, you know, seeing that and getting, you know, benefits from that. but the, you know, it's, we'll be working hard this year, believe me, to produce something. But at the end of the day, isn't, you know, if you're going to, it takes the whole industry to agree, I think, for movement, actual changes to happen. And in this case, I really think we'll produce something that will be significant and hopefully move that needle forward. Well, I'm excited to be a tiny part of it. And I think what you're doing at the Sports Innovation Lab is really noble.

Thank you. And hopefully we'll move sports forwards, too, because if there isn't this kind of information out there, it just makes it harder for athletes to adopt products. Yeah, and the intelligence is everything to me. It's not just an opinion. You know, I don't want, Angela thinks this, therefore, it's, no, this is what the market's doing. If we can study the market, study trends in consumers, right, study what's happening and make sure that the sports industry understands those trends, understands that dynamic.

shift that's occurring. And then we provide the solutions that will actually help counter, you know, the challenges that they may be facing. Media and was one great example. If we're, you know, Netflix announced, I think I mentioned this a couple days ago, their biggest competitor, named competitors, Fortnite. I know. Like, what? So if you think about that, sports, which has been in a silo for so long, without real competitive pressures, is now up against Fortnite. Is, up against, you know, Netflix, is not competing with and against other sports teams,

but against other entertainment forms. If we don't evolve and change and adopt through tech, we will lose out. Kids will lose out. You know, the next generation fan will not be there. And that's the thing that I love about what we're doing is we're trying to help the athletes, obviously, become better versions of themselves through technology, but also help the people that are leading these massive businesses. and massive, you know, properties to adopt the right solutions because there's so many of them.

I mean, we've got over 5,000 that we've tracked. And, you know, but there's a lot of snake oil, too, to your point. Like, how do we make sure they're not, you know, biting off the wrong, you know, paying a lot of money for something that ultimately will break? Well, I think your point about, you know, sports as an entertainment industry, competing against all these different things is so important. because, you know, time is undefeated. If you're on top, eventually you're not, right? Like, we've learned that. So why is it that all these sports are going to be on top forever?

Right? Like, I actually think that we will start to see a decline in the performance of some of the major sports leagues that we consider wholly. And personally, I would be nervous buying a sports team today in some of the major sports arenas. you know, maybe the exception in my mind would be the NBA because I think that the personal brands that NBA players are able to build because they're not wearing helmets and there's only five guys on the floor, that can help skyrocket the valuation of the teams. But, you know, if you think about some of the other leagues,

like what are they going to do to innovate and keep up when the younger generation is maybe first interacting with their sport by playing the video game of their sport? and then what's to say they're not going to just watch two other people play the video game of that sport versus watch the actual sport or even a simulation of the video game, just a pure simulation, right? Yeah, and we're seeing that. That's why everyone's scratching their heads over e-sports. E-sports is a juggernaut.

They're engaging with fans. They are 100% that, you know, if you go on a Twitch, the platform Twitch, it's a social platform, you're interacting with others, you're engaged with the content. Yeah, you're watching other people play video games, but that's what we do in our living rooms. We watch people play a sport, so it's not that crazy when you think about it. But the actual medium that they're engaging people

is completely different than traditional sports. It's a tech platform that gives you agency that allows you to hang out with your friends. So if you're playing Fortnite or your... So we look at it from that perspective, like what are they doing well, and how could traditional sports stay relevant? So your vision of taking whoop data and broadcasting it, you know, in real time for fans to see to then have that social,

hey, well, look at that, look at that, look at his or her art rate is crazy. Or they didn't, I didn't get it. Yeah, there's run down there are peaking. But that's, to me, the next generation of what fans expect. They expect to see more, interact more, and why I'm really excited about sports betting, because I think it's, again, another way that we're going to get younger, not younger, but people to engage with the content that might, today they view it as stale.

They view it as passive. They view it as something that's on the background, and they're here to hang out and drink and have nachos versus actually caring about the content that's on the screen. So, yeah, what we're doing is hopefully trying to shed some light into that future of entertainment and how to sport. stay up to par with all the changing fan expectations around entertainment. And that's tech.

So for people who are listening who are interested in these types of topics or even interested in performance, like what kinds of things do you read or engage with that you feel like are good sources of what's next or, you know, just generally speaking. Yeah, well, we aggregate hundreds of sources, so I'm reading our feet all the time because it's all synthesized. Well, first of all, how can people find the Sports Innovation Lab or engage with you guys? Yeah, just we've, you know, sportsylab.com and send us a note, and we're a B2B solutions, so we don't service, we love consumers that nerd out over this stuff with us,

and we'll talk to you on Twitter for sure, but we're a B2B solution, so if you've got a technology or you've got a product in the sports tech landscape, certainly we want to be aware of you and track you and make sure we're talking accurately about you. That's our job. but yeah the sources I bring in I mean I'm always trying to read obviously sports sources technology journals I look at funding news a lot too because you know if you're raising capital you're growing or you're those are the companies that they're going to be making moves in the future so I'll look at you know like crunch base or pitch book one of these things So there are different types of sources that I'm always trying to stand up.

But I'm busy just like you. You're running around. How do you keep your finger on the pulse? What we're trying to do is make you read less. Like tell us the things that you care about. So you don't have to filter through it on your own. Yeah, totally. That's really my goal is to, like, give time back.

Because I, myself, try to stand top of the things. And I'm very lucky. We've got internal analysts on Fridays. We'll tell us a download of what happened that week. and we'll have, you know, it's like the TMZ sit in the same room and, you know, and talk about the big moves in the market and the major announcements and what people are doing. And I learned so much from my team. So I'm grateful that I have a group that's like constantly looking at what's happening

and then spoon-feeding me what I need to know. Now, you're someone who's always traveled a lot, both as an athlete and as a businesswoman. What kind of tricks do you have for our audience on how to beat travel, beat jet lag? Is there anything that you do? Move your watch forward as quickly as possible. Even before you leave on your trip, like if I'm about to go to Europe, I might go to bed earlier and get up earlier the week before because I know I'm going to...

Try to get on the time zone as soon as possible. As soon as you can, I mean, before you leave is even better, but certainly as soon as you get on the plane. Try to eat and sleep accordingly. Exercise is really helpful. I agree. Particularly if you're for jet lag, again, it might, if you're exhausted and you want to take a nap, but you shouldn't because it's four in the afternoon and like go for a run and then try to stay up as long as you can.

It's hard on business, but don't drink as much. Yeah, right. In Switzerland, I went to all the time with the I.C. There was great wine there, but I was trying to limit it. Because, again, it's all about trying to get what you're doing is track your recovery, and it's so much harder to recover when you've got booze in your system. Well, alcohol is like a reoccurring theme of just bad, according to whoop data. It's a sad thing, unfortunately.

Yeah. And it's hard in business. At least in sports, you can justify it. It's like, yep, I've got to cut that out. Yeah. If you're wearing a whoop and you're required to have a drink for work. But you've got a big presentation the next day. again, you just have to be aware of the trade-off you're making.

Yeah, right. No, and I mean, I try, once in a while I'll take, like, melatonin as a sleep aide when I'm on a long flight to Asia or something to make sure I sleep on the flight over. Yeah, that's probably my favorite sleep supplement, I would say. Melatonin? Yeah, because it's not super addictive, and it's not, it doesn't have the same impact as, like, an ambient or, like, a true sleeping pill. It's not going to, like, totally rewire your sleep. I made that mistake once. I took an ambient going to Europe, and the flight wasn't long enough.

Oh, no. I got. They land. I'm like, no, I can barely keep my eyes open. It was right in the thick of it. It was the worst. That sounds like a horrible experience. Yeah.

Well, where can people find you if they're interested in engaging with you? LinkedIn's probably the best place. I'm on there all the time or Twitter or. At Angela Ruggiero is my Twitter Twitter channel and send us a note through sportsylab.com. And yeah, if you're interested in what we're doing, I speak a bit.

I'm always trying to get the good word out on what's happening in the sports tech community. But, no, we're happy to have me today. I'm really excited that I was able to talk about sports and tech and performance with you. And I want to tell you, Will, I am so proud of you. Oh, thank you. Because I remember the meeting we had when you first had this idea, and it was, what, seven years ago now?

Yeah, it's been a while. And you were so passionate about it, and you took your experience as a student athlete, and really wanting to help people. I think that's what I saw. It's like, you got this idea, and you made it happen. And being an entrepreneur myself, it's hard to build a company. It's hard to, you know, get the right people and build the right culture and, you know, stay true to your vision. and so congrats on what you're doing. It's really fun to see your success.

Oh, well, thank you so much, Angela. And it's really a pleasure getting to interact with you in this space. And I wish you nothing but the best success as well. Awesome. Thank you. Thanks. I want to thank Angela again for being my guest today. She's truly had an amazing career,

both on the ice and off, and I am thrilled to be part of the Athlete Data Leadership Board alongside her. If you're not already a member, you can join the whoop community now for as low as $18 a month. We'll provide you with 24-7 access to your biometric data as well as analytics across strain, sleep, recovery, and more. The membership comes with a free whoop strap 2.0.

And for listening to this podcast, folks, if you enter the code, Will Ahmed, that's W-I-L-L-A-H-M-E-D at checkout, we'll give you $30 off. Thank you for listening. Put $30 on my tab. get that free month, and hopefully you enjoy Whoop. For our European customers, the code is Will Ahmed E.U. Just tag EU on the end of my name, and that'll get you 30 euros off when you join. Check out whoop.com slash the locker for show notes and more, including links to relevant topics from our conversation.

You can subscribe, rate and review the Whoop podcast on iTunes, Google, Spotify, or wherever you've found this podcast. We'd love to hear your feedback. you can find me online at Will Ahmed and follow at Whoop on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook. You can also email The Locker at Whoop.com with any thoughts, ideas, or suggestions. For our current members, we've got a lot of new gear in the Whoop store. I suggest you check that out. It includes 612 and 18-month gift cards, help you save over time. We've got new bands, new colors, new textures.

Visit whoop.com for more. Thank you again for listening to. to the WOOP podcast. We'll see you next week.