WHOOP Podcast - How 3x Olympic Gold Medalist Aly Raisman is Redefining Recovery and Resilience

Episode Date: November 12, 2025

This week on the WHOOP Podcast, WHOOP Founder and CEO, Will Ahmed, sits down with 3x Olympic Gold Medalist, Aly Raisman to discuss the ins and outs of Aly’s gymnastics career. Aly opens up about her experience training, the intense pressures of elite competition, and how it took a toll on her body. Through her experience with burnout and anxiety, Aly shares the lessons she’s learned about recovery, self-care and taking care of her body and mind. Will and Aly go through Aly’s top WHOOP journal behaviors that help her feel recovered, such as gardening, learning, and time spent with loved ones. This episode offers inspiring insight on resilience, balance, and the importance of listening to your body to support your overall health. Show Notes:  (00:54) Aly Raisman on Growing Up in Boston(02:10) Aly’s Introduction to Gymnastics(03:14) Choosing Gymnastics At A Young Age: Training and Technique(05:23) Drive As The Fuel For Greatness(07:29) Building A Support System & Navigating Perfectionism(11:20) Self-Motivation & Pushing Yourself To Be The Best(14:28) Healthy vs Unhealthy Aspects of Being an Olympic Athlete(20:31) Recovery in Olympic-Level Sport(27:12) Nutrition and Body Image in Elite Gymnastics(34:47) How Aly is Redefining Recovery(42:57) Mental Health Advocacy & Awareness(47:41) Aly’s Toolkit To Protecting Mental Health(50:18) Finding Purpose and Fulfillment (56:42) Sleep Metrics and Habits to Help Recover(01:01:29) How Aly Uses WHOOP: The Mental & Physical Health BenefitsFollow Aly Raisman:InstagramXFacebookSupport the showFollow WHOOP: Sign up for WHOOP Advanced Labs Trial WHOOP for Free www.whoop.com Instagram TikTok YouTube X Facebook LinkedIn Follow Will Ahmed: Instagram X LinkedIn Follow Kristen Holmes: Instagram LinkedIn Follow Emily Capodilupo: LinkedIn

If you don't pick a day to rest, your body will pick it for you. I feel like I've ignored my body for so long that it has just completely picked all the days for me of needing to rest because it just took so much out of me. It's also, I think, very unnatural to have that much pressure on you. And, you know, when you think about the Olympic Games, it's a completely different environment. If I could go back and I could change something, I wish that I felt better during that process. I wish that every day wasn't such a struggle of just feeling good. And it's honestly something I still struggle with today. I used to train every other day for about seven hours.

I still don't feel my body is fully recovered. And most of the time throughout my career was six days a week. But before the 2016 Olympics, sometimes was seven days. So in my experience, there wasn't enough emphasis on recovery. Allie, welcome to the Woof podcast. Thank you. I was so excited to be here. I've wanted to do this for a long time.

I mean, I think you have an amazing story, an inspiring story. You're from Nita, Massachusetts. Yes, well, thank you. That's so nice of you. And I think you have an incredible story, too, and just have so much respect and admiration for what you've built here. And obviously, love that you are a Boston-based company. Yeah, that's right.

I mean, I've been here now for, like, 15 years, which is kind of crazy to say. You obviously grew up in Nita, Massachusetts. Yes. You started training as a young girl pretty much right out of the gates. Yeah, so my mom did high school gymnastics. She was always a fan. I'm the oldest of four kids.

So my parents, I was very lucky. They kind of put me in a bunch of different sports. And I started gymnastics when I was two with mommy and me classes. But I did tennis, ice skating, soccer, t-ball, basketball. My dad coached me in t-ball and basketball, and I loved it. he coached me in soccer too. So now that I'm older, I just appreciate so much that he did that for me because it was so nice to have that fun quality time. But gymnastics was my favorite and I was just so in love with it and obsessed with it. My observation is that it seems

like specialization for youth sports is happening earlier and earlier. However, gymnastics feels like it's always been, if you're a gymnast, you started essentially right out of the womb. It's interesting. I have some teammates, I think, that started when they were maybe six, which is so funny to think about because that feels late. Yes, but it's not, but it's totally not. And I think that you're really never too late to start, but I did start so young at two years old. But of course, when I was two, I mean, my mom was just picking me up and holding me and helping me, you know, walk around. But I just, I loved it so much. It was my favorite place to be. And when I was eight years old, I did soccer and gymnastics. And I remember at the time, my coach said, if you want to go to the next level, you have to stop soccer and just do gymnastics. And that's very young for eight years old.

But I just made the decision on my own. And to my parents' credit, they just let me decide what I wanted to do. And then I kind of never looked back. And it was something that I just dedicated so much of my time, physically and mental. emotionally too. And I look back now when I see eight-year-olds and it's so young to be making that big of a decision. But at the time, I just loved it so much that it was a no-brainer for me. And I just, I don't know. Yeah, but I did love soccer too. It just, I was obsessed with gymnastics. And again, I mean, eight years feels so young to have to say, okay, I'm picking this

one sport over others. Is some of that have to do with like the body type you need to develop as a gymnast? Is soccer almost going to, you know, make you develop the wrong muscles or that sort of thing? Or is it more that you just needed to spend that much time on one thing? Gymnastics is such a hard sport and soccer is such a hard sport too. It's just for gymnastics because I have more of the expertise in that I can explain it better is that there's four events. So it almost sometimes can feel like you're doing four different sports. And I actually think a fifth sport because you're also working. working on the dance element of it, but also the conditioning element of it, too. So from a young age, I was doing anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour and a half of just

strength and conditioning. And that didn't even include the amount of time I would spend on bars, beam, floor, and ball. And then sometimes there would be a fifth rotation of doing dance or kind of ballet stuff. So it just requires so much of your time. And it's funny when I was playing soccer, the way that I would kick the ball, my gymnastics coaches felt like I brought that habit into gymnastics and felt like I was doing stuff with flex feet. So I would kind of joke around that they didn't like that I was playing soccer because

gymnastics is so specific. You're trying to be on relevee with pointed toes. And so when you do soccer, it's a totally different way that you're kicking the ball versus, you know, on Releve doing a kick in the air with your leg straight and toes pointed. So my coaches didn't like the habits I was picking up from soccer as well. Now, as an eight-year-old, can you already tell that someone's really good? I think so, but I always like to share this story when I'm with kids or parents or anyone who looks after kids because I think it's important that people know that it's not always where you start.

my coaches would always say they would rather have the hardest worker rather than the most talented kid in the room. And to them, they didn't always think I was the most talented because they felt that if you were, if you had a group of eight-year-olds, I don't think someone would have picked me out and said, that's going to be the one that's going to go to the Olympics. But if you were doing it based off of who loves it the most and who is the hardest worker, maybe somebody would have picked me because I, just was so driven and I actually used to get bullied when I was younger because I would always ask the coaches for feedback and it would annoy the other people in my group because I would want the coaches to watch me and give me feedback and sometimes it would annoy the girls that were older than me because I thought it was annoying that I was talking too much. But it just shows I think how much I was obsessed with getting better and growing. But when I was six years

old, I was trying to get my round-off back handspring. I was in a pre-team, which is a level before level four. It was years ago. They've changed it now. But level four at the time was the first level that I could start competing at. And so I was trying to get my round-up back handspring. I couldn't get it. My whole entire group got to move up to the next level, except for me. And my mom told me that I was special, that I got to repeat it again. She didn't tell me it was because I was literally the worst one in the class. But I always like to share that story with kids because my worst event was floor,

and then it ended up being my biggest strength when I got older. So... Want a gold medal. Yes. Yeah. So it became my favorite event, but I guess you wouldn't have picked me. Certainly wouldn't have picked me as the best when I was younger.

Where did your parents fit in from a support system standpoint? My parents, I am so appreciative. that they never pushed me, and I genuinely mean that. It's funny because there's a video of them in 2012 that went viral of them in the stands, and they're so nervous, and they do look like they are the crazy stage parents that put a lot of pressure on their kid, but they were so nervous because they love me and they care about me. They know how much I put into it, and I can't even imagine watching someone you love compete on a four-inch-wide beam. It's so stressful. I can't even imagine, but they, I don't know what I would have done if they weren't there for me

because I already put so much pressure on myself. I got enough pressure from my coaches and being on the national team and also the pressure of competing at the Olympics or World Championships. And I knew that if I didn't do as well, my parents would be the first ones to support me. And I remember at 2015 World Championships, I had the worst competition of my career and I just remember after the meet, my parents were there hugging me and I was crying to them and they were so supportive and it just would have gutted me even more if they were disappointed in me. I just already put enough pressure on myself and that's why sometimes when I see parents or any coaches or anyone that is putting pressure on kids, there's already

so much pressure on kids and youth sports is so competitive. I think people have to trust that the kid is already putting enough on themselves. And sometimes you just need a hug and someone to support you and remind you that there's more important things in life than being the best athlete. And how you learn and how you grow is by sometimes making mistakes. That's part of it. And, you know, there's no athlete in the world, no matter how good you are and how much you prepare that doesn't have off days. We all have them. So I wouldn't have survived in the sport if my parents weren't there for me.

And if I went home from practice and they were grilling me about how many routines did I stick or how many skills did I mess up, I would have never made it. I think my parents made it very clear from a young age. First of all, if I wasn't a good person, then that was unacceptable. It was way more important. They would always tell me, people will remember you for the kind of person you are. rather than what place you are on the podium. And I remember when I was competing in the 2016 Olympics, that actually is what I thought about before I competed.

And it really calms me down. Before I went up on every event, I would say, people will remember me for the kind of person I am rather than what place I get on the podium or what score. Because people now will forget how many medals I have or what score I got, and I'm totally fine with that. But I want people to remember me for being a good teammate and a good friend. And I'm so glad my parents taught me that because it's hard not to wrap my whole

entire worth into my results, which I did for a long time when I was competing. So even though your parents had this, it sounds like amazing support system for you and very balanced support system for what it's worth, which by the way is, it's not necessarily common of athletes who reach your pinnacle, so to speak. I mean, there's famous examples of Tiger Woods's father and Andre Agassiz's father and Serena Williams and Venus Williams father and and there's just like long list of of parents that were overbearing and intense but the outcome was like a you know a prodigy of their sport and and it sounds like your parents had had a very different balance but it also sounds like you drove yourself a little bit crazy too and you had that that bar for yourself which is if

I don't win I'm not good enough I was so hard on myself and what age are we talking about talking about now? I would, for as long as I can remember, I think, I can remember maybe around eight years old, seven years old. I was very hard on myself and I remember if I didn't do well at a competition. It was almost this, you know, I don't know if it was maybe OCD, but I had a hard time leaving the gym on a note that in my mind wasn't perfect, which there's no such thing as perfect, but I can remember begging my dad and my coach to let me stay to keep practicing.

And I remember my coach when I was younger said, you have to stop trying to stay later. You've already been here for two hours. I think I was somewhere between six, seven, eight at the time, and he said, you're going to get burnt out. You can come back tomorrow or the day after whenever I'd practice next. But I just had such a hard time leaving the gym if I didn't finish my last skill or my last routine up to how I thought was sort of what I wanted it to be. And you have an off day. Some days you just feel your balance is more off than other days or you don't sleep as well. You're tired. And I look back and I don't know how I balanced it with school.

And that was another thing was my parents were always prioritized making sure that when I came home from school, I did my school work, did as much as I could before practice, and then finished it after. And my coaches always emphasized that as well. But I don't know how I just kind of didn't stop. And that was my priority. But as I got older, I got harder on myself. And I also got superstitious because I felt, okay.

well, I had a good practice today or a good competition. What exactly did I do? I had this money hair elastics in my hair. I wore this color leotard. I ate this food and I was very particular about what I did. And I think it became unhealthy because when I'm in the comfort of my home, maybe I can do that stuff, but it's still not, it's not mentally relaxing to have to do all of those things. If you forget something, it's stressful. But if you're in a foreign country, I didn't have the control of having all of those variables. So it was a very interesting thing to navigate, and especially at a time we weren't talking about mental health

or maybe OCD among athletes or not defining your worth by your success or your losses. So it was something I kind of tried to figure out, but I didn't have the tools to navigate that. Our best sale of the year is right around the corner. be on the lookout for offers you will not want to miss. Do you think there's an element of being an Olympian that just by default is unhealthy? There's a certain insane rigor that has to go into being the best at anything, period. And then on top of that, you amplify it by saying it's one day of four years.

You know, in a lot of other sports, you're trying to be the best week over week, and you know, you've got all these check-in points. whether it's a football game or a golf tournament or whatever. But like the Olympics happens every four years. And so you have that obsession, that drive just to get yourself, you know, in the competition. But then the competition itself is such a singular moment. To me, it just makes for the environment of a lack of balance, stress, you know, fill in the blank level of anxiety. Yeah, I completely agree.

It's really interesting because I think about this so much is knowing what I know now. So the L.A. Olympics are a couple years away. Obviously, that would be the most magical experience to be able to compete at an Olympics at home. I just, I can't wait to watch and I can't imagine how special that must be as an athlete to represent your country. country in an Olympics at home is just hard to even imagine what that would be like. And so many people have asked me, are you going to come back? Even if I wanted to, I just, my body could not do it. I'm so, you asked about it being unhealthy. Yes. And I agree. I think it's at least the way that I did it, I think there's a better way to do it, but the way that I did it where I just pushed myself so

much. And I saw this quote years ago that said, if you don't pick a day to rest, your body will pick it for you. And I feel like I've ignored my body for so long that it has just completely picked all the days for me of needing to rest because it just took so much out of me. It's also, I think, very unnatural to have that much pressure on you. And, you know, when you think about the Olympic Games, it's a completely different environment, no matter how much I prepare myself, whether I try to somehow emulate the environment, I just couldn't. You know, if I'm in the comfort of my gym, I trained in Burlington Mass. And if I was in the gym by myself and I was on beam and we tried to make it quiet, what if there's a fan, you know, that's screaming something and

it startles me in the middle of my routine or at home, I don't have the cameras in my face. And something I remember very distinctly is at the Olympics, you can hear the clicking of the camera, at least I could, when I was competing, which is so, it is so quiet. Sometimes in the arena, I can hear the clicking of the camera. And sometimes when you're competing, there's a camera running with you on vault by your feet. And so imagine you're running. trippy too. Yeah, you're running towards the vault table on the runway and there's a camera going with you and you're not, I'm not used to that at all at my gym at home. It's not something

I experience in most competitions. It's very unusual. Yes, or maybe a world championships. I don't think they have that at U.S. gymnastics championships that I can recall, but there's so many other factors that you don't even know to prepare for until you're there. And then I remember London Olympics. I tried so hard to tell myself it was just another ordinary day, but everywhere you look, there's the Olympic rings everywhere. And so it's just so emotional too. You realize I've been training for this my entire life and then it's here. And so I think that amount of pressure and build up into something is so overwhelming and hard to process. And then, of course, if I've had experiences where I did better than expected, but also didn't do as well as expected,

in the pressure of social media and the amount of people's opinions, even if, you know, I tried to ignore it, you still feel it. You feel the weight. And of course, people watch the gymnastics expecting us to win. So that adds so much pressure. And then I used to train every other day for about seven hours. And it's funny, sometimes when I say that to people, they say, oh, that's not bad. And I still haven't. I still don't feel my body is fully recovered. And most of the time throughout my career was six days a week, but before the 2016 Olympics, sometimes was seven days. So I don't feel that in my experience, there wasn't enough emphasis on recovery at all. So it was, it was very unhealthy. Plus, I was very strict with what I was eating, everything I was putting into my body. And

I didn't know how to feel my body the proper way. And I have always felt like I've never figured out how to eat properly to make myself feel good. And I'm actually still trying to figure it out. Now I started to see a new nutritionist, but that's something I've always struggled with is how to eat the right way to fuel myself. That feels good. And I think people assume that because we're at that Olympic level, we have access to all of that stuff. But because we all train individually, I don't know how it is right now, but when I was competing, we kind of all had to figure it out on our own. Yeah. And, you know, that's also very expensive for the athletes and their families and all that. So it's really hard to find, because you could see 10 nutritionists

and they might all tell you different things or different therapists might tell you different stuff. So it was very hard to navigate. I'm still, I guess, working through all that now. Well, one thing I appreciate so much about your story is the vulnerability with which you talk about it. I mean, just to underscore it, you're describing in great detail how hard it was. And yet, at the same time, you know, you're one of the highest ranking medalists of all time for U.S. gymnasts in terms of your success at the Olympics and in your whole career. So you've reached this pinnacle, but in listening to you talk about it, you know, you make it sound like very little came easy. And I think there's something important for people to hear

about that, you know, whether they have aspirations to be a serious athlete or whether they're trying to accomplish anything in their life is that what I've gotten to enjoy about doing these podcasts and getting to meet, you know, world-class performers like yourself is that you see how much work it is and how hard it is. It's very rare that someone who's super successful in their field it comes super easy to them. In fact, it's all the hard work that makes it look easy. I would never have known that you were all bothered by some camera at the Olympics, right? Because when you're up there, you look like this superhuman woman who is oblivious to cameras and all these things. But what you're revealing as you talk about this is just like, holy shit, this is so fucking hard,

you know, like so much work. And I can even feel as you talk about it, just the weight that you're carrying with it, you know, not just during that competition, but in all the hours surrounding it and leading up to it, just the time thinking about it and preparing for it. And again, I don't think that people, I don't think people see that cost, you know, and there's a certain, I think, desire to want to be that person who's on the podium, but without any recognition for all the pain and suffering that goes with it. It's interesting because I started commentating for college gymnastics a few years ago. Oh, cool.

And something that's really important to me is to try to articulate how small the margin of error is for gymnastics. And it's so challenging because if someone's vaulting, that's a few seconds. And I try not to talk, working on it,

trying not to talk while they're vaulting. When they land, you just have a couple of seconds to do a really quick, get in your quick word and then get out because then the next gymnast is going to go up on the next event and then you focus on that person but it's so hard to figure out a way to explain to someone the margin of error if your arms are out to the side and one of your arms is even five degrees lower than the other side or even a degree off you could end up going out

of bounds on floor or you could end up having a huge wobble on beam or falling off beam or even just you might sometimes not even know where you are in the air sometimes when you're in the arena, the lights are so bright and it's different than what we're used to at home. So you might put your head back a degree more than you're used to. It might make you completely lost in the air and not know where you are. So I think another piece of gymnastics is how dangerous it is. Totally. And for me, when I was competing, I had a lot of anxiety about what if I get hurt? That's a normal thought that I would have because, of course, you know, as an athlete, getting injured is so scary because you might be out for a long time.

And I remember before 2016 Olympics, my Achilles was bothering me so much. And an Achilles injury is not a good one. It's a nightmare for athletes. And so I remember that fear every day in the back of my mind worrying and having the balance of working out, but then not doing too much, but then also imagine doing a tumbling pass. and it's a natural, I think, thing to try to, by accident favor the other leg. But if I'm tumbling a little bit more on my other leg to try to save my Achilles and I could injure my other leg or hurt my back or my hip, there's just...

Unbelievably, yeah. Gymnastics, there's so much force on our bodies. And I saw something that said if you stick a landing, it's like 18 times on vault. It's 18 times someone's body weight. And they did it on a specific gymnast, so maybe each gym is a little bit. bit different, but when you stick it, there's so much force on your body, and that's if you land, stick it in a healthy way. You could land a little bit to the right or the left or a little bit forward. It's just the fear and anxiety of getting injured is also something that consumed a lot

of my mind, and I think there's such a hard, difficult thing to navigate is between overtraining and under training and just getting the right amount, because I can remember competing and I was exhausted. When I competed, my worry was, what if my muscles cramp up? Because I had so much muscle cramping when I was competing. And I can remember being on the podium, not the podium you stand for medals, but we call getting up on the floor. It's literally on a stage or on a podium. So we would call that getting up on the stage or the podium to get ready to compete. And before the fly goes up for my name, I would stretch my calves and my legs and worrying my muscles would cramp up because I was so overtrained and so tired. And now that I look

back, I was very malnourished and I wasn't eating enough and didn't have the right tools to navigate how to feel my body the right way. And it was very difficult. I will say, because we're in Boston and they were so helpful. The second time around when I came back after 2012, I started training again in 2014, and I was working a lot with the Patriot staff. And they, I don't know what I would have done without them. Their sports dietitian, the athletic trainer, chiropractor, they had a flotation tank. They had all these different things, dry needling. Acupuncture, man. Yes, all this different stuff. The sports dietitian, too, was just so helpful for me to have access to that because we, like I said, as being a part of the national team, we didn't have those people that

we could go to for help. We sort of would figure it out on our own. So I don't know. I wouldn't have been able to do it. Which is another crazy thing too, right? Just that like in some cases, Olympians don't have access to all the resources that you would expect for what you all are putting yourselves through. Yeah. I imagine, and I've heard you talk a little bit about this publicly, but the nutrition piece was twofold. You weren't entirely sure what you should. should eat. And then the second piece is that you are sort of balancing being a high performance athlete with also being essentially like a model. You know, when you go do gymnastics in front of all these people and then in front of judges, like there's also a pressure, I imagine, all around

your body. And had you navigate that. Yeah, it was difficult. And I think at least at the Olympic level, world championship level. And, you know, I've been out of the sport competing since 2016, so it's been a while, but I'll share from when I was competing during that time and prior, you know, I think there was a lot of emphasis, at least in my experience, for me to be thinner and to the people around me, not my parents, but the people around me to be thinner and to look a certain way. And gymnastics is a subjective sport, so there was just this immense pressure and I would have judges give feedback, whether it was to me directly or through my coaches or through the national staff that I needed to lose weight. And that is so crazy. It's so

so also devastating to hear, I think at any age or any point, but to be in high school, I remember feeling so insecure. And I just look back and it makes me so sad how self-conscious I was. And I thought that because judges or maybe coaches or people in the gymnastics community among these quotations thought I was overweight because of course I was not overweight at all. I had such low body fat, which I'll get to in a second. But I thought that everyone else in the world saw me that way because I spent so much of my time in gymnastics. So I hadn't really experienced a lot of life outside of being in that bubble. So I really thought this is how the This is what girls look like.

Well, this is how the rest of the world perceives me and everywhere I go, whether I'm getting coffee or at school, that people think that I'm overweight. And I remember my dad, this was even before I had my license or sort of maybe around that time. And sometimes I was just so tired that my parents would drive me to and from appointments because I was so tired after practice, I didn't have anything in me to drive. So I'm so grateful for their help and their support. But I remember when I was around 16 years old, I went to a strength and conditioning person, not to get stronger, but just to help with some injuries. And I remember he had tested my body fat, and he had said, you know, I've never in my life seen someone under 12%.

So we're going to test yours. But even 12%, he had told me that he felt that that would be too low for me. and mine was around 8% and he was really horrified at the time and was really upset and probably at the time was judging my dad because probably thought my dad was a crazy parent for allowing me to keep pushing myself and continue down this path that wasn't healthy but then actually right before I left for the 2016 Olympics I got my body fat tested and I remember it was at 5% Oh, my gosh. Which is so, I mean, I'm not a doctor professional, but I think that's extremely unhealthy for a female. But I remember I was. And women typically have higher percent body fats than men, too. Yeah, that's what I've heard.

And I remember the person who was testing my body fat at the time. I think it was the last time I was seeing him before I was leaving for Brazil for the Olympics. And I remember I could tell that he was really upset and very concerned and was telling me he was also the sports dietitian I was working with and saying you need to eat. I don't care if you have ice cream. I don't care if you have cake. You need to put on some weight and get some more fat on your body. And I remember at the time, I think I was also sort of almost brainwashed in a way because there was so much pressure to keep getting thinner. And in my mind at the time, I thought that the way that it was sort of taught to me in the gymnastics world was a half a pound

could be the difference between first place and second place. Which obviously I don't agree with that. And if there's any kids listening to this or any athletes, I do not agree with that. And it wasn't healthy what I was doing. And I remember telling my sports dietitian at the time, I said, I just, but I'm going to be fine, right? Everything's going to be fine. I remember he said, I can't tell you that. You know, you're really at risk for injury and this is really serious.

And I just remember at that time I would wake up in the mornings and I would start dry heaving into the toilet because I was so nauseous and I felt so sick. And it wasn't, obviously, it was not by choice, but I think my body fat was so low that I was so physically feeling sick. And I look back and I can't believe that I competed the way that I did with feeling that exhausted all the time. So I often... And you won three medals at that Olympics, right?

Yes, I did. Yeah. And I was just exhausted. I don't know how I did it. I wonder if I had been fueled in the right way what I could have done. Yeah, I mean, in some ways it's obvious to say that you were below your potential, although it's hard to do that much better than three medals at the Olympics. You know, it's like you're amongst the top three to five women in the world at something.

Yeah, and I guess I say that, meaning I'm so, more than satisfied with my gymnastics career. And I think when I was younger, my worth was dependent on how I did. And now I look back and I'm so proud of my gymnastics accomplishments. And I don't think about the color of the medal or any of that. I guess what I wish, if I could go back and I could change something, I wish that I felt better during that process. I wish that every day wasn't such a struggle of just feeling good. And it's honestly something I still struggle with today. Before the interview I was putting on peppermine oil and you ask why. And it's because sometimes when I talk publicly, I feel anxious or if I'm talking about things that are personal. It's amazing

how much my body reacts to it where sometimes I feel nauseous, but I still struggle with nausea and fatigue and I'm still sort of navigating that. So it's wild to me that it's been almost 10 years since I finished competing and training intensely and I still do not feel well. And so I can't reiterate how much I do not recommend the process that I went through to get there because it's not healthy and we shouldn't put health and people's well-being over medals and winning. It's not it shouldn't be that way well thank you for speaking about it i mean it's uh it takes a lot of courage to say that you were at the top of something while also feeling terrible and and and something that you're you're still recovering from why don't we talk about that a little bit like what does recovery

mean to you today and obviously you've been on whoop for a while too which is an amazing connection point. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I've been a fan of VOOP for such a long time. And I remember when you met a couple years ago, I was telling you about how I probably use the product differently than other professional athletes you guys work with because I'm not working out every single day. I would love to, but I just, my body can't do it right now. And I don't say can't in the sense. I don't mean that in a um like i can't do something i just am working on listening to my body and i am really prioritizing making sure that when i wake up in the morning i don't feel nauseous i don't have a headache or a migraine i guess it would be extremely unusual if there was a week that i woke up

without any of that in an entire week so i i think i really hit a point where after the olympics I was so fortunate that there were so many opportunities and I tried to do as many things as I could. I was on a plane probably six days a week. I was saying yes to as many things as I could and trying to be very outgoing and do as much as I could. And I think I just hit a point where I realized I actually didn't recover from my gymnastics career. And if there's ever an athlete that asks me advice, I wish I could go back in time because when I was computer, I would get massages and I would do the flotation tank and I do the dry needling and so many different things for recovery. And then when I finished competing, I had this kind of new sort of

freedom that I hadn't had and I was excited to just live life and do normal stuff. And I stopped doing all of that stuff. And I wish that I had better healed injuries that I had over use issues that I had in certain parts of my body and just really prioritized healing myself and still kept the recovery going even if I wasn't training. So it's taken me almost 10 years, but now I'm back to doing that. And I've started to see some of the people that I used to see when I was training again because my body is hurting and I want to feel good. I mean, our bodies are so important. And I want to do a better job of listening to my body. So I guess recovery looks like to me trying to also reflect on what I'm eating.

If I have a day where I have a lot of energy, I'm going to look back and see what did I eat, what did I drink, maybe who did I spend my time with, did I go for a longer walk? What type of workouts am I doing that are making me feel good? But it's difficult for me because if I were to run for maybe a minute, and a half just a normal jog if I would start to feel nauseous. So my body is so it's a very difficult thing to navigate, but I've been validated by different neurologists that I've seen and they've given me more of a diagnosis as to what it is. So that's also given me permission to not be so hard on myself because the athlete in me wants to push myself. And it's given me

permission to listen to my body and take better care of myself. So I walk a lot. I have a dog that I am so in love with. His name is Milo. We go for, we walk at least a couple hours a day. So I'm getting, trying to get there. I love the on the Woop app. I love how you can track your steps. So I use that a lot. And then I try to do, I had one time a doctor say to me, think about working out as almost you have snacks during the day. So she called it a workout snack. So my body at this point is not able to do a 45 minute or an hour workout. But I can sort of create little workout snacks throughout the day. So even if I'm brushing my teeth, I'll do some calf exercises or do some type of squatting thing.

I'll do some type of thing if I'm feeling good or if I'm somewhere. and I'm trying to get to the fifth floor, I'll take the stairs. I didn't actually take the stairs up here, but maybe I'll take the stairs down today. But I try to keep myself active throughout the day because if I do too much at one point, it just wrecks me in it. I have a really hard time recovering from it. So I'm still navigating and learning it. And I don't wish that other athletes had this experience, but I'm sure I'm not the only one that pushed myself too much in my career that struggles so much with energy. I have another teammate that really struggles as well and we'll talk about it.

But I imagine there's other athletes that struggle with it. So I think it would also be helpful to be able to talk to other people that have had that experience to see what they've done that's helped too. I imagine that's true. And I also think at this stage in your life, like your story is much broader than an athletic one because you're speaking very openly. about, you know, mental health challenges and fatigue challenges and things that you're navigating in your life that are really hard. And I think a lot of people of all ages, there's a lot of

people who are going through, you know, forms of depression or chronic fatigue or some kind of debilitating injury that they need to overcome. And they're trying to figure out what they can do to feel better, you know, whatever that may mean for themselves. Yeah, I also have learned from my own experience the power of feeling validated. And I don't think there's enough conversation around being in pain can be exhausting. Having anxiety and depression is exhausting. Having stress and something that is on our mind can take so much out of us. But I don't think enough people get validated for not need.

to have an excuse to be tired. I hear so many people say, well, I'm feeling tired, but I don't know why. And I used to say that all the time, too. And the truth is that you don't need an excuse to be tired. It's okay to be tired. We're also so busy. And we're also, I really try to balance my time with my phone. But, I mean, it's so unhealthy. I think how much I'm on my phone, even when I try not to be. Even if it's in the other room, I'll get up or think, oh, I should check it. And then I realize, wait, I don't need to check it. But the amount of time I spend on my phone, even though I'm cognizant of it, it's just, it's not healthy. And that's also probably disrupts, you would know this more than me, our sleep and everything. But I wish there was more conversation around

whether it's an injury or anxiety. It is so draining and so exhausting or I get migraines a lot. So that can be really exhausting as well. Or even the anxiety also around, okay, well, if I get a headache, what's going to happen, how is this going to affect my day? And I've learned that it's interesting. It's also really sad, but the more I talk about this stuff, the more people I find can relate to it. I think most people are either struggling with something or they know someone who is or has. Most people, I'm sure, are dealing with something that's on their mind or something that maybe it's a body part that hurts or a health issue. Everyone I've learned is battling something. or has battled something or know someone who is.

And I think it can be very scary and hard to talk about, but I think people would be surprised how many people could relate to them if they shared what they were going through. And I think people would be surprised how understanding, hopefully, people will be about it as well. You've been very brave to talk about sexual assault as well. And I imagine that there's been an avalanche of people who have come out of the woods to you, probably privately, to say, like, I had a similar

experience. It's devastating how many people come up to me and tell me that they have had a similar experience or they know someone who has. And I've had a lot of men who have come up to me and said that they have had a similar experience. And it's something our society does not talk about that boys and men are also victims of sexual abuse or any type of abuse as well. And so I think our society puts so much pressure on men and boys and doesn't allow them to be vulnerable. And I think that's really important is to make sure that boys and men feel comfortable and safe to talk about what they're going through.

I think that's really, really important. I mean, imagine if we lived in a world where every person felt comfortable talking about what they were going through. I feel like we would live in such a better place. But I've been just devastated to see how many people can relate to me. And it is, at least according to the experts I've spoken to, it's more common for girls or women to be abused. And, you know, even though it's been more of a conversation in the last. last, you know, I don't even know how many years, maybe nine-ish years, it's still something that so many people suffer in silence and so many people feel alone. And there's a crazy statistic

that around 30% of the time actually sexual abuse happens within the home, which is so horrific. Yeah, so horrific. And so I just don't think people realize how many people feel alone. You never know what someone else is going through and I think there's so much power in being there for someone else you may never realize how much even your someone confiding in you they're feeling tired and you just saying well I hear you it's okay you're allowed to feel tired you have no idea what they're going through and that could also give them so much courage to talk about other things or seek help and I think something else is really important I know I've mentioned validation a few times. But I really believe Rachel then Hollander, who's also a survivor and was just such a

powerful voice for me and other survivors. And I'm so thankful to her. But something that she has always said is that the way a survivor heals is linked to how their abuse is handled. And I really think that's so important because when people go through a hard time and you don't have a support system to help you. It is just so awful and to go through something hard and to have to suffer alone and then to not have the support you deserve is just it's not right. But I think there's so many people out there that don't have a support system. And I know I've talked about my parents a lot on this podcast, but through meeting fans, I've learned there's so many people out there that don't have a relationship with their family. And there's a lot of people who don't even

feel they have a friend or a teacher or colleague or someone that they can go to for help. And so I think that finding a support system, it doesn't have to be blood-related. Someone that you know that you can go to to talk to is so important because no matter what you're going through in life, I think not having to do it alone is really helpful and it's nice to have someone there that can validate you and help guide you because life is a roller coaster and, you know, sometimes things happen that are out of our control that it's nice to know that you're not alone for it. What's up, folks, if you are enjoying this podcast or if you care about health, performance, fitness, you may really enjoy getting a whoop. That's right. You can check out. You can check out.

out whoop at whoop.com. It measures everything around sleep, recovery, strain, and you can now sign up for free for 30 days. So you'll literally get the high performance wearable in the mail for free. You get to try it for 30 days, see whether you want to be a member. And that is just at whoop.com. Back to the guests. Well, let's talk a little bit more about the toolkit, so to speak, of coping with all of this. And I imagine there's lifestyle decisions you make. I imagine there's little hacks and products that you like to use. You've got an interesting list of things in your whoop journal that you shared with us

around tracking things like caffeine or family and friends or purpose, social fulfillment. Just talk a little bit about, you know, for someone listening to this who's like, gosh, like, I haven't been through what Allie's been through, but I've got my own bag of issues, and I want to feel better. Like, what's worked for you? So I am obsessed with gardening. It is something that I do almost every single day. In Boston, obviously, we can only garden for some of the season because it gets so cold here, but it brings me so much joy. I feel so relaxed. That is also very fulfilling to me because now if I have a friend over or I'm going to a friend's house, I will pick some herbs or different veggies from my garden and I'll either do a little flower

arrangement with the herbs or I'll bring them some vegetables. And that feels very personal for me and I really enjoy doing that because I've worked really hard at it. Some of the stuff I planted from seed. And so every day I'm really taking care of it. And I feel so myself because I don't have to be on. I can just fully be myself and I can get my hands dirty and messy and it doesn't matter. And I don't have to be perfect. I can make mistakes. I can learn from it. And I feel like every season I learn more because, you know, maybe there's a certain soil that works better than another one or maybe there's two types of vegetables that go well together or that don't go all together, and I love learning that.

And that's something that brings me so much joy, and every single day is different. So it's always something for me to look forward to. It's amazing how much something can change from the day prior. But it's interesting because when I was really feeling so burnt out and fatigued, and I am at a place where I'm still navigating it, but I'm in a much better place than I was a few years ago. I had this fear of, well, if I took, if I said no to more things and I was home a little bit more, I'm worried I'm going to feel, I'm worried I'm going to feel less fulfilled.

Or I think it's a fear a lot of people have is if I do less, I don't want to, I guess the word in my mind comes up of, I don't. I'm afraid I'm going to feel lazy or someone else is going to think I'm lazier. I'm afraid I'm not going to feel I'm going to be depressed doing less things. And it's so interesting because I've prioritized personal life more than I ever have. And that's been a priority for me because most of my life I prioritize my gymnastics career. And then after my professional career and lately it's been my personal life. And I feel so much more fulfilled.

And I think it's because the things that I'm doing, I'm able to really take it in and be more present. And, you know, for example, after this, I'm able to go home and my friend is actually visiting from Australia. So I have the time now that I can see her and see her in the short window she's home where before I might have been right after this interview running to jump on a plane to go somewhere else where I feel like I can actually take in my life. and I feel more appreciative and grateful because I have time to really reflect on it. And I also have time to learn about things. You mentioned the, I think it was purpose or the social fulfillment. You've got purpose here, social fulfillment. And learning something new is really, yes.

The learning is very important to me. I love listening to podcasts and reading. And I like to be able to be at a dinner table. And if someone's talking about a topic, I want to be. curious or if it's something I've listening to a podcast about or read an article about I want to share oh well this is what I think about it or I haven't heard that perspective I want to feel more curious about life and I feel like I have more time to do that and so I feel that I'm really living my life in alignment with where I'd like to go because I have the time and the

capacity to do it, and that feels really good. So I have surprised myself with, I guess, not running myself into the ground of being busy has actually made me feel more fulfilled. One just observation on gardening is that that's a hobby, creating life. It's also a hobby that has a lot of depth to it and breadth, and so you can kind of keep going deeper and deeper into it. It's also something that you probably continue to get better at. A mistake that a lot of adults make is they don't start new things that they keep improving at, but rather do things that they used to be better at. And so there's a lot of fulfillment that comes from going deep on some new hobby that you're continuing to get better at, right?

Yeah, and it is funny. I mean, even with gardening, I mean, the bags of soil are very heavy. Sometimes if you're ripping up. There's a physical element. Yeah, it is. It can be tiring. there's certain times where if I'm carrying a lot of things or even you're pulling out a big plant that it's past the season so you're getting rid of it. It is physical and it's a workout and it feels

good and it's so fulfilling and it also, to your point about, you know, learning something new and improving and can get better out. There's so much depth to it. It also makes me more inspired to cook and to learn different recipes and things. So I'm also trying to become a good cook. And it makes me, it challenges me because if I have a vegetable that I normally wouldn't get at the grocery store, it makes me think about how do I want to cook this or it makes me, I guess, more excited and inspired to try new things. So I really love that aspect of it. And people really appreciate it too. I think sometimes we forget life is so. beautiful and the world around us, you know, when you look around even now when I'm driving

on the highway, I realize even just all the trees that are all around the highway and especially being in New England in the summer, it's so beautiful. There's so many gorgeous places that are a drive away. And I feel like almost in a sense I'm experiencing life for the first time again because I, instead of my mind thinking of I'm really not feeling good, I need to get home, I can really take in my surroundings and feel, I guess, more present and more appreciative for what's around me. And I'm not trying to sound unrelatable because I have anxiety. I have moments where I don't feel like that, of course.

But I really also, my friends make fun of me, I literally will stop and smell the roses. If we're on a walk, my friend's joke, I'm the slowest. walker ever. So whenever we go for a walk somewhere, we're in a group and everyone's going into town. I'm always the last one because I will literally stop and smell the flowers, but also sometimes I'm tired. So I don't have the energy to walk as fast as them, but everyone jokes about it. And it's kind of a joke among my friends that if you didn't know me for being athletic, you would never know that I was super athletic because I'm the slowest walker. but I really do try to smell the roses and be more present.

And I have my green tea here. I have the peppermint oil. I told you this before we started. But something about the bitterness of the green tea and the peppermint oil, the sensations are so strong that it makes me feel more present. Yeah, more alert. And then, of course, there's caffeine in that as well. But even with my garden, the smells of the herbs are so strong.

It's incredible. And when I have people over there, they're shocked that it's not perfume. It's amazing how, you know, if I'm feeling anxious, I'll just grab some rosemary and rub it on my fingers. And it's just that moment of I'm focusing on that

rather than what was in my head. And it really helps me. And it's amazing how there's so many different smells and it helps me kind of relax a little bit. Sense is kind of a forgotten sense in a way. Yeah. Like it's a powerful sense that. I feel like, at least this conversation is reminding me to flex more.

You shared some of the elements that have the most positive recovery impact. So, not surprisingly, sleep performance, hot shower before bed, that's interesting. And then consistent wake time and bedtime. But those are the four things that when you do a great job at, most positively improve your recovery. What sleep look like for you today? I feel like because my. priority has been waking up early. My goal is to watch the sunrise every morning. I'm not there yet. But my goal is to do that. And having Milo, my dog, really helps me because one of the first things I do

in the morning is take him for around an hour walk. And I love that. It's so peaceful and usually pretty quiet. And I just, I love it. But waking up early really helps me get a better consistency with my sleep schedule. So I feel like lately I've been in bed around 9 to 10 and I'm trying to eat earlier so that I have more time to... She improves your sleep. Yes. I'm trying to do that and then also trying to go for a longer walk before bed as well. I also take baths as well, which is very relaxing for me. But it's interesting because I think that this is a symptom of some of my neurological stuff, at least that's what one of my neurologists said, is that I don't tolerate heat and cold very well. So I think when it says hot shower, it's probably not as hot as maybe someone

else or even taking a bath. It's not super hot. So it's just very relaxing for me. But it's interesting because I'm curious from your perspective, the cryotherapy, do you find most people that helps with their recovery? It depends a little bit. And I'm not sure if I have the data right now. the top of my head on cryotherapy versus cold plunge, but cold therapy in general has gotten super popular, and it's one of our fastest growing recovery modalities on whoop in terms of people doing it. What we typically see is that people who do cold exposure, let's call it, two to three times a week, actually have more positive recovery benefits than people who don't do it at all, or people who do it five or six days a week. And I'm actually now. So,

one who's in that five to six days a week camp just because I've gotten a little bit addicted to the way it mentally makes me feel. But it's also a question of what you're trying to optimize for. I really like doing cold punches in the morning because for the rest of the day, I feel mentally so much calmer when I've done them. And like calm but alert, it's like a really good combination I find. There's enough studies, though, to show that if you're doing weight training, you want to avoid doing cold exposure right after the weight training because it can actually, you know, blunt some of the muscle growth, particularly if you're doing hypertrophy training

where you're doing like very high rep training. So typically it's better to do weightlifting and cold exposure separately. Now, if you were doing a sport like gymnastics or football or something that maybe has more impact as well and maybe more repetitive muscle soreness, then it could be good to do cold exposure right after for your body because that'll also reduce inflammation. Yeah, it's interesting.

I'm curious because I hear a lot of people say the alertness is really impactful for them. When I was training, I was one of the only athletes that didn't do the cold plunge because I would get so much muscle cramping after and throughout the day. And for some reason, my body just couldn't recover. after it, I felt so stiff and we were working out so much at the time that I, you know, if I worked out in the morning and then my body didn't recover in time for the afternoon training session if I did the cold splunge, but then even after, I still felt stiff throughout the night, but I asked about the cryotherapy because I tried it for the first

time recently. And it's really interesting because the last year or so I've noticed I don't tolerant heat, hot heat, or cold very well. And I tried the cryotherapy. And I felt relaxed, but I went, I was so tired from it that the rest of the day is my recovery felt so much worse. Oh, interesting. Like, it almost made me need to take. I didn't end up sleeping, but I was so tired that I could have just fallen asleep anywhere. It just took so much out of me. One last question I want to ask you about is obviously you're very intentional about managing your psychological well-being and your hell. You've been on whoop for a while and something that sometimes I hear from people who are thinking about getting on whoop, but like hesitant to, is they're almost nervous that the data will affect them in one way or another? What's your answer to that?

Well, I love wearing whoop because it's really helped me. have a better understanding of what's working for me, but also what's not working for me. And for example, I think the daily insights that Woot provides is so helpful. And it's one of my favorite parts because it's so cool. I mean, even after several days of wearing it, it will say, okay, we have a new insight. You ate this amount of fat today or this amount of fat in the last three days. isn't it either helped your recovery or it didn't help your recovery? So we recommend X, Y, and Z.

And it's really helpful for me to have a better understanding of my body and what's going on because I think I've struggled so much with how to recover. And I have seen so many different doctors over the years and to be able to have something that I can use every single day, many times a day and understand and look at the data and say, okay, well, last month I did this many steps and my recovery was here versus this month I'm doing less. Why am I doing less? Why am I more tired what's happening? It's just really helped me. It's sort of, and the diary is really helpful too. And I think my favorite part is the daily insight because it really gives me so much

insight in just such a quick, concise way of... The little daily outlook, the coaching feature. Yes. Do you ever ask it questions? I have, yes, for sure. And the questions, it's really impressive. It's amazing. It's really mind-boggling what technology can do, and it's incredible what the app

can do, and how much data is on there about myself. It's really cool to learn about it, and I'm just, I'm excited to keep using it and to keep learning more. And now I am really going to focus also on the days that I garden a lot. I really am now excited to hone in on that and see how that affects my recovery too. Well, the future you're speaking about is the AI coaching that's in the app, which is something we've been building out now for a couple years. And I'm excited for you to use it in the next few months because it's about to get a lot better. Okay. So if you already really like it, you're really going to like it. And for folks listening, so don't use it yet, I think they're going

start using it a lot more. Yeah, it's also, I thought you'd find this cool, but I think what's very awesome about it is if I'm at a doctor's office and they're like, okay, well, how much are you sleeping right now? I'm like, okay, let me ask my WOOP coach. And it's really cool because the doctors, the ones that I'm seeing, like they really trust it. And they're like, okay, great. And they're really excited when I say, okay, off the top of my head, I don't know, which is also whoop has inspired me to be more aware of, I mean, my, we only get one body, so why am I not paying more attention to this stuff? It's really been eye-opening for how much I've ignored my body for so long.

And it's, whoop has really helped me appreciate my body more and make sure that I'm paying attention to those little details because it's, I mean, our body, we should treat it well and take care of it and take care of each other too. It's really inspiring to hear your whole story, Allie. And I think for a lot of people who are going through something to hear a woman who has been a superhero at various points in her life and put up on the podium and held the gold medals and been on all the talk shows and sort of seen as this vision of success to also share that vulnerability around just how hard it's been and some of the things you're going through. I think you're a real inspiration for a lot of people. Thank you. Thank you so much for having me.

And you are an inspiration for a lot of people as well. excited to be here. Thanks, Holly. If you enjoyed this episode of the WOOP podcast, please leave a rating or review. Check us out on social at Woop at Will Ahmed. If you have a question was answered on the podcast, email us, podcast to Woop.com. Call us 508-443434952. If you think about joining whoop, you can visit Woop.com. Sign up for a free 30-day trial membership. New members to use the code Will W-I-L to get a $60 credit on W-W-Acessaries when you enter the code at check out. That's a wrap, folks. Thank you all for listening. We'll catch you next week on the WOOP podcast. As always, stay healthy and stay in the green.