The Wild Breakthrough in Blood Pressure Checks

Summary

Camp Gagnon: The Wild Breakthrough in Blood Pressure Checks

Release Date: August 11, 2025

Hosts:

• Mark Gagnon – Host of Camp Gagnon
• Will Ahmed – Co-founder and CEO of WHOOP

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Introduction

In this engaging episode of Camp Gagnon, host Mark Gagnon sits down with Will Ahmed, the visionary co-founder and CEO of WHOOP, to explore groundbreaking advancements in health technology, the entrepreneurial journey, and the balance between personal life and running a successful company. The conversation delves deep into WHOOP's innovative approach to non-invasive blood pressure monitoring, the integration of AI in health and fitness, and Will's personal experiences as a father and entrepreneur.

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Non-Invasive Blood Pressure Measurement

Innovative Breakthrough

Will Ahmed begins by sharing WHOOP's significant advancement in health monitoring:

“[00:00] Will Ahmed: 3 years ago we started working on non-invasively measuring blood pressure. So a WHOOP member would put on a cuff, they take three readings, they enter those three readings into the WHOOP app and then their forwards. They get a daily estimate every day from whoop of their blood pressure and it's super accurate.”

At the outset, Will emphasizes the challenges faced in developing accurate blood pressure measurements without traditional invasive methods. He recounts how starting the company at 22, amidst giants like Nike and rumored entries from Apple into the wearable health space, seemed daunting:

“[00:16] Will Ahmed: I was describing starting a company. I was 22 years old and at the same time Nike was about to enter the space and Apple was rumored to be entering the space. It seemed impossible that you'd be able to measure heart rate from the wrist, let alone at the same accuracy as a chest strap. We banged on that for like over a decade and got really good at it. Now we sit here and we can do blood pressure really well.”

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AI Integration in Health and Fitness

Future of Personalized Health Coaching

Mark probes into the capabilities of current AI models in leveraging WHOOP's extensive data:

“[00:39] Mark Agnon: Will will the current AI models be able to reference all of the retroactive data from the very first day that you put on a whoop, even if it was in 2017?”

Will confidently responds:

“[00:48] Will Ahmed: Yes. Using the Whoop app is like you've got this world class coach over your shoulder looking at the app with you and telling you what to do. We want our members to be able to live healthier, longer lives.”

He elaborates on the potential of AI to enhance user experience by providing personalized coaching based on decades of physiological data, emphasizing WHOOP's commitment to leveraging technology for optimal health outcomes.

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Entrepreneurial Journey and Overcoming Challenges

Starting Young Amidst Industry Giants

Will reflects on his early days founding WHOOP, highlighting the skepticism faced and the resilience required to push forward:

“[00:16] Will Ahmed: I was 22 years old… It seemed impossible… We banged on that for like over a decade and got really good at it.”

Mark relates to Will's experience, noting the absence of immediate peer support and the transition from camaraderie to battling regulatory challenges.

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Fatherhood and Work-Life Harmony

Balancing Parenthood with Leadership

A significant portion of the discussion revolves around how becoming a father has transformed Will's perspective on work and life balance. Will introduces the concept of "work-life harmony" versus "balance":

“[15:04] Will Ahmed: I subscribe a little more to this idea of work life harmony than balance. Harmony is this idea that you're going to have these things coexist in a really healthy way, whereas balance sort of implies that, like, if you spend an hour here, you're going to spend an hour there.”

He shares personal anecdotes about adjusting his work schedule to prioritize family time, illustrating the practical applications of harmony in daily life.

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Exploring Sports: Squash and Paddle

Cultural Influence and Personal Interests

Mark and Will delve into sports, particularly squash and paddle, discussing cultural dominance and personal passion:

“[03:06] Will Ahmed: It's a great question. My dad is Egyptian, grew up in Alexandria… first of all, the Egyptians are like the best in the world at squash.”

Will explains the Egyptian dominance in squash, attributing it to cultural and environmental factors that fostered exceptional skills and strategic play. The conversation then shifts to paddle, with both hosts expressing their enthusiasm and the strategic depth of the sport compared to others like pickleball.

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Navigating FDA Regulations

Challenges with Blood Pressure Feature Classification

A pivotal moment in the episode is the discussion about WHOOP's struggle with FDA regulations concerning their blood pressure monitoring feature:

“[46:29] Will Ahmed: … blood pressure is a critical understanding of your body… it's something that people should be really aware of. … When we launched this feature, the FDA came out to us and said if it's blood pressure it has to be medically regulated.”

Will details WHOOP's efforts to categorize their blood pressure feature under wellness rather than medical use, despite FDA pushback. He emphasizes the importance of innovation and user demand:

“[52:03] Will Ahmed: … inside the WHOOP app, we've got all these disclaimers about how this feature, blood Pressure Insights, is not designed for medical diagnosis. It's designed to understand blood pressure alongside wellness… we're fighting for innovation.”

Mark probes further, questioning the FDA's rigidity and Will's optimism about resolving these regulatory hurdles.

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Future of Wearable Technology and AI

Personalization and Data Integration

The conversation transitions to the future prospects of wearable technology, with a focus on AI-driven personalization. Will discusses WHOOP's upcoming features like Advanced Labs, which will integrate comprehensive health data for more tailored coaching:

“[27:56] Will Ahmed: … the idea that you would want to use a different product should decrease dramatically because of the value that you're gonna get from all the context of this period of time versus that period of time.”

He highlights the potential for AI to reference extensive user data, creating a more dynamic and insightful coaching experience that adapts to various life stages and health conditions.

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Entrepreneurial Insights and Mentorship

Lessons from Building WHOOP

Will shares valuable insights from his entrepreneurial journey, particularly the challenges of fundraising and the importance of building a supportive network:

“[69:16] Will Ahmed: … fundraising is a skill in that of its own… it's the ability to raise capital and tell a story and get people to give you money and believe in the future.”

He advises new entrepreneurs to focus on learning through trial and error, emphasizing resilience in the face of rejection and the necessity of strategic networking.

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Reflections on Greatness and Legacy

Inspiring Through Excellence

Towards the end of the episode, Mark and Will reflect on the concept of greatness, drawing parallels between entrepreneurial success and athletic excellence. Will emphasizes the importance of maintaining drive and appreciation:

“[82:12] Mark Agnon: … developing consciousness in real time is pretty, pretty bizarre… [83:36] … 'Trust the vibes. Trust your intuition.'”

He underscores the significance of being present and embracing the grind, drawing inspiration from both historical entrepreneurs and contemporary athletes.

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Conclusion

The episode wraps up with heartfelt exchanges about the importance of mentorship, the influence of family support, and the relentless pursuit of excellence. Both hosts express admiration for WHOOP's mission to enhance human health and performance, highlighting the transformative potential of innovative health technologies.

“[90:23] Will Ahmed: … there's something about the energia that's palpable and awesome and an electricity that… make America and the world healthier.”

Mark and Will conclude by affirming their commitment to building a legacy through hard work, innovation, and a deep-seated passion for improving lives.

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This episode of Camp Gagnon offers a comprehensive look into the intersection of health technology, AI, entrepreneurship, and personal growth, providing listeners with valuable insights and inspiration from one of the leading voices in the wearable health tech industry.

Transcript

[Will Ahmed]

3 years ago we started working on non invasively measuring blood pressure. So a WHOOP member would put on a cuff, they take three readings, they enter those three readings into the Whoop app and then their forwards. They get a daily estimate every day from whoop of their blood pressure and it's super accurate.

[Mark Agnon]

That's interesting.

[Will Ahmed]

I was describing starting a company. I was 22 years old and at the same time Nike was about to enter the space and Apple was rumored to be entering the space. It seemed impossible that you'd be able to measure heart rate from the wrist, let alone at the same accuracy as a chest strap. We banged on that for like over a decade and got really good at it. Now we sit here and we can do blood pressure really well.

[Mark Agnon]

Will the current AI models be able to reference all of the retroactive data from the very first day that you put on a whoop, even if it was in 2017?

[Will Ahmed]

Yes. Using the Whoop app is like you've got this world class coach over your shoulder looking at the app with you and telling you what to do. We want our members to be able to live healthier, longer lives. If you put really smart minds against something for a long enough period of time and it doesn't defy physics like it's plausible, humanity tends to win.

[Mark Agnon]

What are the other problems that you're trying to solve when it comes to implementing AI with health and fitness? This episode is brought to you by State Farm. Checking off the boxes on your to do list is a great feeling. And when it comes to checking off coverage, a State Farm agent can help you choose an option that's right for you. Whether you prefer talking in person, on the phone or using the award winning app, it's nice knowing you have help finding coverage that best fits your needs. Like a good neighbor. State Farm is there.

[Will Ahmed]

Will.

[Mark Agnon]

What's up, dude? How are you?

[Will Ahmed]

What's up, Mark? Thanks for having me.

[Mark Agnon]

Of course, man. Thank you for having me. And by having me, I mean literally in your in your building. For anyone watching right now, I'm not in my campsite in Brooklyn where I typically like to reside. Instead, we're in beautiful Boston, Massachusetts, in an amazing building, truly. I mean this is like five stories of everyone wearing whoops. I mean, it's like if someone's not wearing a whoop in here, are you a little bit like, yo, how'd you get in? You know what I mean?

[Will Ahmed]

Actually, definitely. If someone's not wearing a whoop, I'm like, this might be an outsider spy. Because every whoop member of the team, of course, wears, wears the product. And, and so that is, yeah, that I would say that's a red flag.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah, that's absolutely red flag. That's why I wore mine.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah.

[Mark Agnon]

You know what I mean? David, on the other hand, sitting in the corner, did not wear his, which is, I, in my opinion, I think, disrespectful.

[Will Ahmed]

Come on, man.

[Mark Agnon]

And just no decorum, no class. There's a bunch of stuff I want to talk about. I want to talk about fda. I want to talk about your personal entrepreneurship journey. I also want to talk about fatherhood, which you and I sort of share in common at a specific window in our lives. But I, I, I am a, I'm a person that's fascinated by culture. And we were speaking briefly before. You have an Egyptian heritage that has, in my opinion, made you a phenomenal squash player. Can you explain why the Egyptians dominate squash?

[Will Ahmed]

It's a great question. My dad is Egyptian, grew up in Alexandria. I traveled with him when I was younger to ca, probably 10 times before the age of 16. And I would play squash there. And I, and first of all, the Egyptians are like the best in the world at squash. Ali Farag, who just retired as world number one, is Egyptian, and he was one of my teammates at Harvard, so it was cool rooting for him, too. And I think it has something to do with the climate and the culture. So for those who aren't familiar with squash, it's a, it involves a very soft ball on a court that, you know, kind of looks like a racquetball court. And the difference is that you have to run a lot more, so you're kind of constantly running in and out of the corners to, to retrieve the ball. And, and the hotter the environment, the more the ball is going to bounce, which means that, in turn, it's harder to end the point. And, you know, at a very elite level, squash players are really fit cardiovascularly. And so they'll be tracking the ball down from, from all, all corners of the court. And I think the Egyptians, because they grew up playing in such a hot environment with the ball being so bouncy, had to figure out how to, how to put the ball away. And so they have by far the best hands in the sport, I think, and also the most deceptive shots. And so you'll see a great Egyptian player, like, hold his racket for a while and then flick his wrist right before he hits the ball. And, you know, sure enough, the player will, all of a sudden his opponent will be Running the wrong direction or, you know, they'll be really good at, at what's called hitting the. Which is where you slot the ball, like, right into the glass and floor area. And so, like, right in that little, that little crack, it makes the ball, you know, essentially roll instead of bounce. And then, you know, I think just with generations, it compounds a little bit where young kids are taught how to hit drop shots and how to, you know, be deceptive at a young age. And that's part of the culture.

[Mark Agnon]

So Egyptians are deceptive, is what you're saying.

[Will Ahmed]

That's deceptive and deceptive and good at putting the ball away. In squash.

[Mark Agnon]

Only in squash.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah. In squat.

[Mark Agnon]

Okay. Okay, that's, that's fair.

[Will Ahmed]

Okay.

[Mark Agnon]

I, I was asking you before. You're now playing paddle, which I think is wonderful. I, in my opinion, I think it's like, it's my favorite game that I've played since soccer. I grew up playing soccer my whole life, and then now I'm playing paddle. It's, like, phenomenal. What was the thing that got you into playing that, like, picking up a new Sport in your 30s is a pretty, is a pretty bizarre, you know, occurrence. I think most people are just like, dude, I play ball. That's it.

[Will Ahmed]

Well, I, I'm actually one of those people who's in the camp of you always want to be trying new things as you get older, because if you can find sports, exercises, activities, I mean, for a lot of people, weightlifting, if you can find things that you're going to be getting better at as you get older because they're new or because you're now investing in them, I think that's just great for you. Like, it's, it's a, it's a great feeling to be learning something and improving at it. And I think more often than not, you know, people who are college athletes at something kind of let themselves just decay at everything else as they get older, but there's a bunch of things you can do and actually get better at. And so anyway, as a mindset that kind of put me, that put my antenna up to these new games like pickle bell, Pickleball and Padel and, and, you know, Barry's boot camp and all these different sort of fun activities. Surfing more recently, although I'm terrible at it. And pickleball, I think's a pretty lame game. We can talk about why, like, as a racket sport guy who grew up playing squash and tennis, like, I, I, I, I didn't like pickleball, but paddle is a Phenomenal sport. It really is. And in a lot of ways, it feels like a. Like a merger of squash and tennis, and it's pretty strategic game. You know, one thing I look for in. In racket sports is how easy is it to pick up, and then how great can you become? And I feel like with pickleball, the reason it had so much growth is it's super easy to pick up.

[Mark Agnon]

The learning curve is.

[Will Ahmed]

But if you watch, like, the world's best pickleball players, I don't know about you, like, it's totally unwatchable from my standpoint. And that's no criticism of them. It's just more of a criticism of the sport, which is that at the highest level, it doesn't look that exciting, whereas paddle's super easy to pick up. But then when you watch the highest level of paddle, you're like, holy shit.

[Mark Agnon]

The ceiling is high.

[Will Ahmed]

These guys are running outside the court and, you know, diving and, like, the whole thing looks really, really dynamic and exciting.

[Mark Agnon]

There's flow, there's, like, chemistry. The whole thing has, like a. Yeah, totally.

[Will Ahmed]

You can. You can just see. Wow. There's. There's 10 levels to this.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Will Ahmed]

And so that gets me excited when I look at a new sport.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah. And not to mention the learning curve that you can pick up. You know, you can start playing paddle one week, and within, like, four weeks, you've multiplied four times in terms of your ability to play, even with no racket experience. I never played a racket sport growing up, and I picked this up, and I was like, dude, this is so fun.

[Will Ahmed]

It's so fun. And. And it's great that it's more of a team, you know, or more of a double sport. You know, you don't really see people playing. Playing singles. I think that's fun, too.

[Mark Agnon]

That's. That's true. It does require community, which I think is, like, so fundamental. I mean, now more than ever. But I think with just sports in general, like, the whole point is community, in a way. And paddle necessitates it because you need a partner and you need four people at least to get together.

[Will Ahmed]

And by the way, there's not enough courts, so it'd be hosed if there was only a bunch of singles players, because it doesn't feel like there's enough courts around the world.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah.

[Will Ahmed]

I mean, particularly in the U.S. it's interesting. I first started playing when I would make trips to the Middle east because it's so big in the Middle East.

[Mark Agnon]

Right.

[Will Ahmed]

And. And it seems to Be a sport that's grown very fast around the world. And it's sort of. The US is sort of catching up.

[Mark Agnon]

Dude. I think in Covid Sweden, buil 20,000 quarts. It's like something insane. You're like, you mean 2,000, no, 20,000 quarts. Whereas in the U.S. i think there's like a thousand maybe, you know, like it's.

[Will Ahmed]

And, and I wonder, I wonder where tennis is 10 or 20 years. Because if a lot of people start playing paddle instead of tennis, that'll. That'll change tennis.

[Mark Agnon]

Oh, absolutely. And I think, again, I think the issue with tennis is just a learning curve. You're just chasing balls like the first month that you're playing tennis if you just started when you're 30. Whereas the paddle, you can pick it up and be like, oh, I'm actually decent at this. You know, like, you can kind of figure it out as you go. What's up, guys? I'm on the road. That's right. I'm going to Burlington, Vermont, Montreal, Toronto, Detroit, and a bunch of other dates that I will be adding to my website, markagnon live.com I would love to see you guys there. Obviously, if you don't know, I'm a stand up comedian and stand up comedy is my passion. It's the thing I love to do. And seeing you guys all come out to the shows truly makes my life. I hang out after the show and say, what's up? To everybody. So if you want to come through, check out the show, say what's up to me. It would mean the. You can see me at all these dates and more on my website, markagnon live.com and I'll see you guys on the road. We got merch, if you don't know. We got camp research and development merchandise. You can see it right here. Also, my buddy Andrew Schultz was actually just out hanging with his fam, having a good old time. All of a sudden a dude walks up to him and goes, yo, what's up, Schultze? And guess what? He was wearing this shirt right here. So shout out to that legend, whoever you are. You're the man. I appreciate that. And if you want to cop your very own camp threads, go to camp-rd.com dropping all sorts of new gear. You can see some of the images here of some of the products that we got. And anytime you buy a T shirt, you help this show directly operate. It is a huge, huge lift and I'm very grateful for everyone that reps the gear, especially at the live shows. Seeing you guys wearing the T shirts at the shows truly makes my life. It's the coolest thing ever. I cannot believe people are actually wearing clothes that me and my friends are designing and sending imessage chats like, yo, you think this is cool? It's the craziest thing in the world. And I'm so grateful for everyone that does it. Check it out. We got the link in the description. Now let's get back to the show. This episode is brought to you by Indeed.

[Will Ahmed]

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[Mark Agnon]

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[Will Ahmed]

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[Mark Agnon]

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[Will Ahmed]

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[Mark Agnon]

Sponsored job credit@ Indeed.com podcast. Terms and conditions apply. Yeah, I think that's, I think about that now that I'm a dad, I'm like, what sports am I going to get my kids involved in? I'm actually curious about that. For you, how old is your son?

[Will Ahmed]

Five months.

[Mark Agnon]

I mean, that's awesome. This is an interesting transition point for you as an entrepreneur, having a child. This is your first, your first kid, right?

[Will Ahmed]

Yep, first kid.

[Mark Agnon]

To me, that's interesting because I, I have a son, he's 10 months.

[Will Ahmed]

Okay. A little ahead of me, a little.

[Mark Agnon]

A little bit in some ways. But like, I found that my whole perspective on the work that I do and my life has changed so fundamentally from having a kid and a lot in like, preparation, but also like narrowing my focus in a lot of ways. So I'm curious, how has parenthood affected your focus as an entrepreneur, as a CEO, as someone that is running a massive company?

[Will Ahmed]

Well, it's interesting, as an entrepreneur, you are thinking a lot about the future and like, what the future should look like. And in my case, I think about the future particularly in a specific lane, which is around health and how do we make the world healthier and how can, you know, the health care system be more effective in the next decade or two and how can this technology continue to evolve and replace the doctor's office and so on and so forth. And so in some sense, you think about the future in an ambitious way, but in another way, like a somewhat narrow way. Like, I'm mostly focused on on the future as it relates to health. And I think one of the biggest wake up call calls to having a son is all of a sudden you think about the future and all These other dimensions, you know, I hadn't been thinking that much about, okay, what's the education system look like in the next 20 years now? I think about it a lot, Right. Because like, you want your son to, you know, live through that and have a great education, whatever that may look like. And, you know, you start to pay more attention to things like collapsing fertility rates and you start to wonder, well, you know, how is AI going to affect relationships for human. I think having children is like a beautiful experience in a lot of different ways. But one way that I think it's very important for society at large is it makes the current generation that's in charge, so to speak, care a lot about the future. Like, you really want the future to be better so that your children have a better future?

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah. You have a real investment, you have a stake in it. And I think everyone cares about the future sort of philosophically. Right. Like you're like, oh, yeah, I want things to be good. I want my legacy to be great. But once you actually have a child, like, it creates a very real politic.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah.

[Mark Agnon]

Operation for how you're going to deal with your day to day life. Like, no, no, I'm going to give him something either on a personal basis, like, you know, an inheritance or on a social basis, like the, you know, country or the world that I leave behind. And it's really kind of changed my perspective a little bit on, I don't know, like, the work that I'm doing and the amount of time and how I actually manage work life balance. That's been the biggest challenge for me because before I was just like, all right, I'd like hang with my friends a little. I hang with my wife a lot and then I do work the rest of the time. You know, it was just like focus on just like hustle culture. Yeah. Growth. Just like getting better. And like, I think my obsession with health is kind of intersected with that a little bit like just like optimization and like, I want that to kind of permeate into every little element of my life. But now that I have a kid, I'm just, I'm forced to do nothing in a lot of ways. So I'm curious how has that affected just on a personal basis, like work life balance, like five, five, five months is, is not a ton of time, but it is enough time to have, I think, the way that you operate be fundamentally shifted.

[Will Ahmed]

I subscribe a little more to this idea of work life harmony than balance. Harmony is this idea that you're going to have These things coexist in a really healthy way, whereas balance sort of implies that, like, if you spend an hour here, you're going to spend an hour there. And, and I gravitate to Harmony because there are just situations where you have to be all, all in on one or the other. One of the hard things about the timing of my son's birth, which was like late February, is it was about, you know, six or eight weeks before we were launching this product that we had been working on for three years. And the lead up to a launch is just an insanely intense period of time. And so I was traveling a lot more than I wanted to be, and I was just working a lot more than you probably otherwise would have wanted to be. And at the same time, I knew that this period was going to happen. And so I booked this pretty awesome 3 week vacation in June on the other side of the launch, where I'd be able to kind of drop off the grid in Italy with my wife and our son, you know, knowing that I'd be on the other side of it. And, and so that was like a pretty amazing trip that we just, we just came back from not that long ago. So to me, that, that's, that's what I think of when I think of Harmony, where, you know, sometimes it's just 9010 and then sometimes it's not, you know, 9010 the other way. Right. And. And I think that's okay. I will say I've gotten increasingly it. I think I was always pretty good with time management, but, you know, if I can duck out 30 minutes early to be at home when he goes to bed for bedtime, like, you know, that's a big win. And, and admittedly, I still miss more bedtimes than I'd like, but, you know, those are the things where you just feel like an sort of increased sense of urgency or, or deliberation.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah.

[Will Ahmed]

I also find the, the bar for I'm gonna go to this thing that I'm being asked to do has just gotten a little bit higher. Right. Like you just. Whereas before maybe I would say yes a little bit more often, or if I wasn't sure, I'd still get on the plane, you know, and now it's like, well, I'm just gonna be a little more selective.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah.

[Will Ahmed]

And. And so in some ways I'm grateful that I started this company before I had kids, because I do think when you're trying to make it, when you're kind of in that more zero to one stage, like, I Do think there's a lot of sacrifice that comes with that. And, and I'm so. I'm glad that I, I'm at a stage now where I, I can have some of these trade offs because it's just hard. It's hard to be a great entrepreneur and a great father all the time in harmony.

[Mark Agnon]

And how old do you know?

[Will Ahmed]

35.

[Mark Agnon]

Which to me, even, like, having a kid at 35 by New York standards is like, almost like, relatively young, you.

[Will Ahmed]

Know what I mean?

[Mark Agnon]

Like, all my friends in the city that have kids, like, again, I'm.

[Will Ahmed]

It's crazy how much that's changed in the last, like, 30, 40 years, bro.

[Mark Agnon]

It's. I mean, we're talking about fertility rates. It's like, it's wild. But I also recognize, like, New York is a very specific pocket of people that are hustling, that are, you know, addicted to caffeine, nicotine, and, you know, other stimulants. So it's. Yeah, it's a place where people go to make it, get money and, you know, like, delay having families. But even having A kid at 35 is like, I think a pretty. It's an interesting move on your part because I do think it indicates a desire to have a family and like, be focused on things that exist outside of, you know, your work Persona, so to speak, you know, And I know a lot of people that are so focused on work that they'll. They wouldn't even. They always say, like, oh, yeah, have kids when I'm. When I'm done, you know, but you're still very much in the middle of it. Like, you're dropping new products and launching new features and then also, you know, harmoniously being like, yeah, I want to have kids and like, raise a family. And I just think it's like an admirable thing to do that I, I hope other entrepreneurs kind of take, you know, a little bit of encouragement from. I guess, you know, I appreciate that.

[Will Ahmed]

I mean, I think that. I think that you can do it. I think you can balance these things or, or manage these things, I should say. And by the way, it really helps to have a great partner. Like, you want to get that piece of the equation right. And so I have a lot of gratitude to my wife who's. Who's been able to balance a lot as we've welcomed little Thomas, that's our son, to the world. And look, it feels great. It's really cool when you get to spend time with this little dude and hold him and hoist him up in the air, and he smiles at you, and you kind of feel whole suddenly, you know, It's. It is. Yeah. It's an amazing feeling.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah. No, truly, I feel like it is. I mean, I've heard people say similar things, but it is kind of the main event in a way. Like, so much of what I have tried to build through comedy and podcasting and entertainment has kind of paled in comparison to this sort of legacy feeling that I have when I'm with my kid. I'm like, oh, this is really kind of the immortality that I think so many people are trying to achieve through their work on Earth, which I don't think is futile. I don't think the task is trivial to try to create something great while we're here, and I think that it should be something that we should strive for. But ultimately, I do look at my son, and I'm like, oh, the memories that we have, and the way that you might talk about me to your kids and then to your grandkids, I feel like that legacy is. I think that's the statues that people want erected of themselves kind of exist in their children in, like, a metaphorical sense, you know, And I think that both can be done, but for me, at least, I just didn't expect to have such a sudden onset of emotional capacity and sort of, like, broader belief about myself through having a kid, you know?

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah, it definitely widens your. Your emotional range, and I think it gives you more perspective. There's an interesting evolution that I think happens for every entrepreneur that also, in a way, ties to having children. And that evolution is this idea that initially, you're very outcome driven. And so it's all about, okay, I need to raise this much money, or I need to get the company to this valuation, or we need to have this much revenue, or, you know, I need to have this many subscribers, or, you know, fill in the blank, whatever your hustle is. And. And then, sure enough, you kind of drive and drive and drive, and then you get to that thing that you said was the gate. And then, of course, you don't feel the thing you were supposed to feel, or you've used up all the dopamine to get there. And so you say, okay, well, no, actually, I just. I had the wrong number. It's a bigger number. You know, that that's when I'll feel, you know, feel good about things, or that that's the outcome I need.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah.

[Will Ahmed]

And. And look, I think every entrepreneur is guilty of that to different degrees. The. The key is to to move away from being super outcome driven and, and manage to stay driven while also being grateful. And, and, and so it's using different chemicals in your brain too. So the outcome mode is, is like a dopamine system, but you can burn out on the dopamine alone. And so the gratitude system is the serotonin system and that also makes you happy. And so, and sometimes entrepreneurs worry that if they're too like pleased with where they are today, like it'll hurt the drive system. Complacency kills, but it actually doesn't. It's, it's, you can be, you can be hyper driven and appreciative along the way and that in turn will make you one, I think, be able to run for longer, but also kind of have a healthier mindset. And I bring that up because I think in the context of having kids, it's not about again, trying to seize this sort of notion of immortality or it'll be great when, or I need my kids do this thing so that I feel something. It's much more about just appreciating the fact that you have a child and getting to see the interactions and seeing the kid grow and seeing that learning on like a week by week basis and the evolution and in a way getting to relearn yourself, like an appreciation for the world around you. You know, when you see a kid play with a toy for the first time or a ball for the first time, or you know, look in a mirror for the first time, like all of a sudden you're like, yeah, wow, look at all these things around us.

[Mark Agnon]

Developing consciousness in real time is pretty, pretty bizarre.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah. And so I think a lot of the battle for a hard driving entrepreneur is to be present. And I think a lot of the magic of being a parent is to be present.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah.

[Mark Agnon]

I've heard someone say that kids slow you down and that's the point.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah, that's a good way to put it. Yeah.

[Mark Agnon]

And I do think about that like if I'm like rushing but like I can't get his shirt on, I'm like, okay. The point is to kind of, it's okay to take an extra four minutes. It's not that big of a deal. I'm curious, with a newborn, how are you sleeping?

[Will Ahmed]

Reasonably well. Fortunately, he's a pretty good sleeper and we've got a nurse who's terrific, who's helped with some of that.

[Mark Agnon]

Oh, that's awesome. Yeah, that was the thing. To be honest with you, I stopped wearing my wub for three months.

[Will Ahmed]

Because the sleep was that bad.

[Mark Agnon]

Truly. Yeah. I wore it every day for, I mean, probably like two, two and a half years. And then a few months ago, I took it off and I was like, I just. Every day waking up being like, 20% recovery.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah, it's hard.

[Mark Agnon]

Was just bumming me out and then thinking that I was sleeping better than I was and then seeing it, and then just seeing. No, you slept terrible. You slept terrible. So terrible. For like, the first few months of.

[Will Ahmed]

His life, honestly, bummed me out is definitely the hardest.

[Mark Agnon]

I was like, dude, what is the point?

[Will Ahmed]

Once you get on a sleep schedule. Yeah.

[Mark Agnon]

Now it's been fine.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah.

[Mark Agnon]

But I do think Whoop needs a dad mode. It needs. And you need a button to be.

[Will Ahmed]

Like, yeah, feedback heard.

[Mark Agnon]

I have a kid, so just don't judge me too hard. Right.

[Will Ahmed]

We're working on that, actually, with this, a lot of the AI work that we're doing, which is going to make the. The coaching and the feedback in the app is so much more catered to you and what you're experiencing in your life.

[Mark Agnon]

So adaptive learning, it's like, oh, you have a child right now.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah. And all you'd have to do is tell Whoop at one, you know, at some point, hey, I've got a newborn who's born on this date, and all of a sudden that'll completely change the way Whoop talks to you.

[Mark Agnon]

Interesting. Would it? And would it change sort of like your relative floor? Would it be like, okay, you typically are getting this much recovery, but we understand that given the circumstance, for the next few months you'll be getting, you know, this recovery.

[Will Ahmed]

The. The scores wouldn't change, but the coaching on the scores would change.

[Mark Agnon]

I see.

[Will Ahmed]

So it would give you a little bit more permission to be run down and maybe scold you a little less for being run down in the case of dad mod.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah, yeah, no, that's really cool. The AI implementation I've found really interesting. Like, even just on the app, going into, like, the AI coach being like, hey, what time do I need to go to sleep to get better recovery, and just being able to ask and not have to search through a UI and actually find it for myself, just being able to go to a place, be like, hey, this is what. What do I need to do? And being able to have someone just tell me is really transformative for health. I think in a really broad way that I don't know if people really are anticipating, but I think it's going to fundamentally change fitness.

[Will Ahmed]

Well, I'm Glad you said that. And it's going to get a lot better. For what it's worth. I mean, we're. We're making some big investments in it right now. And one big piece around it is personalization. So it should talk to Mark differently than it talks to Will, differently than it talks to Jack, and so on and so forth. And. And that could be based on where you are in your life. That could be based on what motivates you to be successful. You know, some people probably want, like, a hard O. Some people need a little bit more of a comforting, loving V voice, you know, and. And. And anywhere in between. Right. That's. That's sort of the. The brilliance of coaching. There's going to be a whole memory component where essentially everything that you input in the journal and you tell whoop, and so on and so forth. Whoop will just remember, and that'll be used in the context of how Whoop coaches you. There's a lot that we're doing right now around structuring the data. So, you know, I've got, like, between 10 and 11 years of continuous physiological data on WHOOP. That's a pretty fascinating data set. It's probably one of the largest physiological data sets on a human being ever. And how does Whoop use that data? So it feels like it's at my fingertips. Right. And how does it reference different periods of time? And that's going to be a very interesting question, but essentially we want it such that, you know, once you've spent like a year on whoop, the idea that you would want to use a different product should decrease dramatically because of the value that you're gonna get from all the context of this period of time versus that period of time.

[Mark Agnon]

Right.

[Will Ahmed]

Could be different seasons, could be different locations, could be different places. You know, all these things affect how you slept or you recovered or your motivations, and there'll just be so many more insights at your fingertips.

[Mark Agnon]

Will the current AI models be able to reference all of the retroactive data from the very first day that you put on a whoop, even if it was in 2017?

[Will Ahmed]

Yes. And even more exciting than that, it's also going to be able to reference other data sets. So, for example, we're coming out with Advanced Labs this fall. Advanced Labs is going to allow you to upload all of your past blood tests. So, you know, if you've ever done a blood test through your doctor or you've used one of these other platforms, Quest and whatnot, and you'll just be able to upload that and then WHOOP will essentially store it and beautify it across all of our different graphs. And then that data will live within again this memory of understanding who you are. And then on a go forwards basis, you'll be able to do blood tests through whoop. And so it'll, it'll all feel under the same umbrella. And you can imagine over time adding more of these data sets because, you know, I have access to a lot of the best doctors and researchers and obviously I run this company and I've got WHOOP on and da da da. And yet it's still kind of hard to connect all these dots. Right. Like you've got some blood test over here, you've got a DNA test over here, you've got a doctor visit, you know, maybe two doctor visits in the last 12 months. Oh, I had an MRI because I had surgery recently.

[Mark Agnon]

It's very decentralized.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah. There's just like, and what do you make of all of it? And often you've got different doctors. Even at times, like when something goes wrong, you're seeing multiple doctors, you get different doctors at times telling you different things because they don't have all the same information. And so all of this data needs to live under one umbrella and there should be a powerful AI that sits on top of it that you can communicate directly with to make sense of it.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah. And then ideally give some insights for how to proceed.

[Will Ahmed]

Oh yeah, by the way, that's the punchline which is, I don't want to.

[Mark Agnon]

Say prescriptive, but I mean, in a.

[Will Ahmed]

Way it is, you should be coached to be health and, and it should be super proactive and preventative. You know, we've got like a, a chronic disease crisis in this country and, and in many places of the world. But, but I am quite concerned about America's health care system and, and you know, Americans now spend more on health care than they do on housing or food, which is insane. And I'm hopeful that continuous physiological monitoring, coupling data and putting it all under one umbrella and powerful AI is going to be able to help shift that.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah. And I mean just the diagnostic ability of something like ChatGPT to me in the past year has been tremendous. Like, I had a friend recently who had a hip injury, went to multiple different doctors, got Multiple different, different MRIs. All of them kind of told him different things. You should get a surgery, you just need to do physical therapy. I don't see anything wrong. I mean just the entire spectrum of political opinions and didn't Know what to do. Submitted everything to ChatGPT, and within like, five minutes of questioning, diagnosed almost perfectly what his issue was. And he went back. He went back to the physiologist or the doctor that actually gave him that sort of diagnosis, and he was like, yeah, this is exactly. Almost more descriptive than what I was thinking it was. And then he got surgery, and it was to the T. Exactly what the issue. Like, once they actually cut him open, they're like, yeah, it is a cartilage issue. And to me, I was like, he went to so many different people, spent so much money, and this AI was able to diagnose it immediately.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah, I think. I mean, in the immediate, it feels like AI plus your doctor is better than one or the other.

[Mark Agnon]

Right.

[Will Ahmed]

There's a. There's sort of a clumsy thing that's being done right now, which is like, should you ask your doctor or should you ask AI? Well, it's like, okay, yeah, it's like, I mean, wouldn't. Wouldn't it just be better off the doctor was asking AI too? You know, like. Like, let's just, let's. Let's create the best system we can. Yeah. Maybe in the long run, you only need to go to the doctor when something's really wrong or you need to have surgery or so on and so forth. But right now, like, tomorrow, we should just get doctors using these tools.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah. What's up, people? Quick announcement. If you are a fan of Camp Gagnon or religion Camp, I' Great news, because we are dropping History Camp. That's right. This is the channel where we're going to be exploring the most interesting, fascinating, controversial topics from all time throughout all history. Right. You probably know about Benjamin Franklin. I don't know, Thomas Jefferson, Nikola Tesla. Interesting figures from history and you probably learned about in school, and they were pretty boring. But not here. No. As you know, I was raised by a conspiracy theorist, so I'm going to be diving deep into all of the interesting, strange, occult, and secretive societal relationships that all of these famous, influential men from our shared past have. So if you're interested, please go ahead and subscribe to the YouTube channel. It will be pinned in the description as well as the comments. And if you're on Spotify, this doesn't really apply to you, but these episodes will be dropping as well. Just go ahead and give us a high rating because it really helps the show. Running a business comes with a lot of what ifs, but luckily there's a simple answer to them. Shopify, it's the commerce platform. Behind millions of businesses including Thrive Cosmetics and Momofuku. And it'll help you with everything you need. From website design and marketing to boosting sales and expanding operations. Shopify can get the job done and make your dream a reality. Turn those what ifs into sign up for your $1 per month [e-mail] specialoffer I'm curious, how can Whoop avoid some of the other issues that, you know, different AI models have had? So like for example, like I found ChatGPT even with having like a trainer or like a coach, I'll just program, be like, okay, be Dave Goggins, be Jocko Willink for me, give me like my eight week block, like give me whatever my, my training set is. And then over time it becomes softer and then over time it kind of loses personality. And I don't know what is happening internally within the API, but the voice changes. So I'm curious, is this an issue that you're aware of as far as like models kind of forgetting information or changing over time? And is there a way to remediate that within whoop internally?

[Will Ahmed]

What you're describing sounds like an issue with personalization and memory.

[Mark Agnon]

Right?

[Will Ahmed]

And I think the model companies are trying to decide right now how much of that they want to own versus how much they want to be just a great model.

[Mark Agnon]

Right.

[Will Ahmed]

And yeah, it sounds like that specific case something didn't really follow on the personalization and memory standpoint because the version of it we're building for whoop, if you told it those things, it wouldn't forget that. And if it was a hard o on day one, it's gonna be a hard O on day 100 until you tell it, hey, I wanna go back to dad mode, you know, or whatever. Pick whatever analogy you want.

[Mark Agnon]

Right. That's interesting. What are the other problems that, that you're trying to solve when it comes to implementing AI with health and fitness?

[Will Ahmed]

I like to just sort of think backwards from the member experience. Right. I think sometimes it's easy to get so obsessed with the technology that you kind of keep building technology and then figure out what to do with it. But really you want to start with what is the member experience and then figure out how the technology applies to that. I think the member experience should be to navigate any health issue in your life and to have this partner in crime, so to speak, to do that. And we want our members to be able to live healthier, longer lives. You know, we recently updated our mission to unlock human performance and healthspan, which Reflects really the evolution of the company, which was all around human performance and the pinnacle of sports and athletes with healthspan, which really reflects this idea that, that it's not just how long you live, but living at a higher quality. And we want people to live longer quality years. And where the experience kind of is really important is when you're looking at your data, you can quickly understand it and know what to do with it. I think Whoop has been good at this historically in the sense that we've always tried to summarize him for information in layers. So if when you open the app, for example, we just showed you all the things we collect, you would be like totally overwhelmed and have no idea what to do with it. So just the idea of from an experience standpoint, okay, if you have three seconds, maybe it's what color is my recovery today? Red, yellow, green? Or if you got 30 seconds, it's how well did I sleep last night? And what's my percentage of my recovery? And if you've got three minutes, maybe it's then understanding those things as well as your heart rate variability and your resting heart rate and what workout you should do, that's, I think, been a, like a productive system in terms of layering data. The health span version of that is. Is your whoop age, where, yes, we collect all these. These things about you, but we're going to give you one number at the top of the screen that tells you whether you're younger or older.

[Mark Agnon]

Right. What does it mean? Yeah, right.

[Will Ahmed]

And then, okay, if you want to dive into that, there's nine different metrics that we've, you know, worked with the Buck Institute, which is the leading longevity institute in the country, to figure out, you know, these things most highly correlate with all cause mortality. Okay, you want to pay attention to these nine things, and then we show you within those nine things, how far apart are you from people your age or people who are younger your age and all of a sudden you can action on it? Anyway, I give this background just to say, like, we've done a pretty good job, I think, structuring data in layers and creating scores and summaries of information to help simplify that experience. The next evolution of that is really telling people how to change these things in an effective and useful way. And if I were to be critical of the current experience, it relies a little bit too much on self interest or self motivation to figure some of that out. You know, whereas a really great coach will guide you through it and what you want to feel like on a go forwards basis using the WHOOP app is like you've got this world class coach over your shoulder, looking at the app with you and telling you what to do. And based on this data, you should do these things. And by the way, some days might feel like a coach, another day might feel like a nutritionist, another day might feel like a doctor. You know, and that's the power of AI and for us it's power of going really deep on these use cases and building out all these different experiences based on the journey that you're on.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah, I'm curious about nutrition because that is like, you know, I use like my fitness pal for if I'm going to track macros, if I'm in a specific, you know, moment of, you know, focusing on my nutrition, or I'll use even ChatGPT to log food and things like that. How is Whoop going to make a push to sort of own nutrition its own specific way, or is that not something that's going to be a priority?

[Will Ahmed]

I'll give you a general answer. The challenge with nutrition historically has been a data challenge. So everything we just talked about sort of implied that the data piece was solved. Hey, we can collect all this information, now we got to tell you what to do with it. In the case of nutrition, there still is a fundamental problem with can you collect the information? What do I mean by that? Well, okay, let's say you use one of these nutrition trackers and you remember to do your breakfast and your lunch and you put all the things in and then you kind of screw up dinner. You sort of forget to do dinner and by the way, you forgot about the snack and da, da. And so you say you ate 2000 calories and whoop says you burned 2200 calories and great, you're on a path to losing weight, but actually you really consume 2400 calories and you know, so you're actually gaining weight. So like data integrity is something I care a lot about. Because if we're going to coach you on something or tell you something's true or not true, the foundation with which we're telling you that has to be really, really robust. And, and so that's been a, that's been a problem with nutrition tracking. We've looked at making acquisitions in the space, we've looked at building some of our own capabilities. I think AI should help a lot. You know, now just the idea that you can take a picture and get pretty good macros from that, that's a big Leap forwards. But just to say it, a lot of people still will not take a picture of every single thing they ate. And so, you know, one of the principles to building this company is how do we do things non invasively? How do we do things in the background? How do we make it easy for you? Nutrition's an area where we're still figuring that out.

[Mark Agnon]

I wear a continuous glucose monitor.

[Will Ahmed]

Okay.

[Mark Agnon]

That helps purely. Yeah, like, just like performance, you know, I'm interested in like how my food is affecting the way I feel, how that affects the way I think, how that affects the way I train. I'm not diabetic, I'm not pre diabetic. I just like to wear it and I wear like a non medical version. I just got it on Amazon. I plug it in, tells me stuff on my phone. And I've heard from a friend that wearable tech generally, as a macro trend becomes smaller and closer to you. And I wonder, do you think there's a future for wearable tech? Maybe not whoop specifically, but in the world of fitness wearables, that things become, you know, a sleep tracker plus a glucose monitor all into one mechanism, or do you think the tech is too difficult, that these things would have to be like two separate systems?

[Will Ahmed]

Well, continuous glucose monitor is something that I think a number of companies have tried to do more non invasively. I think eventually it can be done with photoplasmography or versions of it, I think. And just to say that's like a non invasive way that you measure things like heart rate or blood pressure, it.

[Mark Agnon]

Could be done through, I think so.

[Will Ahmed]

I mean it's, it's still early, but that's fascinating. There's, there's a number of companies that are, that are working on it and they've had varying degrees of success. But that's one of those ones where if it feels like the future probably will happen.

[Mark Agnon]

Right.

[Will Ahmed]

And my instinct is that that'll probably happen. I don't have a good time frame for that. I don't think that's like in the next 12 months. But I, you know, I default back to like when I was starting this company 12 years ago, it seemed impossible that you'd be able to measure heart rate from the wrist, let alone at the same accuracy as a chest strap. And you know, we banged on that for like over a decade and got really good at it. And now we sit here and we can do blood pressure really well. Like no way anyone thought you could do blood pressure, let alone heart rate. So if you put really smart minds against something for a long enough period of time. And it doesn't defy physics. Like, it's plausible. Humanity tends to win.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah. Do you think they just become so small, like the chip theory or these types of things being just implanted into people? Do you see that as a plausible future? Do you think the option to wear it or not wear it, as far as just generally, you know, as far as wearables go.

[Will Ahmed]

Well, I. So to me that feels like you're leading with the technology rather than the experience. When you say all of a sudden it's inside of you versus on you.

[Mark Agnon]

Right.

[Will Ahmed]

Like, what benefit does that create for the experience? Does it, does it, you know, does it mean that it's measuring something that you otherwise wouldn't be able to measure? Okay, that could be possible. So, you know, that might be one reason that all of a sudden you have an implantable versus something that you're wearing externally. I think in general it's easier to have mass adoption when something's non invasive versus invasive, of course. So I like thinking about things non invasively. There is an element again of if it feels like the future, it's probably the future. And so there's something about implantables in that category. But I think there's a lot of. I think there's still a lot of interesting problems to solve non invasively.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah. Yeah. I'm just curious what that. I mean, obviously with like elon and neuralink and.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah, I mean, that's amazing technology, right.

[Mark Agnon]

I just, I'm curious how that affects, you know, wearables. And as like, if this theory that, you know, a friend said to me, things get smaller and closer to you. Her kind of conclusion was like, you know, ultimately these things become, you know, just things that are, you know, subdermal that are implanted for, you know, two months and get changed or something to that effect. And I guess I'm curious, like, is that timeline even remotely close, like within people in the space? Is that something that people are discussing with any type of legitimacy?

[Will Ahmed]

Well, we've said for a long time we, we always want the technology to get smaller and smarter, which is similar to what your, your friend says about smaller and closer. You know, when I was starting, whoop, there was a lot of, like, I sort of looked at the arc of technology, which was that computers were going from being on your desk to being on your lap to being in your pocket. And it seemed inevitable they were going to eventually be on your body or in your body. And so you do see that arc playing out. And neuralink's a good example of that as well, where you've got an implantable that's all of a sudden changing people's ability to communicate with their brain. So I, I look, it's a space that we're, we're interested in and, and we're looking at.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah, that seems ominous. I like that. I'm curious. We've been talking about, like, kind of flirting around this idea of, like, wearables as, you know, obviously health devices, but potentially even medical devices. And I know the fda, recently, you guys have been in a battle for some reason that I fail to completely even understand why this is an issue and why they're making such a hard line with you guys. So can you kind of explain what the issue has been with the FDA with specifically, like blood pressure tracking, why they're making such a stand on this issue with you?

[Will Ahmed]

So the first thing to understand about medical regulation is one, it varies by market, so every country has their own form of a regulatory body. And two, there's an important distinction between is something intended for wellness use or is it intended for medical diagnosis? Now, the FDA's mandate is to regulate things that are for medical diagnosis. If you look at a lot of different physiological metrics, they have a wellness intended use, and they have a medical intended use. So let's take heart rate, for example. Heart rate has existed since the 80s with, you know, chest trap monitors. It can be used to, you know, help people understand exercise or stress. You know, whoop does it. The apple watch does a lot of products, do heart rate monitoring, and that is under a wellness umbrella. Those use cases, because you're using heart rate to explain exercise. And so that's for. Intended for wellness. If you want to tell someone that they have afib, right, all of a sudden, that requires a medical clearance because it's more in this, you know, umbrella of diagnosis. And so that's an example where you'd have to work with the fda, you'd have to go through clinical trials, and you'd have to get the product approved. Now just to say it, Whoop has actually done both of those things. We've done heart rate monitoring in a wellness capacity, and we've done ECG monitoring, and it's cleared by the fda. So today we have a medically cleared product by the fda. So we're pretty familiar with this distinction. If you go down the list of physiological metrics, you know, heart rate, sleep. Right, Sleep, okay, we can tell you your hours of sleep, or if we want to detect that you have sleep apnea. Okay. That needs to be approved. Right. Again, wellness versus medical.

[Mark Agnon]

And I can see the distinction of why that matters.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah. And you kind of keep going like SpO2 and respiratory rate and so on and so forth. There's all these metrics that have a wellness use case and a medical use case case. Okay, blood pressure. So three years ago we started working on non invasively measuring blood pressure. Just to say it, blood pressure is a critical understanding of your body. It's a really important physiological metric. There's a reason when you walk into a doctor's office, it's the first or second thing they do is they measure your blood pressure. It's something that people should be really aware of. And so it's a metric that we care a lot about. We had a breakthrough over the course of those three years where all of a sudden we were able to measure blood pressure quite accurately when alongside a cuff calibration. So what does that mean? So a WHOOP member would put on a cuff, they take three readings, they enter those three readings into the WHOOP app and then their forwards, they get a daily estimate every day from whoop of their of their blood pressure. And it's super accurate. And we built this feature under the umbrella of wellness. There's a ton of peer reviewed research that supports the fact that blood pressure has a wellness impact on your life. Not surprisingly, you know, blood pressure affects your sleep and your stress and it's affected by nutrition. And you know, I had a woman in my office a couple weeks ago, she had a, you know, a lower reading on WHOOP for blood pressure. And all of a sudden she realized she was dehydrated. She drinks more water, all of a sudden their blood pressure is back normal. Like that's a classic wellness use case. The fda, when we launched this feature, came out to us and said if it's blood pressure it has to be medically regulated. We said, well no, we built this for wellness use case. And they said, well if it's, if it's blood pressure, it has to be regulated. And meanwhile, inside the WHOOP app, we've got all these disclaimers about how this feature, blood Pressure Insights, is not designed for medical diagnosis. It's designed to understand blood pressure alongside wellness. And you know, the FDA didn't really have an open mind to some of that. And so that's where this engagement is right now. And you know, we're fighting for this because first of all, it's the law. There's the 21st Century Cures act that makes it incredibly clear that there's a distinction between wellness intended use and medical intended use, and that the FDA is only supposed to regulate things that have a medical diagnosis. Whereas in this case, we're not diagnosing hypertension or anything else. And we're very clear about it being for wellness. We're also fighting for it because it's really innovative. I mean, the fact that we're able to measure this thing super accurately in a non invasive form factor is a breakthrough. And by the way, it's being celebrated in 50 markets around the world. The only country where it's being challenged is in the United States. And so we're fighting for innovation. And then lastly, I think there's a whole thesis right now around giving Americans access to health data. And the same way we've given them access to things like heart rate and, you know, respiratory rate and pulse ox and use that information to shape behavior as we were talking about earlier, and drive behavior outcomes. It's just totally inconsistent that those things can be under wellness, but for some reason blood pressure can't. Even though there's all this research that supports that blood pressure as a wellness impact.

[Mark Agnon]

So what is happening internally? If you had to guess with the fda, why are they doing this with you guys specifically? Like, obviously you're making the breakthrough, but I can't imagine that, you know, this is the first time something has sort of been in maybe a gray area between wellness and, you know, medical diagnostics. So why is this the thing that they're taking such a hard line with?

[Will Ahmed]

Well, I think that's a, that's a good fundamental question. My sense is there's an over reliance on past precedent, which is because all the cuffs needed to be regulated and cuffs measure blood pressure. If something measures blood pressure, it needs to be regulated. Well, no, we actually created this whole new sophisticated way of doing this that now also talks about wellness and is focused on wellness and is not intended for medical diagnosis. Right. So like they, they haven't quite adapted to that new world of, of technological innovation.

[Mark Agnon]

They had some type of legislation in the 80s that was like, hey, if you go into a CVS and put your arm in a cuff or whatever, this has to be federally regulated.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah, the blood pressure cuff is a, is a fairly old instrument and every prior product that could measure blood pressure was a C. And so, you know, I can kind of understand some confusion there, but at the same time, you want to create an environment in which America's best technology companies can innovate and provide access to health data to Americans.

[Mark Agnon]

And not to mention that this information would be helpful on a wellness basis. Like, you know, just.

[Will Ahmed]

Oh, totally.

[Mark Agnon]

Like, it'd be massive for someone to be able to have like, you know, accurate or even semi accurate blood pressure information on a regular basis. I mean, yeah, it's a breakthrough.

[Will Ahmed]

And so, yeah, that's why we're fighting for it. We think we're on the right side of history with this. And for what it's worth, it seems fairly consistent with a lot of what the administration, this administration has said about their desire to give Americans more access to health data.

[Mark Agnon]

And are you optimistic about the outcome or what that will look like? When could this be resolved? How long does something like this take?

[Will Ahmed]

Well, we're actively engaging with the fda. I mean, just to say it, like, I have a lot of respect for the fda. I think they play a critical role in society and I just think they got this one totally wrong. And so, you know, there's a little bit, I think of hopefully a magnifying glass on some of the policy here and what really is wellness, which I think a lot of companies will benefit from more transparency and clarity around. And yeah, I'm pretty optimistic in the long run, we'll be proven right.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah. I wonder if they are also maybe just like worried about like slippery slope or something. If they're like, oh, you know, with the, with wearables, whether it's Apple Watch or Garmin or Whoop coming out with more features. If they're just like, we don't know what is going to happen. We just need to put a stop to this now and create, you know, precedent going forward. And I wonder if it's a little bit reactionary from their part, you know.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah, I can't speak exactly to where they're coming from on this. I just think that there's a reliance on past precedent, there's a lack of understanding on current technology, and there's a broad inconsistency around how a bunch of these different metrics are being treated. Yeah, you know, you can't have five different or ten different physiological metrics be clearly identified as wellness and then all of a sudden have another one just not be wellness. When of course, all the peer reviewed research supports how important it is to your wellness right now.

[Mark Agnon]

Blood pressure is a feature that's available on the new.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah, this is on Whoop Life, which is our highest membership tier.

[Mark Agnon]

Gotcha. And what other features are there on Whoop Life? Like, what are the new ones that have dropped from the, the previous iteration.

[Will Ahmed]

So we've got the heart screener, which has the ability to. To do AFIB detection with an ecg. So you can take an ECG directly from your wrist like this. I hold these two little tabs. It'll do an ECG reading. I can send that to a doctor and immediately get feedback on it.

[Mark Agnon]

Oh, you can send it to the doctor internally from. From Whoop.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah, directly from whoop. Yeah.

[Mark Agnon]

Wow.

[Will Ahmed]

And by the way, that's a medically cleared feature from the fda. So, like, we worked with the FDA for two and a half years to get that cleared. Wow. So, you know, I just want to say that we're pretty familiar with this distinction between wellness and medical, and we've already engaged very closely.

[Mark Agnon]

Open to collaboration.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah, we're open to collaboration. Yeah.

[Mark Agnon]

What is the feature from, you know, Whoop Life that you are most excited about or most proud of? Like, was there one specific thing that you're like? You know, to the average consumer, they're like, oh, cool, a new little thing. But you're like, you have no idea how difficult it was to try to achieve this new thing.

[Will Ahmed]

Well, I would say Blood Pressure Insights was one of the hardest features we've ever developed, in part because we did so many things on the technology side to make it possible, but we also did a lot of things to make it a wellness specific feature. You know, one of my frustrations with this process with the FDA is they haven't even engaged around a lot of the things that we did to emphasize its wellness category. So, for example, when we were testing, we initially called it Blood pressure monitor and we initially said today's reading. So when you were looking in the app, it would say blood pressure monitor and then it would say today's reading. And we did a bunch of user testing and we were asking people if they thought this was a blood pressure monitor versus something that was giving them this like, you know, daily estimate. And you know, a few people, like most people it was like 17 out of 20 or something, said that, that they knew it wasn't a blood pressure monitor. But a few people, you know, thought it, thought it could be used as a medical device. So then we changed the language so that it was, it was Blood Pressure Insights and Daily estimate. And we also changed where some of the disclaimers were. And then when we did user testing again, every single person said they knew it wasn't a medical device. So that's like some of the sort of. Of painful effort that we put into designing this for Wellness that, you know, if I were the fda, I would at least hear us out on. Like, there should be some conversation about this stuff. And so that's part of my frustration is just I don't think we've been able to sort of explain all the things we did to make this possible. And lastly, I'll just say on this point, we've heard an uproar from our member base. You know, the idea that this feature should be regulated by the fda, our members totally disagree with that. And they talk about how they had to go through all the disclaimers, how it's very clear, how they love the feature, how it's super accurate. So again, you know, if you just listen to your consumers, you listen to Americans, you know, I think that also demonstrates wrong. Good standing.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah. Do your parents wear. Woo.

[Will Ahmed]

Of course.

[Mark Agnon]

They rock it all the time. Do they give you feedback?

[Will Ahmed]

Oh, yeah, yeah. My mom will take screenshots, be like, I'm a little disappointed by the feedback Whoop gave me today. Really? Oh, thanks, mom.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah, that's so funny. Have they, have they contributed anything? They're like, oh, that's actually brilliant. Like, I didn't even consider this, like, specifically in the early days. Were they ever, like, going through being like, this doesn't actually function properly?

[Will Ahmed]

Well, I mean, I'll say this, if you're 22 years old and you want to start a company, your parents energy towards you on that topic matters a lot. And my dad, you know, immigrated to this country when he was 22 years old with like three grand in a suitcase and really had, you know, not a lot of a plan in front of him, and he figured it out and, you know, went on to have a very successful career.

[Mark Agnon]

What kind of work did he do?

[Will Ahmed]

He worked in finance.

[Mark Agnon]

Okay.

[Will Ahmed]

Like in private wealth management and worked at JP Morgan for a while.

[Mark Agnon]

Was he doing finance in Egypt before?

[Will Ahmed]

No.

[Mark Agnon]

Really?

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah, he, he, he left from Alexandria and then came to the States to figure it out.

[Mark Agnon]

Did he have college education in Alexandria?

[Will Ahmed]

No, it was in, it was actually in London.

[Mark Agnon]

Oh, interesting.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah.

[Mark Agnon]

So he went Alexandria, here, London, then came back.

[Will Ahmed]

Well, to be fair, he went from, from Alexandria to London, London to the States. So he was in London for two years before coming here.

[Mark Agnon]

Gotcha.

[Will Ahmed]

But my point broadly being, like, he did something a little crazy when he was really young too.

[Mark Agnon]

I mean, very crazy.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah. And, and you know, my mom, I think, has always had a positive attitude towards this entrepreneurial spirit of mine. And, and so I think they both were excited for me and nervous for me, but they weren't negative about it. And that was helpful because it was at a time when I think a lot of other people in my life were quite negative about it. You know, starting a company was not like just the leap of saying I was starting the company was one of the hardest parts of building. Whoop. Because I was in this very, you know, from the ages of like 20 to 22. I wanted to do this thing, but I didn't know what I was doing. And a lot of other people were, were taking safe jobs and going on a safer path and making, by the way, six figures right out of college because Goldman Sachs or McKinsey wanted to pay him a bunch of money. And so I, you know, I felt kind of like a loser going to start a company. And especially when I tried to raise capital for the company initially or I tried to recruit people, there was just a ton of rejection in that process. And, and, and so that was hard. That was, that was something that I had to overcome and get more comfortable with.

[Mark Agnon]

You didn't have friends from your immediate peer group at Harvard that were also starting businesses and.

[Will Ahmed]

None really.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah, I'm shocked by that.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah. I mean, I think it's a little different now. This was again, like 12 years ago. It feels like today there's maybe a slightly broader network that you can plug into if you want to start a company. And maybe I didn't look hard enough, but I didn't find that network.

[Mark Agnon]

That's interesting. So early on, most of your peers were like, yeah, I don't know if this is the way.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah. And I would say it was much more critical than that from the standpoint of like the adults, you know, when I went to go meet with people who invested in early stage businesses or who understood technology or, you know, had built a successful career and told them about what I was thinking about doing and why I wanted to start this thing. Overwhelmingly negative feedback.

[Mark Agnon]

And what was the criticism couched in? Is it, oh, they don't understand wearable tech? Obviously it was in a very different place 12 years ago.

[Will Ahmed]

I think the most sympathetic defense I can give of that sort of broad narrative that I heard at the time is that I was describing starting a company at the intersection of hardware, software design and medicine. And I was 22 years old and I wasn't an engineer or a computer scientist or a designer or a doctor. And at the same time, Nike was about to enter the space and Apple was rumored to be entering the space.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah, Fitbit was.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah. So that I, I Think when I say it out loud like that, it's like, okay, this is somewhat implausible.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah. It feels ambitious.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah. And so I could see people around you, maybe even, well meaning, being like, yeah, dude, why not just go take a sick job at McKinsey and just consult for, you know, some government and make crazy money and just live your life. Life. Whereas you're like, no, I have this crazy idea that's. I don't know how it's achievable. So I can see the sympathetic side of them being like, eh. Have they come around those same people? Do you keep in touch with any of the people that initially gave resistance?

[Will Ahmed]

Not really. Yeah. It's funny, I don't think that much about them.

[Mark Agnon]

Right.

[Will Ahmed]

There's. There's like, the spiteful version of the entrepreneur, I think, where you're like, oh, I'm gonna show them in the back of your mind, like, wait till they see what I'm gonna do. Right. But I actually. I got over that pretty fast. I just realized it didn't matter. And I think one secret in that is you're much more. You'll be much better off focusing on the believers than the naysayers, you know, and it doesn't matter if you. You run into 20 naysayers, as long as you find one believer.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah.

[Will Ahmed]

And just, you know, stay close to the believers. Get under the same roof together.

[Mark Agnon]

And your parents were big believers. They supported off rip.

[Will Ahmed]

I think they believed in me. I don't know if they initially thought the idea for the company was like a home run or not, but I think they believed in me.

[Mark Agnon]

What made you think that they were not as enthusiastic about the idea? Did at any point your dad pull you aside, be like, hey, Will, what are we doing?

[Will Ahmed]

Well, I mean, look, even there's times where I think back on it and I'm like, God, it was a hard idea. You know, I didn't. I didn't. I mean, I was naive, and that in some ways helped. I didn't realize how hard it was to build a company that was hardware and software and kind of in the intersection of research and medicine.

[Mark Agnon]

Thank God you didn't know.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah.

[Mark Agnon]

No way you would have started had you known how hard it was going to be.

[Will Ahmed]

There's an element to that. There's certainly an element to that.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah. And so were your parents. At any point, was your dad like, eh, or was he like, yo, go ahead and we'll see how this goes? And then pretty quickly, you started having, you know, versions of success that he was like, oh yeah, we can let this, let this rock.

[Will Ahmed]

I think his headline was go for it, you know, good luck. And we didn't spend a lot of time talking about the nuances of, you know, how big the hardware team should be versus the software team or how much capital I needed to raise or whatever. A lot of that was just under the umbrella. Figure it out.

[Mark Agnon]

Were there mentors that came along that started to guide you at a certain point and actually showed you how to build a company and how to assemble teams and create leadership hierarchies?

[Will Ahmed]

I learned a lot of things, I think, through trial and error. I think I did have great early stage investors and mentors and advisors. And one thing I learned over time was to figure out who to call for what problems. I think a mistake you can make as an entrepreneur is to think that your mentor is the person you call about everything. But really you want to find sort of these different strategic nodes that you can go to for different problems. Okay, I've got a capital problem, I'm going to this person, I've got a design problem, I'm going to this person. I've got an engineering problem, I'm going to this person. You kind of build this like network around yourself.

[Mark Agnon]

Do you still have that now in some capacity or does it exist as like the executive team internally?

[Will Ahmed]

I'd say it's both of those things. You know, you have a board of directors that you lean on. I've always had a lot of advisors around the company because what Whoop does is so multifaceted. You know, there's so many different divisions and types of, of hard work that we do here. But I'll say this, and this is not something again, I knew when I was 22, if you set out to do something really ambitious and really hard that attracts a certain type of person. So maybe it's going to turn off nine out of 10 people, but the one person it intrigues is probably pretty good at what they do because the best people want to work on the hardest problems.

[Mark Agnon]

Right?

[Will Ahmed]

And you do want to create a filter as well, depending on what kind of business you're building. But the filter goes something like this. If I tell you, Mark, you're going to do something that's never been done before, we don't know how to do it. But you're either going to be someone who smiles and says, hell yeah, right? Or you're going to be like, that's what? That doesn't make any sense. Why would I do that?

[Mark Agnon]

And you're self selecting for people that are amazing.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah. And by the way, just like be honest about that filter. Like, hey, we want you to do something that's really hard, that's never been done before. Do you want to work here? Yeah, right. Like, and, and so in a sense, it self selects and you end up with the. This really ambitious, capable group of people. And everyone's a little bit it crazy in a good way.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah. How were the early rounds of actually funding and getting investment? Was that difficult? Like I can imagine that point of being like, especially a young founder being 22, 23, trying to loosen up a couple mil from an individual investor, from, you know, private equity, you know, group must be a daunting task. What were those early meetings like? Trying to actually get capital.

[Will Ahmed]

I mean, a lot comes to mind. I think fundraising is a skill in that of its own. Right. And people don't really talk about that, you know, but it's an obvious thing if you think about it. Like the ability to raise capital and tell a story and get people to give you money and believe in the future and to create alignment around that and to create a process around that. It's a, it's a skill. And that's the skill I needed to develop. And you can make the mistake as a young entrepreneur or really as anyone who's trying to raise capital, first time of thinking, you either have it or you don't. And that's not the right way to think about it. It's just something you need to get better at. You need reps, you need rejection, you need to smile after that rejection, and you need to keep going. And so that's the, that's the pain of learning how to raise capital for the first time. In my case, there were a few other challenges. One was that I didn't really know even where to start when it came to raising capital. So there was a lot of. I get introduced to this person who introduces me to this person who introduces me this person, and you're kind of on these various, you know, webs of introductions trying to figure out where you're going. And in hindsight, like now I would know very quickly where to go to raise any type of capital for any type of business. Another thing was that the business I was building again was very capital intensive. So it wasn't like, oh, if this person can raise a few hundred thousand dollars, it'll be obvious that I should add a few hundred thousand dollars. You know, there's a little bit of like a momentum element to fundraising where if you can get a few people and then a few people follow, it really was like, oh, wow, this business is going to require a lot of capital. And by the way, the, the companies that are entering this space are the biggest companies in the world with, you know, hundreds of millions of dollars dedicated to this specific problem. So remind me what you're going to be able to do with my 100 grand or 50 grand. Right. Another mistake I made was I, I felt like I was perpetually fundraising for the first year or two of the business. And when you raise capital, you really want to have a beginning of a process and meet everyone at once and then push to close. You know, you want to create pace and you want to create scarcity. Those are two key components, independent from your business, that drive a fundraising process. It needs to move quickly and there needs to be a lot of demand. And then that herds everyone together to boom, close. If you go meet one investor and wait two weeks, and then go meet another investor and wait two weeks, weeks, they all kind of just wait around. And in a sense, you can't blame that investor because the investor is trying to look for other sources of data. They just met you. They're trying to figure out, is now the time to jump in? Well, if nothing's really happening yet, I guess I can just wait a little bit longer and see where Will is in a month, you know, whereas it's like, hey, this is coming together, this is happening. We're getting term sheets. So again, that was another mistake I made. And I think the last piece, which we touched on a little bit, is you meet, especially for an early stage business, you meet a lot of investors who want to keep asking you questions. And so you'll be on your 5th or 6th or 7th or 8th meeting with someone, and you'll be thinking to yourself, gosh, it's only one more meeting. Like, I'm gonna get this person across the line. I've put so much into this. They must be so close.

[Mark Agnon]

Sun cost, totally.

[Will Ahmed]

And in the amount of time that it takes to kind of keep trying to drag this person across the line, you could have gone and met five other people and one of which would have said yes in the first meeting. And, and, and so that's a huge like. And I don't even know if those investors realize they're not going to invest, but just empirically, they never invest.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah, yeah.

[Will Ahmed]

You know, and so you need to move on from those people quickly.

[Mark Agnon]

You sound like a girl in the city right now. You're like, these Guys, they go on dates and, like, it just feels like no one wants to settle down, you know? Yeah, well, I mean, that's how it is, though, you know, These guys, if they're not gonna. If I, I do know dudes that are like that, that, like, they just seem like they're perpetual flirts when it comes to investing. And they'll, like, kind of like it. It seems like they don't say it directly, but, like, they'll kind of allude to, like, yeah, I have another meeting with these guys. I'm like, this is the fifth time you've talked to them. Like, how do you not know if you're in or out?

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah, yeah, that's a huge waste of everyone's time.

[Mark Agnon]

So what is the policy now? Are you like, hey, two rounds, three rounds, three meetings, and that's it.

[Will Ahmed]

Fortunately, when you get to a later stage, it's a much more structured process in a way, because you have big institutional investors and they have teams and you have a data room. And that makes sense. You know, the process is sort of set up up right from day one, right. And there's enough like, infrastructure around it where it kind of self manages. And then it also depends how good your business is. In the early days, though, and this is where I'm speaking to, like, that entrepreneur who's trying to raise a million bucks or whatever and get their thing off the ground. You can raise a million bucks just on an idea. And that's one of the beautiful things about America is there's a lot of people who will fund that. If you're a credible, ethical person and you've got a vision for something, and that's kind of what I'm speaking to, where the process matters a lot today. Just because we have a real business that's got certain business metrics that are exciting, we could raise capital without me pitching anything, just because there's a financial story that speaks for itself. But at the early days, when you're. You're building something that's on an idea and it's all on the come, you knew. You do need to find, you do need to develop the skills and the muscle around how to close a round of financing.

[Mark Agnon]

That makes sense. Was there ever an opportunity early on that someone approached you and said, hey, we'll buy everything you guys have done, all the data, give you a clean exit. Here's a few hundred million, just get out. Did that ever come across the table? Did you ever consider it?

[Will Ahmed]

There were a couple versions of that over the course of the History of whoop. I never seriously considered it. There was versions of that at a very early stage where it was like, we're excited about the technology, and we want to acquire it. There was, like, a version of that in, like, 2018, 2019, where the business. The product was then more robust. So technology being like, okay, they can measure interesting things. Let's turn it into a product product. Then the product being something that people wore and liked. Okay. But we still hadn't really built the business, which is, like, all the sales to go with it. And so that was kind of the second version of a potential exit, but we weren't interested in it.

[Mark Agnon]

Can you say what the number that was floated at that second exit was?

[Will Ahmed]

I'm not gonna get into it.

[Mark Agnon]

That's a lot. That means a lot. That's an interesting thing, though. I just know I've. I've met founders on opposite sides of the spectrum where, you know, I'll just have friends. I had a friend that exited for, like, 160 million, like, last year, and he was just like, yeah, dude. I was. I was. I'm done. Like, I was happy with what we built. I liked it. I wasn't obsessed with it. It was cool, and I'm clean, you know, And I was like, oh, that's an interesting perspective. He's like, yeah, I didn't want to have 10 years and. And this arduous process of building and competing and trying to get knocked off and regulation. I just wanted a clean break. And then I've met other folks that are like, no amount of money would get me to budge because this is my life's goal, this is my passion, and I am an unmovable object when it comes to me pursuing this dream. And it feels like things kind of exist on either side. I'm curious. I mean, based off your behavior, I feel like you are a true ideologue that really loves what you do and have a real vision for, you know, making America and the world healthier, more health conscious, and just promoting wellness. Is that fair?

[Will Ahmed]

I'm certainly, like, a missionary about it. I think at the same time, I'm pragmatic about it. You know, like, it feels great to make investors money. It feels great to make shareholders money. It feels great to have your team win, you know, and that requires a financial outcome. And, you know, I'm going to deliver that for the team and the shareholders and all the people who have believed in me and this vision along the way. So you can't let the mission. You can't let the mission cloud, the fact that this is a capitalistic endeavor too, from the standpoint of taking care of the people who believed in you, like, I do really believe in that. That said, there's a huge overlap in these two concepts in the sense that as you've hit milestones over the course of a 10 year period, do you feel like you've reached the top of the mountain from the standpoint of what the mission is capable of and what the business is capable of, or do you feel like you're still ascending? And where a lot of businesses get sold is when the CEO or the management team kind of feel like we're at a local high here. We don't really know how we're going to get to the next thing. And these guys want to give us a lot of money. Right. And so when you look at it through that lens, you're like, okay, yeah, we should probably, we should probably exit here. But if you're on this ascent and you actually feel the opposite, which is, one, we're not even close to the top of the mountain, and two, we actually know a lot of things internally that no one knows about, that we feel like if we can really do, we're going to be at a whole nother stratosphere when we execute, then you're, you're ready to keep going, you know, and you're ready to strap in.

[Mark Agnon]

That makes sense.

[Will Ahmed]

That's how I feel.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah. I think that gives me a much better perspective on kind of the calculation that went into it.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah.

[Mark Agnon]

The last thing I'm curious about, just with kind of understanding you just as like an entrepreneur is, I mean, I think you, you sort of possess like an interesting, almost like prototype. And I'm sure people have made comparisons like, oh, Zuckerberg or whatever, right? Like a young founder from Harvard that's developing something that is hyper ambitious, that is now massively successful. And I'm sure people make a bunch of overlaps and they try to project it onto you. I'm curious, growing up or even now in your entrepreneurship journey, do you feel like you connect or commiserate with other business people, any other entrepreneurs? Is there anyone that you read about that you're like, oh, yeah, I can understand what this is, or maybe that even inspired part of the journey or why you wanted to be an entrepreneur in the first place?

[Will Ahmed]

There's a lot of entrepreneurs that I read about just because I love the entrepreneurial journey. I read all the Steve Jobs books, the Elon Musk books. I like reading specific stories of how an entrepreneur built a business that maybe I didn't know that much about. I grew up in love with Nike as a brand. I still have a lot of admiration for Nike as a brand. So I read Phil Knight's Shoe Dog and, you know, got very interested in Phil Knight for a period of time and how Nike was created. So I. I think I'm. I gravitate to being a study of these types of entrepreneurs. I'll say this, though. I think you're better off not comparing yourself to other entrepreneurs. Entrepreneur success, quote, unquote. Successful entrepreneurs do a good job creating a benchmark of what's possible. You know, this idea that you can create something from scratch and that can actually change society and change the world we live in and make a little dent in the universe. Like that as an inspiration is something that you should really cherish and keep close to your heart. When you're building something that doesn't exist, that feels really hard, that feels like it's about to fail, so on and so forth. I think the key, though, is not comparing your skills to those entrepreneurs, but rather comparing yourself to yourself and this idea of just trying to get a little bit better every single day.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah.

[Will Ahmed]

And that is a mindset for me, I think, has been helpful in growing the business. The other group that I've always gravitated to is professional athletes and just people at the pinnacle of athletic performance. And so I grew up loving Michael Jordan and Tiger woods and Roger Federer and some of these just iconic athletes who always found a way or who could dig deep. And one of the cool things about building this company is now I'm friends with a lot of professional athletes and have relationships with a lot of professional athletes. And so I've gotten to, you know, sit like this with. With a Cristiano Ronaldo or, you know, a Rory McElroy or a Michael Phelps or Patrick Mahomes and so on and so forth. And. And I think there's. There's something. There's a positive, like osmosis that comes from being able to sit in that environment and just sort of feel what kind of energy that person is bringing and. And what was the cost of their success? Yes, we see the trophies, but. But what is that grind behind the scenes? And if there's anything I've learned from these professional athletes who are at the pinnacle of their sport, not just a great professional athlete, but one of the best of all time of their sport, it's the insane cost that comes with that and the amount of work that comes with that. And there's an element where you even wonder, if everyone in the world had that talent, how many people actually would be sitting in the position that that person's sitting in because of the work that goes into it.

[Mark Agnon]

I even think the athlete comparison is apartment and sometimes I'll read a book about Rockefeller or Bezos and my friends will be like, what bearing does reading about Bezos have on your work? Or what you do? And to me, I'm like, it is just a study of greatness.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah, totally.

[Mark Agnon]

Regardless of what you think about Bezos as a person, billionaires as sort of a philosophy, it's like, like, he's great. He's an amazing architect of systems and supply chains and understanding how human beings work. I'm like, and Michael Jordan is great, and Tom Brady is great and Wayne Gretzky is great. And they all exist within a spectrum of highest achieving people to ever exist. And to me, it's an admirable thing to study. And I think a lot of people look at sports and be like, oh, yeah, I like basketball, so I like studying Michael Jordan. But to me, I'm like, I just like greatness and people that do great things. And that's why I'm drawn to Bezos or Elon. Irregardless of how they operate on a personal basis. I just find them fascinating.

[Will Ahmed]

Totally. And these greats often have valuable little one liners that if you can kind of keep in your back pocket, are useful. Like you were mentioning Bezos and I was thinking about his. He's got this great line that people tend to overestimate risk and underestimate opportunity.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah.

[Will Ahmed]

And it's just like little things like that are like, nice little.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah.

[Will Ahmed]

He's got another one where it's if the data and the anecdotes don't match, trust the anecdotes. I love that.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah.

[Will Ahmed]

It's like if something just doesn't feel right, it doesn't sound right. But Data's telling you one thing, like, pay more attention to what's going on.

[Mark Agnon]

Trust the vibes. Trust your intuition.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah. Which is an interesting thing for someone to say who's built one of the most successful companies in the world.

[Mark Agnon]

He had a thing about entrepreneurship. He's like, the amazing thing with entrepreneurship is that you're basically playing baseball and the returns from your home run are so outsized. He's like, if you're playing baseball, the most points you can score is four.

[Will Ahmed]

Right.

[Mark Agnon]

But in business, the most you can score is a million X. Like the top end is so high. And the strikeout is the same, but the top end, the ceiling is massive. And just that metaphor of like, oh, yeah, imagine you're playing baseball, but there's almost an infinite number of bases and there's a runner on all of them. Like, yeah, you're absolutely should swing. Like, to me, just even that metaphor is just like so much wisdom distilled into a single line. And I think about Bezos a lot for that reason.

[Will Ahmed]

I think there's a version of that with people too.

[Mark Agnon]

In what way?

[Will Ahmed]

Like, I think that it. You can invest in someone and create the right belief system in them and they can work their asses off and commit to something and be like a thousand x the person that under different circumstances they could have been. And people don't really talk about that. But I do think there's this element of human potential which is underestimated. I think we all kind of have a, like a massive spectrum on our potential.

[Mark Agnon]

Oh, absolutely. And I think the amount that it's nurtured and the environmental components I think are like fundamental. Like, I mean, I think. I mean, it's trite at this point, but like, hard work beats talent, you know, like those kind of ideas. If talent doesn't work hard, like, like, that'd be something you'd see in a locker room. But I do think, like, the fundamental idea behind that is true. Like, if you can instill the feeling of hustle and like hard work, that is going to outpace someone that is just naturally talented if they don't have the same thing. And creating the environmental atmosphere for someone to do that and to actually, you know, commit themselves to achieving something hard. I mean, now again, as a parent, to circle all the way back, Like, I think about that with my kids, I'm like, how do I create an environment where they are nurtured and well loved, but also really want to work hard and like, really love working hard and like handle rejection like that. To me, that is like one of the biggest challenges that I'm thinking about with my kids.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah, it's a hard. It's a hard thing. I found that it's hard to take someone who is seemingly like lazy or not not hard working and try to make them hardworking. But I think you can take someone who has drive and put them on something that matches their ambition or skill set or potential, and all of a sudden they can work much harder than they even realized.

[Mark Agnon]

Oh yeah, yeah, absolutely. Especially once they start getting the positive feedback from that success. Whereas for someone that is just like, naturally lazy. There is no real positive. Like, it's just more work, which is the exact thing that we're trying to not do. So, like, that initial stage is just so arduous. They're like, yeah, I'm good.

[Will Ahmed]

There's a good line about laziness, which is if you can show someone and not the cost of what it takes to do something, but the benefit of what it provides, that's the path to overcoming their laziness. So people who are lazy tend to think about, oh, this is going to be so much work to do this. But they don't think about, if I do this, this is what I'll get or, this is what I'll receive. It's just a simple reframing.

[Mark Agnon]

That's interesting, because in my mind, I think my dad was very much an entrepreneur, and so I. I feel like I was raised with that mindset of, like, the work is completely, like, who cares about the work? Like, yeah, you're gonna die, life sucks, whatever. Like, just do the work. But I always saw what the outcome could be. Like, that outsized opportunity thing that Bezos talks about. Like, dude, I. I always saw that. So even putting myself in the mindset of someone that isn't considering that at all, and only thinking about the work is almost. I. I'm almost. I lack, like, a basic empathy because I didn't realize that that was the mindset. That. And even just hearing that quote, I'm like, oh, yeah, that makes a lot of sense. That's a much better way to rephrase it. For people that are just not interested in hard work.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah. And then for the people who are naturally hard working, then. Then they also start to love the grind.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah.

[Will Ahmed]

And that's what you see for the. Like, back to the athletes. That's what you see for the athletes who have crazy longevity is. It's not that they just love championships. They actually have, like, forced themselves to love the grind. Oh, yeah.

[Mark Agnon]

Well, I also think just outlasting anyone is going to be almost one of the biggest indicators of how great you can be. LeBron's greatness, I think, has to be looked at through the scope of his legacy and how long he's been playing.

[Will Ahmed]

Totally. It's amazing.

[Mark Agnon]

It's remarkable. And. I don't know. I'm just fascinated by greatness, and that's what makes this conversation awesome. I really appreciate you sitting down, because I think what you're doing is phenomenal. And, yeah, just what you've built is really impressive and inspiring. So. So thank you so much for. For letting me come into the compound and. And chop it up with you.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah, it's been awesome, man. It's been great spending time with you. Appreciate seeing a whoop on your wrist.

[Mark Agnon]

Come on, brother. Come on. I'm locked in. I'm actually about to get the. The updated one.

[Will Ahmed]

Oh, good.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah, yeah, that's what. That's what Abby was saying also. Are you ever in New York?

[Will Ahmed]

I am, I am. I. You know, it's funny. I haven't spent nearly as much time in New York as I used to. There was something about COVID for me where I used to go down to New York all the time and post Covid meetings that I would have in New York, all of a sudden became Zooms.

[Mark Agnon]

Right.

[Will Ahmed]

And. And by the way, I'm like, I'm an in person guy. Like, you know, this built this office in the middle of COVID We've got people in the office. I like to see people in person. And New York is maybe my favorite city in the world. I mean, I think it's just got an energy that's palpable and awesome and an electricity that. That. That I've always gravitated towards. I did a few internships in Manhattan when I was in my early 20s. I actually always thought whoop would end up in Manhattan because I loved the city so much. And Boston, to its credit, kind of kept growing on me and also on the company. And in many ways, Whoop is a. Is very much a Boston company because it's at this intersection of healthcare and sports and research and, you know, education and, of course, technology. And those are some of the things that make Boston great.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah. I imagine the depth of the talent pool here probably makes things a little bit. A little easier in certain ways. Obviously, New York has talent, but this is the intellectual breadbasket of America.

[Will Ahmed]

Yeah, both markets have a lot of talent. I think. I think. I think Boston has more of a research engine, particularly when it comes to, like, health research and medical research. And I think. Think we've been able to plug into the schools like Harvard and MIT and Northeastern and. And. And others. I think New York's got more creative juice. I think it's got more design horsepower. I think there's some really great independent studios in New York through that same lens.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah, well, whenever you come back up to New York, there's also some paddle.

[Will Ahmed]

Some paddles. Oh, yeah, we gotta do that. Where do you play in New York?

[Mark Agnon]

Paddle house in Williamsburg. And the one in Dumbo is actually the better one.

[Will Ahmed]

Okay, I've heard that.

[Mark Agnon]

Yeah, yeah, but. Yeah, but they're both awesome. But that club is just great. And so it'll be fun. David and I have been getting into it. David had a. He had a tough couple matches, but we're going to get him some time. I mean, the kid's a freak athlete, but he just can't. He just can't do a bandeja to save his life. I don't know what it is. We're going to figure it out, though. But anyway, whenever you come up, team up, we'll get a game.

[Will Ahmed]

All right. This is fun. Thanks, man.

[Mark Agnon]

Thank you, brother. If you've made it to the end of this episode, you are clearly someone who understands that beneath every historical event lies a deeper truth waiting to be uncovered. You're the type of person who knows that real history is more fascinating than any fiction, and we deeply appreciate that about you. I'll be honest, that's exactly why I personally invite you to sign up for Today in History, our free newsletter that goes beyond the surface of historical events. We dive into the stories that textbooks never told you, the secrets that challenge the course of nations, and the forgotten tales that deserve to be remembered. Let's continue this journey of discovery together. Take the conversation from your headphones into your inbox. Sign up now through the QR code or link in the description Today in History. Because every day holds a secret waiting to be revealed. Thank you for being part of our historical journey. We'll see you next time.