Future of Fitness
We are putting a shoulder into the fitness industry and pushing it forward into the modern digital age. Eric Malzone, a 14-year industry veteran, entrepreneur, advisor, and coach, interviews the brightest movers and shakers in the fitness and health industries. Interviewing some of the industry's top executives, entrepreneurs, investors, and thought leaders, topics will vary covering cutting edge technology, entrepreneurship, hot industry trends, and so much more. If you're in or around the industry, this is how you keep your edge sharp.
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Erik Jivmark - Sleep Cycle: 85 Million Downloads, 15 Years of Data, Zero Wearables
<p>In this episode of The Future of Fitness, host Eric Malzone sits down with Erik Jivmark, CEO of Sleep Cycle, to discuss how passive tracking technology is transforming the health and wellness industry. For 15 years, Sleep Cycle has been quietly analyzing a millennium of sleep every single night, leveraging audio and advanced machine learning algorithms to map sleep stages with the same precision as leading wearable hardware. Now, the company is democratizing this massive data layer by opening up its seamless Sleep SDK to developers, health apps, and IoT providers worldwide. Erik shares the brand's incredible origin story—from an...
Eric Casaburi - From Serotonin Centers to 108,000 Gyms: Solving Longevity's Distribution Problem
<p>Eric Casaburi — founder of Serotonin Centers and former builder of Retro Fitness — is back to break down one of the most exciting business models emerging at the intersection of fitness and longevity medicine.</p> <p>In this episode, Eric walks us through the creation of SLIM Gym (Serotonin Light Impact Model), a turnkey longevity clinic concept that plugs directly into existing gym and fitness studio spaces (think 200–500 square feet of unused office or childcare rooms). It delivers hormone replacement therapy, medical weight loss, GLP-1 protocols, peptide therapy, IV therapy, and comprehensive lab work to gym members—without the gym owner ev...
Karl Foster - Why Most AI Projects Fail: Sport Alliance's Head of AI on Change Management vs Technology
<p>In this episode of The Future of Fitness, host Eric Malzone sits down with Karl Foster, Head of Artificial Intelligence at Sport Alliance, to bridge the massive gap between AI marketing hype and operational reality in the fitness sector. Drawing from his unique trajectory from personal trainer to CTO and global AI leader, Foster reveals how Sport Alliance's native CRM and ERP integrations—Perfect AI and Magic AI—are redefining the member journey. He outlines the critical distinction between passive chatbots and proactive, agentic AI ecosystems that capture time-sensitive data to drive engagement, boost sales conversions, and optimize retention. Fost...
Eric Cressey - 110 MPH Fastballs, Youth Specialization, and Cutting Through YouTube Garbage
<p>In this episode, Eric Malzone catches up with Eric Cressey, high-performance sports specialist and Director of Player Health and Performance for the New York Yankees. The two take a deep dive into the evolving world of sports performance, touching on the ongoing crisis of youth sports specialization and what it takes to actually build sustainable velocity without blowing out young arms. Cressey shares how his team leverages advanced sports science and biometric data to drive precise interventions, while also keeping a critical eye on the over-saturation of the mental performance market and the over-hyped trends in recovery technology. Finally...
Edward Hertzman - Why Are the Most Successful Companies Hiding? Athletech CEO on Repositioning the Industry
<p > Eddie Hertzman, founder of Athletech News and creator of the Athletech Innovation Summit, pulls no punches in this conversation about what's holding the fitness industry back — and what it's going to take to finally move it forward. From the frustrating silence of successful fitness executives who refuse to show up at industry events, to the critical gap between how this industry sees itself and how consumers and investors see it, Eddie breaks down why fitness still hasn't gotten its "got milk moment." He and Eric dig into the second year of the Athletech Innovation Summit, what makes it genuinely di...
Women's Health Series - Groe Solutions: Dr. Jennifer King, PhD, MPH - The Forgotten Population
<p > Women over 60 are one of the most biologically dynamic — and most overlooked — populations in the fitness industry. In this closing episode of the Women's Health Series, host Eric Malzone sits down with Dr. Jennifer King, behavioral scientist, gerontology researcher, and nationally competitive physique athlete, to tackle one of the industry's biggest blind spots: the near-total dropout of research, diagnostics, and programming once women move past menopause. Dr. King unpacks why clinical guidance so rarely includes the very women it's meant to serve, how gym environments send the wrong signals through layout, tour routes, and equipment placement, and what intentional desi...
Women's Health Series - Groe Solutions: Amy Bantham, DrPH - From Playground to Silver Years
<p > In this episode of Future of Fitness, host Eric Malzone sits down with Dr. Amy Bantham — public health researcher, fitness professional, and founder of Move to Live More — for a refreshingly real conversation on women's health across the full lifespan. Rather than carving women's health into isolated phases like pregnancy or menopause, Dr. Bantham makes the case for a whole-person, health-span approach that starts in childhood and never stops. They dig into why most women aren't lacking motivation — they're lacking time, community, and programming that actually meets them where they are. From the funding gaps in women's health research, to bui...
Women's Health Series - Groe Solutions: Anaelle Oiknine - The Research Revolution
<p > Women's health has been one of medicine's most overlooked frontiers — and the data gap is decades deep. In this episode, Eric Malzone sits down with Anaelle Oiknine, clinical development lead at Ultrahuman, to unpack why the majority of drugs, exercise prescriptions, and health metrics have historically been built around male physiology — and what that's cost women. From the thalidomide tragedy of the 1950s to the ongoing research mismatch around endometriosis, Anaelle breaks down the systemic failures that left half the population underserved, and why the tide is finally turning. She shares what continuous wearable data is revealing about the fema...
Dave Appel - A Tsunami Is Coming: What Gym Owners Need to Know About Peptide Deregulation
<p > Dave Appel, Chief Health & Wellness Officer at KORB Health and 35-year fitness industry veteran, joins Eric Malzone for a candid conversation on the collision of telehealth, GLP-1s, hormone replacement therapy, and the gym business model. Dave breaks down why the fitness industry can no longer afford to ignore the 80% of the population that doesn't identify as "fit," how GLP-1 medications like semaglutide are opening gym doors for people who never felt welcome in them, and what gym operators need to know right now before peptide deregulation reshapes the entire landscape. From KORB's partnerships with InShape Fitness and Fitness 19...
Jane Wang - Your Retention Strategy Is Backwards: Optimity's Lifetime Journey Approach
<p>Jane Wang brings a rare cross-disciplinary lens to one of fitness's oldest problems: member retention. With a background in clinical research, mortality risk, and 12+ years in corporate wellness, Jane shares why the industry's approach to churn is fundamentally flawed — and what a data-driven, human-centered model looks like.</p> <p>What We Cover:</p> Jane's background — From HIV research and ovarian cancer trials to building tech for 7M+ members at Opt Why retention is broken — The industry measures daily/weekly/monthly activity but ignores the full lifecycle of a member Life stages & churn — Having a baby, moving cities, changing jobs: why no t...
