Why Most Workouts Are Wrecking Your Hormones | Autumn Calabrese

In this episode, I get the chance to talk with Autumn Calabrese - Beachbody’s #1 Super Trainer and the creator behind programs like 21 Day Fix and the newly launched Belle Vitale - for an honest and energizing conversation about women’s health. Autumn shares her personal journey from pushing through burnout to creating a fitness approach rooted in hormone balance, sustainability, and self-compassion. We talk about the difference between working out to punish your body and training to support it, the truth about cardio, why more isn’t always better, and how Belle Vitale is helping women reconnect with their energy, metabolism, and mood. If you’ve ever felt like you’re doing everything “right” and still not getting results, this episode is your invitation to shift your mindset and finally feel well again.

Fitness & Nutrition powerhouse, Autumn Calabrese is BeachBody’s #1 Super Trainer and is best known for developing several fitness & nutrition programs that have proven to be incredibly successful, helping millions lose weight and keep it off in a healthy way.  You may recognize the titles and transformation stories from her wildly popular programs, such as, 21 Day Fix, 80 Day Obsession, 9 Week Control Freak, The 4 Week Gut Protocol and her highly anticipated new  women’s hormone health program Belle Vitale which debuts on December, 10th 2024.  Autumns fitness programs have been streamed well over 200 Million times on Beachbody On Demand.

It's not just fitness that Autumn is passionate about. Her mission is to help clients attain their best, happiest, healthiest body without restrictions or deprivation. She believes in no gimmicks or fad diets and attributes hard work and portion control to success. In 2014, she created the breakthrough weight-loss phenomenon Portion Fix, a portion-control food-container system that uses multi colored containers to represent different food groups and the proper portions. Her collaboration with BeachBody continued with the launch of her best-selling cookbook FIXATE in which she and her brother, professional chef Bobby Calabrese ‘fix’ their favorite dishes to the proper standards of 21 Day Fix. To date, FIXATE has sold over 600,000 copies and currently has 2 volumes. Together, they also host the FIXATE cooking show streamed exclusively on Beachbody On Demand and Facebook. In 2022, Autumn will launch her second nutritional program from BeachBody titled The 4 Week Gut Protocol. Autumn’s personal struggles with her own gut health is what sparked the creation of this program. She shares how to take back control of your eating habits in a healthy way that creates a permanent lifestyle by identifying what foods your body needs and what foods your body might not be able to process easily. The 4 Week Gut Protocol will be released alongside 4 Weeks For Every Body as a full inclusive program getting your gut health in check which in turn insures a happier and healthier YOU! 

Autumn was featured on the third season of E! Network’s hit series Revenge Body, alongside, Khloe Kardashian, appearing in the highest rated episode of the series. She has appeared numerous times as a fitness expert on The Today Show, Good Morning America, KTLA, as well as, been featured in Forbes, Women’s Health, Health, Business Insider, Prevention, Livestrong and more. Her celebrity clients have included Kendall Jenner, Tom Bergeron, Brooke Burke, and Rachel Zoe. Even some NFL players like NFL wide receiver Brandon Marshall and NFL running back Eddie Lacy have used her programs successfully, but for Autumn it is the millions of people she has helped through her BeachBody programs that fulfills her the most.  

Autumn is a certified holistic health coach through the Institute of Integrative Nutrition and has certifications from the National Academy of Sports Medicine (NASM), as well as the American Fitness Professionals & Associates (AFPA). She is a mother to her 13-year old son, as well as, an example of how positive thinking can help manifest your dreams. She has built her own personal empire off wellness and helping people while maintaining her own story of struggle with injury, and how that affected her and how she worked through it. She’s gone from living paycheck to paycheck as a personal trainer to being a mini fitness mogul building her empire. Autumn doesn’t believe in excuses – just hard work. That’s what’s gotten her to the top. A passion for helping people and a determination like no other. Autumn takes a positive approach to training, motivating and inspiring you through even the toughest of workouts. When it comes to helping people achieve their goals, Autumn takes it very personally. Your struggles are her struggles and your wins, her wins.

A few of my favorite things we cover in this episode: 

• The original vision and impact of the 21 Day Fix - and what made it a cultural moment
• Her evolving philosophy around exercise, nutrition, and hormone balance
• Why she shifted away from high-intensity cardio and toward Pilates and parasympathetic training
• What “time nutrition” is and why she doesn’t believe in intermittent fasting for everyone
• The creation of Belle Vitale and how it's helping women reclaim their energy, metabolism, and mood
• The importance of stress awareness, breathwork, and emotional regulation in true wellness
• Her own health journey and how functional lab testing changed her personal protocol

Links to things we talked about in this episode: 

• Go to beekeepersnaturals.com/WILLCOLE or enter code WILLCOLE to get 20% off your order. Beekeeper’s Naturals products are also available at Target, Whole Foods, Amazon, CVS, and Walgreens.
• Get 20% off, or if you choose the already discounted subscription, you get almost a third off the price! Only when you visit my exclusive URL Puori.com/WILLCOLE and use my promo code WILLCOLE.
• Visit https://www.ActiveSkinRepair.com to learn more about Active Skin Repair and to get 20% off your order, use code: WILLCOLE.
• Visit https://www.ActiveSkinRepair.com to learn more aboutActive Skin Repair and to get 20% off your order, usecode:WILLCOLE.
• Go to BelleVitale.com and use code BV15 to get 15% off.

Happy listening and we hope you learned a little bit more on the art of being well!

If you like what you hear, please rate and review the podcast, hit subscribe and pass it along to a friend.

In Health,

Dr. Will Cole