Brianne Theisen-Eaton knows how the Team Canada athletes feel in Paris right now. Whether they have reached their goal just by being there or by appearing on the podium, the two-time Olympian knows the physical and mental acumen needed to compete and that penultimate level. Brianne Theisen-Eaton not only represented Canada in both the London Olympics in 2012, she also won bronze at Rio 2016, winning our nation’s first ever Olympic medal in the heptathlon.
Her amateur sports CV is legendary:
- Canadian Heptathlon record holder
- Three time Hypo-Meeting winner
- IAAF World Indoor winner
- IAAF World Indoor silver medalist
- Commonwealth Games gold medalist
- Three time NCAA Heptathlon winner
- Three time NCAA Pentathlon winner
- First Canadian woman to win seven NCAA championships
We didn’t have room to list all of the Saskatchewan-native’s accomplishments. Her favourite motto is “Don’t be afraid of your fears. They’re not there to scare you, they’re there to let you know something is worth it”. The now retired athlete’s latest venture allows her to keep her toe dipped in athletics. Brianne Theisen-Eaton and her husband, two time Olympic decathlon gold medallist, Ashton Eaton collaborated with Apple Fitness+ in a workout led by one of their own trainers – Kyle Ardill.
Brianne Theisen-Eaton is many things – wife, mother, Olympic bronze medalist, and she is also our latest #womeninspiringwomen. Find out more about what motivates her in our latest feature:
What is it like watching the Olympic games now versus the first Olympic Games after you retired?
I have felt very excited for both. Yes, it brings back happy, nostalgic feelings, and I truly miss seeing the competitors I built close friendships with, but there’s no part of me that wishes I was still competing. I now get to experience the incredible performances of the Canadian athletes and competitor friends who I still follow very closely. I cannot wait to see them all compete in Paris.
Being an Olympian and winning a bronze medal is something that most people will never have an opportunity to experience. What was it like to as both a participant and as a medal winner?
Competing at the Olympics is very pressure filled and nerve wracking. I think the fact that you only get a chance to compete on this stage once every 4 years only adds to that. So much work goes into it, hours a day for 4 years, and you obsess about controlling the controllables (getting enough sleep, eating the right things, not overtraining, getting your mind in the right place, etc.).
I think once you get to the Olympic Games, it’s about your mental game. You’re physically fit and now it’s about not letting the pressure get to you. In my first Olympics, I was caught off guard (by the intensity of the British crowd) and starstruck by the fact that I actually made the Olympics. By Rio (where I won my medal), I went into it much more focused on the fact that I deserved to be there and was very much a medal contender. I felt like a totally different athlete.
Being a world-class athlete comes with a fair share of ups and downs. What have you learned from both?
The ups as an athlete are extremely fun; when training is going well, when you’re winning or PBing and you’re traveling the world. The downs are very hard. I constantly worried how I was going to come out of those hard times (an injury, an event I couldn’t figure out, etc.). My sports psychologist was always trying to get me to look at the big picture, the fact that those times in my career were not only blips in my career, but literal pinheads on the timeline of my life. So it’s interesting to ask this question now that I’m 8 years out from my last Olympics as I have a lot more perspective.
I have a family (2 kids), and it’s now clear to me that athletics wasn’t the only important thing I was ever going to do in my life. As an athlete so focused on your career, that sort of thing was very hard for me to see.
Retiring must have been a huge adjustment. How did you make that adjustment and still keep the motivation to excel?
It was an adjustment, and it was by no means easy, but I was definitely ready for the next phase in my life. I just knew that I didn’t have the motivation anymore to give the 110% it takes to be a world class athlete. While physically I felt okay, mentally I was drained. Honestly, I’m still going through the adjustment and trying to figure out “my calling” in life. One thing I learned early was that a new “job” on its own just wasn’t going to be as fulfilling as athletics.
Sport gave me most everything I needed in life; a goal to work toward, adventure in the travel we did, community through my training group and friends I made through competition. Post athletics, these areas of fulfillment need to come from a few different places and you have to work for them. While my job has provide a direction and goal, it isn’t as intense and deeply rooted as my athletic goal, so I’ve had to find other hobbies and outlets to make up for this. I’ve spent a large amount of time building a community, and my husband and I plan trips and getaways to fulfill our need for adventure.
What was the process that you and your husband, Ashton Eaton, used to develop the workout for Apple Fitness+ and what was it like working with him on it?
We knew right away that it had to be total body since we wanted to tie it back to the heptathlon and decathlon in some way. We also wanted to give people a little taste of what elite athletes experience in terms of pushing themselves, which is how the spicy finisher at the end came about.
Apple Fitness+ is something we use regularly, since the workouts are accessible, focus on fitness fundamentals, and have tons of variety so that you can achieve your goals wherever you are, and being able to create a workout that is unique to Ashton and I and contribute to this awesome community was really special to us.
This Apple Fitness+ total-body workout was inspired by Brianne Theisen-Eaton’s and Ashton Eaton’s training with five exercises, done three times each. Some of the moves include reverse lunges, biceps curls, and squats. The workout is now live and you can feel like you are training for your own Olympic appearance along with your favourite high-performance athletes. To try it out yourself, visit the Apple Fitness+ app on your iPhone.
