Global sports agency Wasserman and its womxn’s division, The Collective, are partnering with sports performance and biomarker company Orreco to give women, trans and non-binary athltes new insight into the effects of the menstrual cycle on their training and performance.
With the partnership, Wasserman athletes will have access to Orreco’s Athlete Consultancy program for womxn, which helps athletes train in sync with their menstrual cycle to maintain peak performance.
“No one ever talks about periods, period,” says Wasserman Action Sports Agent, Yulin Olliver. “After seeing the U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team dominate and win the World Cup last summer, then boldly acknowledge the power and insight Orreco offers to maximize performance for womxn by applying science, exercise, recovery and diet insights to menstrual cycles, I knew it was something I wanted to provide to my clients, and the idea expanded from there across The Collective.”
The Orreco program includes the FitrWoman and FitrCoach platforms. Wasserman athletes and their coaches will also have access to detailed individualized reports, as well as action plans and strategies to maintain nutrition, recovery and wellness around the menstrual cycle.
Wasserman athletes who will be working with Orreco include Leo Baker, Sue Bird, Mariah Duran, Gwen Jorgenson, Nneka Ogwumike and Satou Sabally. The range of sports, from skateboarding to basketball, speaks to the widespread benefits offered by the program.
Yulin says that this is not just a program for elite athletes, either: “With the app FitrWoman, anyone with a smartphone can download it and use it. It’s not just something that elite pro-athletes have access to — it’s accessible to all.”
With the partnership, Orreco and Wasserman are also hoping to change the stigma surrounding periods in sports by bringing the subject from out of the shadows.
“There’s an unconscious bias in society towards the menstrual cycle as something extra to deal with, inferring that it impacts an athletes’ energy and their bandwidth,” Yulin told JWS. “But no body is actually lesser than another. We are all equal and whole.”
Coming soon: we’ll be talking to the athletes involved with the program about what it’s taught them so far and how it’s aiding their training.