When Beatrix Whipple wakes before dawn, usually around 4:30 a.m., her day begins with stillness.
“I’ll prep my coffee and sit down on my couch,” she says. “I usually do a session of meditation via a guided meditation app called Open. It’s the only one I’ve been able to stick with.”
After 10 to 15 minutes of breathwork and meditation, Whipple opens her iPad to journal.
“My first part of journaling is always gratitude,” she says. “The second part is visualization and affirmations.”
Then comes a rice cake topped with peanut butter powder, banana, and honey — her pre-workout snack, before heading into her backyard gym, which she affectionately refers to as “the shed.”
“I built it during COVID,” she says. “It’s a standalone workout studio that’s nicer than my house,” she laughs. Outfitted with a Tonal weightlifting machine, Peloton bike and treadmill, it’s the heart of her daily routine.
Whipple’s mornings run like clockwork. She lifts weights four to five days a week through progressive overload programs and does cardio, either spin or running, six days a week.
“I usually work out from like 5:30 to seven or 7:30 at the latest. I’ll come in, I’ll eat.”
Her go-to breakfast is ground turkey with taco seasoning, air-fried sweet potatoes with olive oil, cayenne pepper and paprika, paired with cottage cheese and honey.
“I have that every single morning, and I love it.”
The rest of her day is equally structured.
“I get to the office, and I try to get to my most important stuff right away, while I’m fresh and before I’ve had a bunch of interruptions,” she says.
Beatrix gets home around five to start making dinner. She cooks every single night, planning all of her family’s meals at least a week in advance.
Sundays, she says, are her big training days.
“I wake up at like 4:30 most mornings, even on the weekends,” she says. “Sometimes I’ll sleep in until 5:30 on the weekend. But on Sundays, I’ll ride my bike to Bolsa Chica wetlands, lock it up, change into my running clothes, and I’ll run Bolsa Chica. I’m up to the point now where I’ll run like 10, 12, 13 miles, and then I’ll hop back on my road bike and ride home. So I’m riding between 20 to 30 miles on my road bike every Sunday with like 10 to 13 miles sandwiched in between my rides of a run.”
While Whipple, 47, may seem superhuman in her discipline, she insists her transformation was gradual.
“Consistency is way more important than intensity,” she says. “If you try to do everything at once, you’re going to fail. I became consistent with small things first — walking, cooking at home, journaling — and then built from there.”
Her shift toward intentional wellness began five years ago after what she describes as “a total come-to-Jesus moment.”
“I saw my gynecologist and told her something’s wrong. I can’t lose weight. It must be my age. It must be my hormones,” she recalls. “She humored me and ran all these blood tests, and she’s like, ‘You’re perfect.’ Everything’s fine.
Then she saw a nutritionist, who introduced her to tracking calories and macros.
“You learn so much by doing that. It made me fall in love with nutrition and knowing what I’m putting in my body and how I’m fueling it.”
Whipple says her mission now is to show other women that fitness at any age is achievable.
“It’s not age, it’s lifestyle. And I just want people to know that anyone can do this. I’m not special. I don’t have any more time than anyone else does. I’ve just made certain things a priority.”
For Whipple, success lies in preparation and structure. “Every night I set up my workout clothes for the next morning,” she says. “I set out my pre-workout snack, my coffee, everything, so that when I wake up, it’s just my habit.”
Her habits extend beyond exercise.
“Meditation has been huge for me,” she says. “I went from not being able to do it and feeling frustrated and feeling like I’m failing at it, to really craving it every morning. You don’t have to be perfect at it. You just have to try.”
Journaling and gratitude, she says, are equally transformative.
“Journaling takes this chaos and kind of nebulous feeling that you might have in your brain, and you’re really able to distill, hey, this is what I’m really feeling.”
Among her most transformative habits was giving up alcohol.
“I drank every day for 20 years — not a lot, but a glass of wine after work,” she says. “It was my reset. When I stopped, it was really hard. But after 100 days, I had rewired my brain. Now, my life is so much better without alcohol.”
Her evenings are just as intentional as her mornings. She cooks every night, plans meals a week ahead, and spends Sundays training, meal-prepping, and hosting “Sunday dinners.” “I ride my road bike to Bolsa Chica, run 10 to 13 miles, then ride home,” she says. “Afterward, I go to the farmers market, plan my meals, and often make a big roast for friends.”
Looking ahead, Whipple has her sights set on a half Ironman.
“I recently did a triathlon but had a panic attack in the water,” she admits. “So my next goal is mastering open-water swimming. After that, I want to do a half Ironman in 2027 — and someday, run the New York Marathon.”
Her advice for anyone hoping to improve their health? Start where you are and make small improvements with your training and nutrition.
“A couple of years ago I was running 3 miles at a pace of 9:50 minutes per mile and now I'm running 14 miles at an 8:33 pace.”
“Don’t do drastic things,” she says. “Make little changes you can stick with for life. Consistency is the key.”
I became consistent with small things first — walking, cooking at home, journaling — and then built from there.
It’s not age, it’s lifestyle. And I just want people to know that anyone can do this. I’m not special. I don’t have any more time than anyone else does. I’ve just made certain things a priority.