#29 - Apolo Anton Ohno: 8-time Olympic medalist – extreme training, discipline, pursuing perfection, and responding to adversity

The Peter Attia Drive

Peter Attia, MD

Health & Fitness, Medicine, Fitness

4.7 • 7.3K Ratings

🗓️ 19 November 2018

⏱️ 218 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In this episode, 8-time Olympic medalist, Apolo Ohno, discusses the lessons he’s learned from his remarkable career in speed skating and the extreme physical and mental training — and determination — required to reach greatness.

We discuss:

Apolo’s childhood with his single dad, early success in sports, and falling in love with skating [7:30];
The differences between inline and ice skating, and short- & long-track speed-skating, and the evolution of the clap skate [21:00];
The mental game and the physical game: intense training and mindset [29:30];
Apolo’s early success in short-track that led to an amazing opportunity and his reluctance to go for it [40:15];
Early days at Lake Placid, first experience on the world stage, and a little self-sabotage [56:45];
Tough love parenting, making a commitment, training like Rocky, and developing the mindset of a fighter [1:17:30];
2002 Olympics, winning his first medal, and rising above the sport [1:32:45];
Apolo’s evolving training and body composition throughout his Olympic career [2:05:15];
Going into the Lion’s Den to learn from Korean skaters and making a radical and risky change that led to his most successful Olympic games [2:12:45];
Apolo’s tumultuous relationship with South Korea, from hatred to respect to admiration [2:29:00];
Applying lessons learned through training, adjusting to life after skating, and the struggles many athletes face transitioning to retirement [2:46:30];
The final years of Apolo’s career: intense focus, crazy training, mental fortitude, and resiliency [2:57:30];
Officially retiring and contemplating a comeback [3:16:15];
Where does Apolo want to be in 10 years? [3:22:45];
The pursuit of perfection and flow states [3:29:30];
Where you can follow Apolo [3:35:00]; and
More.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey everyone, welcome to the Peter Atia Drive. I'm your host, Peter Atia.
0:10.0	The drive is a result of my hunger for optimizing performance, health, longevity, critical thinking,
0:15.7	along with a few other obsessions along the way. I've spent the last several years working
0:19.6	with some of the most successful top performing individuals in the world, and this podcast
0:23.8	is my attempt to synthesize what I've learned along the way to help you live a higher quality
0:28.3	and more fulfilling life. If you enjoy this podcast, you can find more information on today's
0:32.5	episode and other topics at peteratiamd.com.
0:41.7	Hey everybody, welcome to this week's episode of the drive. I'm your host, Peter Atia.
0:46.0	I guess this week is my friend Apollo Ono. For those of you who might not recognize Apollo,
0:51.4	which I would guess is not many of you, Apollo Anton Ono is an eight time
0:55.5	of metalist in the Winter Olympics across three games, 2002, 2006, 2010, in short track,
1:02.3	Speed Skating, which is one of the most intense, crazy sports to watch. We're going to have
1:08.0	lots of videos of it in the show notes. And if that weren't enough, he also went on to
1:12.4	win Dancing with the Stars, which sadly we don't get into in this episode, though I wish
1:16.6	we did because we were talking about it over dinner. And it's simply another manifestation
1:22.7	of the type of drive and determination that he brought to his sport. He brought to that
1:29.0	show as well. He has a really unique upbringing. He was raised by a single dad and his father,
1:34.4	who was an immigrant, played just an unbelievable role in his life through the good times and
1:38.6	the bad, which I know might sound like a bit of a cliche, but the level and the detail
1:42.5	at which we go into it in this podcast, I think, is quite inspiring. There's no question
1:47.3	that at least in my mind that had Apollo been raised by somebody other than his father.
1:51.4	It's very hard to imagine he would have achieved the success that he has achieved. His
	...

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