We are, in the technical sense, blood-testing nerds. We've tried the at-home kits, the boutique panels, the startups with sleek apps and questionable methodologies.
Rythm Health is the one that made the rest feel like party tricks. A real philosophy on what to measure, when to measure it, and how to use the data to actually do something with the next twelve months of your life and beyond. Robby's team will be at the Storehouse on Saturday with a full lab setup. Quick, painless, free. Day one of a health journey or day five hundred.
Now, let's chat with Robby about all things blood, baselines, and playing the long game.
Tell us about yourself and tell what Rythm Health is in simple terms. What problem were you originally trying to solve?
I’m Robby Wade, founder and CEO of Rythm Health.
Rythm is the world’s easiest blood test. We ship the test to you, you collect a painless blood sample from your upper arm in about two minutes, we pick it up from your house, and then we test it in our own lab.
We set out to make blood testing feel as normal and easy as checking your sleep, steps, or heart rate.
Was there a specific moment where you realized traditional healthcare wasn’t serving performance-minded people very well?
For me, a big moment came through training for the Ironman World Championship in Kona. When you are training at that level, you realize very quickly that “normal” is not the same thing as “optimal.” I could go to a doctor, get blood work, and be told everything looked normal. But normal compared to who?
That was the disconnect.
Traditional healthcare is not really designed for people trying to understand and optimize performance. If your goal is to run a sub-3 marathon, maximize fertility, build muscle, or live longer, “optimal” looks different in every case.
The more I pushed my body, the more I wanted to understand what was happening internally: iron, inflammation, recovery, hormones, nutrition, hydration, and overall stress on the system. But the traditional blood testing experience was too inconvenient, uncomfortable and infrequent for optimization.
A lot of people only get bloodwork when something is wrong. Your philosophy seems more proactive than reactive. Why?
Most athletes already understand optimization. You do not only look at your training data when something is wrong. You look at pace, mileage, HRV, sleep, recovery, and effort because you are trying to learn what makes you better.
Bloodwork should be the same.
It is one of the clearest ways to learn what is happening inside your body. Iron, inflammation, hormones, nutrition, and recovery all affect performance. That is the idea behind Rythm health. Make bloodwork easy enough to do regularly, so people can learn their body and optimize toward whatever goal they care about.
What are the biggest things runners and endurance athletes tend to misunderstand about recovery and performance?
Fitness is not built from stress alone. It comes from how well your body absorbs that stress.The thing many athletes miss is that you can feel okay while still running yourself down. Low iron, poor fueling, inflammation, hormonal shifts, bad sleep, and general life stress can all quietly build up. Runners are amazing at measuring the outside: splits, heart rate, mileage, cadence, power. But the inside matters just as much. The best performers are not just the ones who work the hardest. They are the ones who understand when to push, when to back off, and what their body needs to adapt.
If someone is training hard but constantly tired, plateaued, moody, or not recovering well, what are some biomarkers or signals they should actually pay attention to?
To name a few:
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Ferritin shows whether your iron stores are supporting oxygen transport and endurance.
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Thyroid (TSH/Free T3 etc.) markers can give clues about underfueling and energy availability.
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Inflammation markers (hsCRP etc.) can show systemic stress, but they have to be interpreted in context.
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Hormones (Testosterone etc.) can be one signal of whether your body is adapting well to training stress.
What percentage of people who think they’re “healthy” are actually missing something important when they finally look under the hood?
I’d answer it another way. I think almost everyone has something to learn and areas to optimize.
Are there any patterns you consistently see in endurance athletes specifically?
Yes. The big patterns are:
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Low iron or ferritin.
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Under-fueling.
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Poor recovery and sleep.
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Low Protein intake.
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Vitamin deficiencies
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Low Libido
What’s something athletes spend way too much time or money on compared to the actual impact it has on performance?
It is hard to pinpoint because it really depends on the individual. But I do think fueling, emotional stress reduction, and sleep are almost always undervalued, no matter how much people are told they matter. Everyone wants the extra 1% from a supplement, shoe, gadget, or recovery tool. But if you are under-fueled, stressed, and sleeping poorly, you are leaving way more than 1% on the table.
There are a lot of wellness and testing companies now. What makes Rythm fundamentally different?
We are not just a wellness app or a marketing company sitting on top of someone else’s infrastructure. We built the lab, the logistics, the technology, and the customer experience ourselves. That matters because it lets us push the frontier on what people can track from home, comfortably, conveniently, and affordably.
Why did Rythm want to partner with the Bandit Grand Prix specifically?
We wanted to partner with the Bandit Grand Prix because we were really impressed by the creativity and cultural impact the event has already had. Bandit has built something with energy, taste, and a real point of view around running culture.
We also wanted to add value to a thriving performance community. Runners already care deeply about improvement, discipline, and learning what makes them better. That lines up perfectly with how we think about Rythm health.
What do you have in store for runners at BGP?
We are building a laboratory onsite... Come say hi and get a free rythm blood test!
What do you think endurance athletes understand about discipline, consistency, and long-term health that the average person doesn’t?
That it’s worth it…and fun when you surround yourself with the right community.
