Ulisses Abbud: recovery is not the reward — it is the adaptation mechanism

Betterness — Wed, 24 Jun 2026 13:31:06 -0400

Ulisses Abbud spent 13 years competing as a professional cyclist. Today he is a high-performance coach, researcher, endurance athlete, and physiology thinker working with athletes, executives, and people trying to understand how performance and longevity actually work.

In Episode 002 of Augmented Wellness, we go deep on recovery: why it is not a luxury, why it is not the reward, and why it may be the missing operating system for founders, executives, and anyone whose mind never really shuts down. We talk about HRV, cortisol, resting heart rate, overtraining, metabolism, nutrition, gravel cycling, Girona training camps, community, and the difference between training from fear and training from love.

We also bring Bett-i into the conversation. Demian shows his daily Focus plan and calls a breathwork agent live to read his HRV and suggest a nervous-system reset. The agent gets one thing right and one thing imperfectly — and that honesty is part of the point.

Full episode page: betterness.ai/augmentedwellness/002-ulisses-abbud

Chapters
(00:00) Cold open: recovery, longevity, HRV, and the agent
(01:01) Brand reveal: Augmented Wellness
(01:20) Meet Ulisses Abbud
(02:45) From professional cycling to riding for love
(04:13) Thirteen years as a pro cyclist
(05:24) Road, gravel, speed, risk, and why gravel feels different
(10:22) The diet trap: why eating less can make the body hold on
(12:12) From engineering to physiology
(14:21) Breathing, HRV, and simple nervous-system tools
(15:53) Why executives think like athletes but skip recovery
(18:54) Chronic sympathetic mode: the founder and vibe-coding problem
(21:09) Recovery is not the reward — it is an adaptation mechanism
(24:13) Cortisol, HRV, resting heart rate, and overtraining signals
(26:13) Longevity: dying young as late as possible
(28:38) Bett-i turns known basics into daily action
(33:56) Girona training camp, stress with intention, and community
(38:22) Recovery routines: cold plunge, sauna, yoga, reading, and mental shutdown
(40:40) Live demo: a breathwork agent reads Demian's HRV
(45:19) Final advice: routine, nutrition, breathing, and sleep

Where to find Betterness
Web: betterness.ai
Instagram: @betterness.ai
X: @betterness_ai

Credits. Produced by Demian Bellumio with the support of agents from Betterness One — the agentic studio inside Betterness. Recorded at The LAB Miami; on-site production by Podcast Studio Miami.

Disclaimer: nothing in this episode is medical advice. This is educational conversation about training, recovery, HRV, breathwork, nutrition, and longevity. Work with qualified professionals for personal health decisions.

Martin Varsavsky: building an AI that aims to pass the FDA — and a genuinely full life

Betterness — Tue, 16 Jun 2026 14:35:16 -0400

Martin Varsavsky has founded six unicorns over 35 years — across telecom, fertility, and now medical AI. In Episode 001 he walks through Certuma — his bid to build an AI physician that earns regulatory trust rather than routing around it, with the stated goal of passing the FDA and a doctor kept in the loop (it is not approved today). He explains how he closed a $10M seed round with AI as his only co-founder, why he cycles 14 hours a week at 66, and how he built "Pedro," a disclosed AI version of himself that posts on his X timeline. We turn it into BetterX: a public, guarded social-autopilot starter kit you can fork.

What runs through it: that AI can legally extend a doctor's knowledge to make care more accessible — Martin's bet with Certuma, on the path to FDA approval with a physician always in the loop — and that an AI trained on you for long enough starts to become you (his disclosed persona "Pedro," two months in the making). Underneath both: risk is relative once you've faced the real thing.

Build the artifact: BetterX — a guarded social-autopilot starter kit (forks with autonomy OFF by default and a review queue, so nothing posts without you).

Full episode page: betterness.ai/augmentedwellness/001-martin-varsavsky

Chapters
(00:00) Welcome to Augmented Wellness — and why Martin is guest #1
(00:56) Origin story: a hard first 25 years in Argentina and 1970s–80s New York
(04:11) The bank that rejected him for a job — then handed him a $9M loan
(05:20) Real estate, pre-money valuations, and rezoning Tribeca lofts
(10:00) A full life across many homes — buying for beauty, not business
(19:30) GLP-1s and Mounjaro: what he takes, why, and where the science stops
(22:32) Cycling at 66 — 14 hours a week, no fractures, and the discipline
(25:53) Building his own app: "U versus U," watts, and racing himself since 2010
(32:04) Data as motivation: Garmin over Apple, audio cues, a radar that talks
(34:00) Certuma: raising a seed round with AI as his only co-founder
(39:50) Certuma Link and Fast Doctor: an agentic doctor, with a human in the loop
(45:02) Pedro: cloning his own voice on X, and what "authorship" means now

Where to find Martin
X: @martinvars
Website: english.martinvarsavsky.net
LinkedIn: /in/martinvarsavsky
Instagram: @martinvars

From Betterness
X: @betterness_ai
Instagram: @betterness.ai
YouTube: @betterness_ai

Credits. Produced by Demian Bellumio with the support of agents from Betterness One — the agentic studio inside Betterness — including specialist agents for content, design, video, photography, insights, brand, and social, coordinated by Bett-i. Recorded at The LAB Miami; on-site production by Podcast Studio Miami.

Made by Betterness. Bett-i — a personal wellness AI, a team of specialist agents tuned to help you live better (Men's Fitness asked if it's “the most ambitious AI health product ever built”). Betterness One — for the businesses doing the helping: one of wellness's most comprehensive analytics platforms and the agentic studio that turns that view into action, seeing and doing in one place. You meet Bett-i live each episode; Betterness One's agents produce the show end to end. Collaborate: partners@betterness.ai

Disclaimer: nothing in this episode is medical advice. Certuma's FDA approval is a stated goal, not a current status, and it operates with a physician in the loop. Opinions are Martin's own.