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Women's Arc is designed to support women through every stage of life, from menstruation and fertility to pregnancy, postpartum, perimenopause, and beyond. Courtesy of Equinox For decades, the science of performance has been written by and for men. Fitness programs, nutrition protocols, recovery models: all built around male physiology and then handed to women with the assumption that they’d simply adapt. But as any woman who’s ever pushed through a workout during her luteal phase or battled brain fog mid-cycle knows, that model has always been incomplete. Now, Equinox wants to rewrite the playbook. With the launch of Women’s Arc, the luxury fitness brand’s new women’s health and wellness initiative, Equinox is introducing what it calls the first truly integrated, cycle-informed, data-driven system designed to support women through every stage of life, from menstruation and fertility to pregnancy, postpartum, perimenopause, and beyond. “We saw an opportunity to design a system built for women from the ground up,” says Stephanie Musso, Vice President and Chief of Staff at Equinox. “Historically, wellness and performance science has centered on male physiology, leaving women’s needs underserved. Advances in diagnostics, wearables, and data interpretation now make precision women’s health possible at scale.” The result is an initiative that merges cutting-edge technology, rigorous science, and a deep understanding of the female body into something far more holistic than a training program—a full-spectrum wellness ecosystem grounded in what Equinox calls MNRC: Movement, Nutrition, Recovery, and Community. The cornerstone of Women’s Arc is personalization. Through partnerships with Function Health and wearable tech brands, each member undergoes comprehensive lab testing (measuring more than 100 biomarkers, including hormones) and receives a wearable device to continuously track sleep, recovery, activity, and heart rate variability. Combined, this data provides what Musso calls “an augmented, personalized view of each woman’s physiology, from hormones to sleep to metabolic markers.” Coaches then use these insights to adjust training, nutrition, and recovery in real time, creating an adaptive plan that evolves with the body’s needs. MORE FOR YOU “It’s about moving from reactive to proactive care,” Musso explains. “Instead of responding to symptoms or fatigue after the fact, we can now anticipate needs before issues arise. This is what precision wellness looks like.” That ability to shift from intuition to information, to turn data into daily decisions, marks a critical departure from the past. Women’s health has long been fragmented, with specialists handling fertility, OB-GYN care, hormones, and fitness in isolation. Women’s Arc, on the other hand, aims to unify these disciplines under one roof, guided by data and delivered by coaches specifically trained in women’s physiology and endocrinology. Women's Arc hopes to bring the various facets of women's health under one roof, offering a long-overdue holistic approach to wellness. Courtesy of Equinox Perhaps most revolutionary is how deeply the program integrates the menstrual cycle and hormonal rhythms into its framework. “Training syncs with hormonal fluctuations,” says Musso. “High-intensity and strength sessions align with peak energy windows in the follicular phase, while lower-intensity and recovery-focused sessions align with the luteal or low-hormone phases.” That might sound small, but in practice, it’s transformative. The approach reduces injury risk, improves outcomes, and maybe most importantly, fosters a deeper sense of body awareness. It’s no longer about fighting biology to achieve results but rather about partnering with it. Women’s Arc also recognizes that women’s health doesn’t begin and end with the menstrual cycle. From pregnancy to postpartum recovery to perimenopause, the program maps the female lifecycle as “a continuum of evolving performance needs.” Universal physiological principles provide the foundation, while biomarkers, goals, and life stage drive the personalization. The message is clear: your body doesn’t work against you; it simply requires a roadmap that understands its language. Building that roadmap required more than technology, and it demanded education. Every coach participating in Women’s Arc has completed a first-of-its-kind Women’s Health Certification through the Equinox Fitness Training Institute, developed in collaboration with the company’s Women’s Health Advisory Board (HAB). The curriculum covers endocrinology, hormonal transitions, and lifecycle training, ensuring coaches can interpret complex biomarkers and translate them into actionable insights. “We wanted our coaches to become true partners in women’s health,” Musso says. “That means understanding not just the physical shifts but the emotional and psychological dynamics that accompany them.” Empathy, she adds, is as essential as expertise. Enrollment in Women’s Arc begins with a comprehensive onboarding process: members complete bloodwork, wearable setup, and biometric assessments to establish a baseline. From there, a multidisciplinary team, including a nutritionist, recovery expert, and personal training coach, builds a tailored plan spanning every facet of wellness. The program requires a minimum 12-week commitment, priced at $6,000, and includes regular check-ins, continuous data feedback, and access to Equinox’s full ecosystem of experts. While it represents a significant investment, Musso says it reflects the depth of personalization and scientific rigor behind the experience. The plan isn’t static, either. Continuous feedback from its health date partners allows the Equinox team to fine-tune in real time, adjusting intensity, nutrition, and recovery protocols based on readiness, hormone levels, and sleep quality. Regular check-ins ensure that members not only see progress but understand why they’re feeling or performing a certain way. The goal, Musso emphasizes, is empowerment. “Ultimately, members gain deep insight into their bodies, turning data into results,” she says. “It’s about reclaiming ownership of your health.” Of course, with health data comes the question of privacy, something Equinox treats with the same seriousness it brings to performance. Data is encrypted, stored securely, and shared only with explicit member consent, Musso says. Both Function Health and the wearable devices used in the program meet or exceed HIPAA-level standards. That diligence underscores a larger ambition for Equinox: to take what’s long been siloed within the medical field and make it accessible at scale. “We’re bridging the gap between fitness and preventative medicine,” Musso notes. “This is where the future of wellness is heading—and we want to lead it.” The program seeks to reframe strength as something that evolves across a woman’s lifetime and adapts to her physiology instead of ignoring it. Courtesy of Equinox For Equinox, Women’s Arc isn’t just another offering; it’s a statement about what women deserve. “Women’s health is not a niche,” Musso says. “It’s central to human performance and longevity.” The company’s five-year vision extends well beyond the club. Future plans include deeper collaborations with medical providers, contributions to women’s health research, and potential digital extensions to bring these insights into everyday life. There’s even the possibility of shaping policy and best practices through aggregated, anonymized data. It’s a bold goal, positioning Equinox not just as a fitness brand but as a global catalyst for women’s health innovation. At its core, Women’s Arc challenges the long-held notion that performance must come at the expense of balance. It reframes “strong” not as a single state of being but as a continuum, one that evolves across a woman’s lifespan and adapts to her physiology rather than ignoring it. In a culture that often celebrates pushing through pain or exhaustion, the luxury fitness brand believes there’s something radical about a system that asks women to listen to their bodies instead. “This is not about fixing what’s broken,” Musso says. “It’s about unlocking what’s possible.” And in doing so, Equinox isn’t just creating a new standard for wellness; it’s helping women everywhere see that peak performance isn’t defined by comparison or conformity. It’s written in their own biology, one perfectly informed phase at a time. Editorial StandardsReprints & Permissions
