What happens when the person running a health system decides to become one of its patients? In this episode of Healthspan Voices, host Matt Lawson sits down with Will Cook, President and CEO of Vail Health, who enrolled in the Healthspan program not just to endorse it, but to live it.

Will shares the personal wake-up call that pushed him to prioritize his health at 52 — being "skinny fat," carrying visceral fat, and facing concerning cholesterol numbers — and how becoming a father later in life reframed his goals around longevity: staying active enough to walk his daughters down the aisle and be a present grandparent. He talks candidly about learning to train in zone two, discovering strength work he'd never tried (Bulgarian split squats included), and the slow-building "aha moment" when consistent effort started to actually feel like progress.

The conversation goes beyond personal fitness into what Will's experience taught him about the future of healthcare itself — the shift from "sick care" to true prevention, the role of behavioral health as a foundation for lasting change, and how Vail Health is working to weave the Healthspan philosophy through its broader system. Will also gets practical, offering his approach to fitting health into an unrelenting schedule: treating it like a budget, building in "twofers" with family, and dropping the guilt when a week doesn't go perfectly.

In this episode:

• Why Will decided to go through Healthspan himself, not just fund it
• The mindset assessment that comes before any physical program
• Learning to train by zone (and fighting the urge to always go faster)
• What changed physically and mentally once momentum kicked in
• How this experience is shaping Vail Health's approach to preventive care
• Practical advice for fitting health into a packed schedule
• Why "something is always better than nothing"