Ex-Googler Jeff Dean shares his grueling weekly workout routine — and how he takes care of his knees and ankles

• Jeff Dean, one of Google's OG employees, left the tech giant to cofound a science-y AI startup.
• He shared the calendar for his final day at Google. Then, he shared his weekly workout routine.
• It includes soccer, running, biking, gym sessions, and squishy shoes.

There's lore around Jeff Dean.

Google's former employee No. 30, who rose to become the company's chief scientist, was once the subject of Chuck Norris-style jokes inside Google — think "When Chuck Norris cooks, he makes onions cry," but for a legendary engineer.

Now, Dean has offered another data point for the legend: his weekly workout routine.

On Monday, Dean shared the calendar from his final day at Google's office during the KDD Conference in Jeju, South Korea.

He reposted a shot of the calendar on his X account on Tuesday. One user spotted yoga tucked into the busy day and asked about his usual workout routine.

Dead said his standard weekly mix includes two soccer games in a 25-and-over league, two gym sessions, two yoga classes, three to four 8-kilometer runs to work, three to four 8-kilometer bike commutes, and one longer run or ride on the weekend.

Soccer (2 games/wk in my 25-and-over league), gym 2x/wk, yoga 2x/wk, run to work 3-4 directions/wk (8k each way), bike to work 3-4 directions/wk (8k each way), longer run or bike on weekend.

— Jeff Dean (@JeffDean) August 11, 2026

Asked what he does to protect his joints during high-impact exercise, Dean pointed to his footwear.

"Squishy running shoes and replacing the shoes pretty often and arch support inserts," he wrote. "It's my ankles that are more troublesome (too many basketball sprains years ago)."

Representatives for Dean declined to comment on this story.

The workout routine comes as Dean is embarking on a major career change. He left Google this month after 27 years to cofound Discovery Loop, an AI startup focused on automating parts of scientific and engineering research.

His departure was one piece of a broader reshuffling of Google's AI leadership. Demis Hassabis moved from CEO of Google DeepMind to chair of the unit and chief scientist of Alphabet, while DeepMind CTO Koray Kavukcuoglu took on responsibility for its day-to-day operations. Dean also departed alongside longtime Google researchers Sanjay Ghemawat, Oriol Vinyals, and Quoc Le, who joined him at Discovery Loop.

Dean's Google ties aren't cut completely: Alphabet is a founding investor in Discovery Loop, and Google Cloud is a partner.