Hugh Jackman’s ‘Days of Future Past’ 5-Day Routine
The man behind Wolverine dialed up his training yet again for the latest X-flick. Here’s a full week of Hugh Jackman's program, straight from his trainer.
This feature originally appeared in a 2014 issue ofMuscle & Fitness
X-Men: Days of Future Past marks the seventh time Hugh Jackman takes on the role of the uber-jacked, adamantium-clawed mutant Wolverine. Of course, he’s once again in the best shape of his life. Needing to reach peak physical condition for the screen, Jackman doesn’t fall back to training templates that worked for past films, says personal trainer David Kingsbury.
“I wanted to adapt and improve the previous plan to take Hugh to the next level,” Kingsbury says. “The new plan follows similar principles, but has a couple of major changes from what we did on The Wolverine. This plan utilizes two percentage systems—one aimed at strength, the other with a focus on hypertrophy.”
The following workout represents one week out of the hypertrophy (muscle growth) phase of Jackman’s program. Give it a try, and don’t forget to check out the The Wolverine Workout program that Kingsbury wrote for Jackman when filming 2013’s The Wolverine.
Warm up and cool down each day with dynamic stretching and foam rolling.
Perform any exercises labeled A and B as supersets, resting only after exercise B is complete.
For any exercises labeled as “50 Club,” use the following rules:
Pick a weight you can use for 12 reps.
With a partner, take as many turns as necessary to reach 50 total reps, going to failure on each turn. If you’re training alone, use rest periods no greater than 35 seconds.
If you reach more than 12 reps on your first set, it still only counts as 12—this is a clear indicator that you should have gone heavier, so more work is your punishment.
The 50 Club isn’t a drop set, so whichever weight you use in the first set is what you need to use for all 50 reps.
Perform as circuit with 3A-2 & 3A-3. Curl the dumbbells up to your shoulders, then rotate your wrists out so that your palms face away from you before lowering the weight.
Use a fixed or loaded EZ Curl bar and pull the weight from your waist to your chin as you would during a normal upright row, then flip your elbows below your wrists and press the weight overhead.
Lie on the floor with your legs in the air so that they are perpendicular to the floor. Rotate your legs left and right, not allowing them to touch the ground; your abs and obliques will have to work overtime to keep them stabilized.
