When you think of legendary fighters, you think Ali, Tyson, Lewis—and you also think Balboa. Even though Sylvester Stallone’s Rocky is a fictional fighter, with a statue at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, he’s solidified legendary status. And as it turns out, Stallone’s training for the character was equally as punishing as what real boxers go through.
In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Stallone explained the lengths he went to to prepare for Rocky III, when his character was facing off against Clubber Lang (Mr. T.).
“My entire breakfast would be maybe two [small] oatmeal cookies made with brown rice, and 10 cups of coffee because I wanted to keep my body fat down to 2.8%,” explains Stallone. “I was forgetting my phone number. I was eating just tuna fish. My memory was shot, it was completely gone. I was getting all kinds of debilitating physical effects. But it was for the cause.”
Over his 50-year career, Stallone has put his body through hell, explaining that he’s had “five back operations, two shoulders, three neck fusions, both knees,” and is basically now “bionic.”
In order to protect his body, the 76-year-old actor has shifted “from lifting regular weights to mostly bands and cables.”
He explains: “It’s kind of like physical therapy. So, you’re using the bar, you’re using different motions and keeping those joints moving all the time.”
At this point in his life, Stallone revealed he has some interesting ways of keeping things fresh in the gym.
“I’ll be in headbands, I’ll be in a top hat, in cowboy hats, just to break the doldrums,” he says. “It’s really hard to work out alone.”
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