Hugh Jackman’s “Wolverine” Workout Routine & Weight loss plan

Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine stands out above the remainder of the mutants that make up the X-Men. His attitude, claws, and brute strength make him a badass. What makes him a fan favorite is that Hugh Jackman has had an insane physique throughout his portrayal of the 3-bladed mutant, Wolverine. Hugh Jackman’s body is so jacked that many guys wonder how he trains and we have now the reply.

This text goes to put out what’s involved in Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine workout routine.

Plus, we’re going to put out 2 entire Wolverine workout plans! 

Training To Be Wolverine

Hugh Jackman first appeared on the large screen at about 32 years old in 2000 to bring Wolverine to the large screen in X-Men. He maintained his brutish, jacked body until this writing (2024) at 55!

That is crucial as that is what Wolverine is. Among the original writers say that his creation was inspired by the likes of Conan the Barbarian. He has also been in comparison with The Hulk as a result of his outbursts of rage.

So, Conan the Barbarian and The Hulk – for Hugh Jackman to present an accurate representation, it’s obvious he would want an above-average body. To do that, he was given a “celebrity trainer.”

As ironic because it seems, many “celebrity trainers” provide questionable training at best. You’ll think that these “elite” trainers are the most effective, but unfortunately, this just isn’t the case.

Questionable workouts, eating regimen suggestions, and subpar exercise selection are commonplace in Hollywood.

We’re joyful to inform you this just isn’t the case with Hugh Jackman’s training, no less than the majority of it.

Looking through YouTube, we did find instances of Hugh Jackman performing things like lunges while alternating between a single dumbbell and bosu ball squats. Don’t do these.

Regardless, it does appear to be the foundations of his training are solid.

While Hugh Jackman has had several trainers throughout the years, one in every of his primary trainers has been UK-based trainer David Kingsbury, who’s out of the UK. Along with training Hugh Jackman, he’s also trained the likes of Ryan Reynolds, Jake Gyllenhaal, and Chris Hemsworth.

These men have awesome physiques, so the Wolverine is in good hands.

What Does Hugh Jackman’s Workout Consist Of?

If you have got been a reader of SET FOR SET for any length of time, you’ll know that we push the thought of simplicity over complexity. Persist with the fundamentals and construct upon them over time. 

Well, this is largely the identical concept that has guided Hugh Jackman’s workout program to remodel his mutant physique. Hugh Jackman followed some basic training principles you have got examine repeatedly in our blogs to get jacked like Wolverine. 

We are able to break these down into six important variables:

Before going further, we wish to say that finding the precise workouts is comparatively difficult. Subsequently, this information is predicated on the cumulative information taken from several sources, including YouTube interviews with David Kingsbury, social media posts, and various excerpts around the net.

1. Exercise Selection

Hugh Jackman didn’t and doesn’t use ultra-complex or trendy exercises. His training program uses your foundational compound movements. The 4 primary exercises that Hugh Jackman uses often are:

As well as, you will discover him doing:

To essentially drive muscle growth, Hugh Jackman uses an excellent amount of accessory and isolation work, but again, he sticks to the fundamentals. Some examples include:

See? Nothing fancy here, just what works. 

In actual fact, there may be a excellent likelihood you have got done every exercise that Hugh Jackman used to construct his body for the Wolverine. There are not any “secrets” in his training, just adherence and intensity. 

2. Cardio

This may increasingly come as a surprise, as cardio doesn’t necessarily go together with bulking up. Nonetheless, you could keep in mind that Hugh Jackman can be required to place in long, physical days on set.

Playing the Wolverine is extremely demanding, with quite a few fight scenes, and Hugh couldn’t pull off mutant power, huffing and puffing after a few sprints.

You could find evidence of him using quite a lot of methods using quite a lot of equipment, including:

Further, he would often use high-intensity training similar to HITT.

3. Progressive Overload

Just like several effective program, the central tenant of the Wolverine’s workout program is progressive overload.

Progressive overload is the central training principle that states that to repeatedly progress, you could consistently place a greater load on the body over time. It simply means to do a bit more work every week.

This overloading continues to force muscle growth; over time, you may eventually change into a Wolverine.

Let’s consider that Hugh Jackman has been training for the past 20 years. It’s been quite a protracted time since he began using progressive overload, which may explain how he has grown over time!

4. Periodization

During our research, we were pleasantly surprised that Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine workout program uses a training principle often called periodization.

Periodization is a tactic that requires a trainee to change his training load and volume over time. Doing it will will let you train and deal with different fitness variables during different time frames.

At the identical time, it’ll alter the stressors placed on the body and might act as a form of recovery.

For instance, training using 90% of your 1RM is totally different than using 75% of your 1RM to failure. These different loads and volumes affect different physiological and metabolic systems; alternating them can provide help to feel fresh. 

At the identical time, it could keep your training a bit more interesting, which will help with adherence.

There are various ways to do that, but a basic idea could appear like this.

• Week 1- Train Hypertrophy
• Week 2- Train Strength
• Week 3- Train Power
• Week 4- Train Hypertrophy

These “periods” might be months, weeks, and even days and use any combination of coaching variables. 

Now, Hugh Jackman’s training program would have him alter his loads every week. Further, it primarily alternated between strength training for 3 weeks after which hypertrophy for one week making up a 4-week block. 

After 4 weeks, the weights can be increased, and the block can be repeated. To do that, it uses percent-based training, which we’ll discuss below. 

It is necessary to indicate that that is primarily true for the first exercise of every session. After this, the remainder of the exercise simply used progressive overload to extend volume over time. 

5. Percentage Based Training

Percentage-based training simply means you choose loads using a percentage of your 1 rep max. For instance, you could be prescribed 5 sets of 5 reps using 80% of your 1RM.

Technically, this requires you to know your 1 rep max or no less than an estimate. The nice thing is that this is barely true on your primary exercises.

If you happen to do not know, you’ll be able to simply run a testing week and find it. Do not forget that this does not must be exact so long as you have got an excellent idea.

This 1RM is then used to prescribe loads for the primary 4-week block. After the 4th week, you’ll add 5-10lbs after which use this number for the second 4-week block.

But here’s the thing. The smallest weight plate in lots of gyms is barely 2.5kg (5lbs). This implies your load will must be a multiple of 5kg (two plates on a bar), similar to 55kg or 70kg.

Nonetheless, this may not at all times occur. For instance, after doing calculations, you could need 57kg. For this, you will have access to smaller weight plates similar to 1kg, 0.5kg, and even 0.25kg.

If you happen to do not have these smaller plates, just round up.

6. Super Sets, Compound Sets And Giant Sets:

One other method of coaching that pops up in much of Wolverine’s training is the usage of special sets similar to supersets and:

• Tri Sets
• Compound Sets
• Giant Sets 

When these are performed, Hugh generally moves from one exercise to the following quickly after which uses 60 seconds of rest between sets. 

Over and over people will use this sort of training for the intensity factor or because they think they’re higher for muscle growth. That’s a completely different topic but Hugh uses these primarily for one reason – save time. 

Hugh Jackman is a busy man and doesn’t at all times have hours to spend within the gym. Subsequently, these special sets serve him a really practical purpose because it lets him get in his training in a time-efficient manner.

Now in the case of advantages, that is ultimately they’re primary advantage as they permit a trainee to get in additional work in a shorter period of time (study). 

Hugh Jackman’s Workout Routine For Wolverine

So, we’ll first review the progression used throughout the 4 weeks on your primary exercise. Each week, a particular variety of reps were used for every set. Nonetheless, the load would ramp up for every set.

• Week 1: 5 Reps @ 60%, 65%, 75%, 75%
• Week 2: 4 Reps @ 65%, 75%, 80%, 80%
• Week 3: 3 Reps @ 70%, 80%, 90%, 90%
• Week 4: 10 Reps @ 40%, 50%, 60%, 60%

After the first exercise, each exercise could have a typical rep scheme that uses basic progressive overload over time – you’ll slowly add weight when in a position to.

As we mentioned above, we’re going to lay out 2 Wolverine training programs!

5-Day “Wolverine” Workout Routine

That is an intense workout and requires loads of calories.

• Session 1: Chest & Shoulders
• Session 2: Lower & Core
• Session 3: Back & Biceps
• Session 4: Chest & Arms
• Session 5: Core & Legs

Session 1 Chest & Shoulders:

Session 2 Lower Body & Core:

Session 3 Back & Biceps:

Session 4 Chest & Arms:

Session 5 Core & Legs:

4-Day “Wolverine” Workout Routine

This 4-day workout is a greater option for lifters with less experience or those that simply don’t have the time. It’s inspired by that of Wolverine’s but built for mutants in training. But make no mistake, it’s still brutal and effective.

It is going to use an Upper/Lower Split.

• Session 1: Upper
• Session 2: Lower
• Session 3: Upper
• Session 4: Lower

Session 1 Upper:

Session 2 Lower:

Session 3 Upper:

Session 4 Lower:

Wolverine’s Weight loss plan To Bulk Up

Training like a mutant will only achieve this much for those who’re not feeding your muscles. Hugh Jackman ate quite a bit to bulk up his roles (which wasn’t easy in response to him). Luckily, we have now an interview where you’ll be able to hear it straight from Wolverine’s mouth.

Depending on if he was bulking or cutting, Hugh Jackman would devour anywhere between 4,000-6,000 calories a day.These calories got here from what can best be described as your classic bodybuilding clean eating regimen. 

A whole lot of chicken, steak and greens.

Hugh particularly mentions that much of his eating regimen was “bland,” similar to steamed chicken breast with no salt. Eating that clean and hitting that many calories is hard.

But Hugh Jackman made it even tougher as he followed intermittent fasting, specifically 16:8. This mainly means he would quick for 16 hours, giving him an 8-hour feeding window where he would want to devour all his calories.

We are able to’t comment on why he would do that, especially for bulking, nevertheless it apparently worked! 

Train Like Wolverine: Our Thoughts

Of all of the celebrity workouts that hit the mainstream, we might say that this is certainly the most effective built on solid principles. If we were to critique it, the first concern can be the whole volume – it’s quite a bit. If you happen to are a beginner lifter, we might advise you to knock off one or two sets from all of the exercises aside from the primary primary exercise. 

The one reason it won’t be for you is as a result of some variable you have got no control over, similar to training frequency. Apart from that, that is one in every of the few celebrity training plans that we might give a blanket advice for most individuals. In other words, training identical to Wolverine is 100% possible.

Unsure if this workout routine is correct for you? Take our workout plan quiz to search out a program that most closely fits you!