Can we all agree that the new Aquaman looks bad-ass?
Neither man’s body makes sense as that of a Miami lifeguard, and watching Efron in Baywatch elicited a panorama of emotions: confusion, envy, horror, and a sense of the unholy. It was at that. R/workouts: Discover incredible workouts & programs for every situation. Largest range of FREE workout routines available! Muscle building, fat.
Jason Momoa has taken a lame superhero, like Aquaman, and made him cool:
(Photo on the right by Jonathan)
A feat, I never thought possible!
But even if you don't care for comic book characters, you have to admit...
Jason Momoa has an awesome physique.
Luckily for you, I'm going to share how you can get a similar body.
But before I do:
I'm going to give a detailed analysis of Jason's best (and worst) bodyparts.
And I'll use this information to select the lifts that will help you achieve the same look.
Let's dive in..
*If you want to skip this and get right to the action, you can download the FREE PDF below.
Inside, you'll get the full workout plan, a cool table with goals, and a bonus guide to counting macros:
Table of Contents
Who is Jason Momoa?
First, a bit of backstory:
Joseph Jason Namakaeha Momoa (what a mouthful), was born on August 1st 1979 in honolulu Hawaii.
Jason was raised by his mother in Norwalk, Iowa. Following his stint at high school, he moved back to Hawaii and landed a lead role in the TV series Baywatch.
Fast forward 19 years and he snagged a role on the Emmy-nominated H.B.O series Game of thrones (2011). He played the infamous 'Karl Drogo', a barbarian King.
(If you've been living under a rock and haven't seen this spectacular series, I couldn't recommend it enough!)
His first debut as Aquaman was a brief cameo in Batman vs superman.
However, he is set to reprise the role in a solo film in late 2018.
6 ft 4 inches (193 cm)
234 pounds (106 kg)
Best muscle-groups
Jason is known for portraying tough, warrior types in his acting roles.
As a result, he carries a higher bodyfat % to give him extra size.
His best muscle-groups are his:
- Shoulders
- Forearms
- Neck/traps
Jason's chest is undoubtedly his best bodypart:
- His clavicles are wide
- He has thick upper pecs
- He has good separation
Achieving a similar looking chest will be difficult.
It will largely depend on your anthropometry and genetics.
How to get his chest: You'll need to get strong on the incline bench press.
Goals: Aim for a 180lb (82.5kg) incline bench for 5 repetitions.
Jason's wide frame can be attributed to his impressive shoulder development.
His shoulders create a '3 D' illusion, making him look good at every angle: including the front, side, and back.
How to get his shoulders: Building round, fully developed delts is a challenge for natural lifters. But it can be done.
The greatest shoulder builder, in my experience, is the standard overhead press.
It recruits the front delt, lateral delt, and the rear delt equally effectively.
*As this is a novice program, don't worry about hitting the shoulder from'all angles'. Focus on getting a strong vertical press and worry about isolating the shoulders later.
Goals: Aim for a 135 lb (60kg) overhead press for 5 repetitions. *MUST be strict, don't use leg drive.
Jason's arms aren't his strong point.
However, he does have good tricep insertions, which make his arms look bigger from the side.
How to get this triceps: The triceps are already hit hard with the bench press and OHP.
Although, I've included 2 assistance exercises for performance benefits:
- The JM press- Recruits the medial head of the tricep, and helps to build lockout strength.
- The close grip bench press- Develops the long head of the tricep (the biggest part).
Goals: The assistance exercises are included to raise the main pushing movements (there is no need to set goals for them).
In the shot above, you can see Jason has decent forearm development...
And they compliment his triceps nicely (making his arms look big from the back/side).
How to get his forearms: The fastest way to develop the forearms is thick bar training and wrist extension/flexion.
I recommend you only use straps on your top sets, this should hypertrophy the forearms. On top of this, I've included wrist curls (for flexion) and reverse wrist curls (for extension).
If you were to cut Jason in half, he would still look impressive...
This is the power of having a big neck/traps.
But if you're like most people, the thought of training the neck directly is strange and maybe even 'weird'.
However, it's worth the effort...
Fortunately, the neck only takes 20 minutes to train, and is incredibly responsive.
You can expect to get an 18 inch neck in roughly 1 year of consistent training (2-3x week).
The beauty of training the neck, is that it builds the traps too:
Therefore, if you train the traps AND the neck simultaneously, you'll see faster results.
How to get his neck/traps: I've included shrugs and direct neck work in this program.
- On workout A, you'll be using strict shrugs to build your strength foundation.
- On workout B, you'll be doing power shrugs to get more overload on the traps.
The beauty of this setup, is that the power shrugs have awesome carryover to strict shrugging strength.
Goals:
- Aim for a 405lb shrug (182.5kg) for 5 repetitions.
- Aim for a 90lb (40kg) neck curl for 30 repetitions.
Worst muscle-groups
Jason Momoa's physique is great, but it isn't flawless.
In my opinion, he has two major weak-points:
- His Biceps
- His upper back
If you look at a front pose of Jason, you'll notice that he has low bicep insertions.
His triceps also overpower his arms, making is biceps look even smaller in comparison.
Unfortunately, this is a genetic limitation; there's nothing you can do to get bigger bicep peaks (apart from make the muscle bigger).
Jason looks underwhelming from the back. His rear delts are quite impressive, however he has a lagging upper back.
To avoid hypertrophying the upper back too much, I've included pendlay rows which remove the eccentric portion of the rep.
What's Jason Momoa's body fat %?
I estimate that Jason's bodyfat percentage (as Aquaman) is between 10-13%.
Here's why I believe he is at least 13% bf:
- He has a flat stomach
- He has a good amount of muscle separation overall
- You can see his abdominals (when flexed)
Here's why I think he's above 10% bf:
- He has minimal oblique definition
- He doesn't display much abdominal separation when relaxed
- He has low vascularity
- His physique has a soft appearance, indicative of the 10-15% bodyfat range.
Jason is 6'4 @ 234 lbs in Justice league (his second appearance as Aquaman).
I also estimate him to be 10-13% bodyfat.
Using this, we can calcualte his FFMI to be around 25-26.
BMI (body mass index) is used in clinical settings to determine how healthy an individual is.
It takes the person's weight and compares it to their height.
The problem with the BMI formulation is that it doesn't take muscle mass into consideration- So a muscular guy who is 5'10 @ 180lbs will be considered overweight.
Fat-free mas index (FFMI) was developed by studying a sample of Mr America contestants in the 'pre-steroid' era (1939-1959).
A 19 on the FFMI scale is considered normal for the average male, and a 25 is determined as the upper limit of what's considered natural.
Jason scores an FFMI of 25 at 13% body fat
And an FFMI of 26 when adjusted to 10% bdoyfat.
Looking at his pictures and FFMI, I'm confident that his physique is achievable naturally.
*This isn't to say that Jason is 100% natural (I can't know for certain) but you can achieve similar body with this program.
Jason Momoa workout (for beginners)
Workout (A)
- Incline bench 3x5
- Below the knee rack pulls (pin 1) 3x5
- Pendlay row 3x5
- BB shrugs (strict) 3x6
- JM press 3x8
- BB curl 3x10
- Ez bar wrist curls 3x20
Neck workout: (2-3x week)
- Neck curls 3x30
- Neck extensions 3x30
Workout (B)
- OHP 3x5
- Below the knee rack pulls (pin 1) 3x5
- Pendlay row 3x5
- Power shrugs 1x5 (ramp set)
- Close grip bench press 3x8
- Weighted chin ups 3x RPT (3-5, 5-8, 8-10)
- Reverse wrist curls 3x20
Workout |
---|
Workout (A) |
OFF (Neck workout) |
Workout (B) |
OFF (Neck workout) |
Workout (A) |
OFF |
OFF |
BONUS: Get the workout as a FREE PDF download
Get the Aquaman workout plan in a convenient PDF format:
- You can store it on your phone and take it to the gym- no fuss!
- Includes a beginners guide to lean bulking.
- It's completely FREE.
I recommend you do a lean bulk, following these guidelines:
- You should aim to gain roughly 0.5-1lb per week (12-24 lbs in 6 months)
- Eat 0.8 grams of protein per 1lb of bodyweight
- 20% fat intake
- The rest from carbohydrates
You don't NEED to take any supplements following this program.
However, you can get a small 5% boost to muscle & strength gains if you use these supplements:
- Vitamin D
- Fish oil
- (optional) whey protein
Conclusion
If you want to look big and strong like Aquaman- this is the program for you!
You should see results in 6-12 months of consistent training.
I wish you the bets of luck with your gains.
Now, it's over to you:
Do you plan on using this workout? And which Aquaman do you prefer; the classic, or the new? Let me know in the comments!
Help spread the word!
Zac Efron’s abs have been haunting me ever since I saw them crinkle together in the trailer for Baywatch. I was even more distraught by their prominence in the movie, released earlier this summer, in which Efron plays bad boy Olympic swimmer Matt Brody and goes vein-to-vein with Dwayne Johnson on an obstacle course that includes salmon ladders and carrying refrigerators. Though smaller than the Rock, Efron is at peak muscular definition, his body resembling something lifted from “Bodies … The Exhibition.” Neither man’s body makes sense as that of a Miami lifeguard, and watching Efron in Baywatch elicited a panorama of emotions: confusion, envy, horror, and a sense of the unholy. It was at that moment I understood that there is a limit to swoleness, to what we are demanding of ourselves and our actors. I felt it was a moment for us, as a culture, to pause and reflect: How did we get here?
In an ongoing personal quest to better understand male swoleness and its discontents, I spoke to Patrick Murphy, the man behind Efron’s Baywatch muscles. Murphy was doing interviews as part of Baywatch’s release on Blu-ray August 29 — a fitting occasion, considering one could now bear witness to Zac Efron’s rippling obliques in “4K Ultra HD.” This is where we’ve been heading visually: toward a heightened sense of the unreal.
Patrick Murphy is a physical trainer and nutritionist based in L.A., and can rightfully call himself a “trainer to the stars.” His very long and famous list of clients includes Jennifer Lawrence, Keanu Reeves, and Judd Apatow. I start by asking Murphy to describe some of Zac Efron’s workouts, which he calls a “loaded question.”
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“I threw my whole tool box at [Efron],” Murphy tells me with the clipped speech of a college crew captain and a touch of California woo-woo ambiguity. “I basically covered everything dealing with stabilizing and balance and everything dealing with strength and everything dealing with power. We did a lot of balance and agility training, we did a lot of the heavier lifting and strength training with slow movements, and then we also did power train[ing] — quick, very controlled movements like power jumps and power lunges and quick twitch movements and jumping movements.” As someone who has been inside of a gym, I already feel winded by these descriptions.
Efron did Murphy’s dynamic and ever-changing program for about three months, five to six times a week, sometimes twice a day (called “two-a-days” in exercise parlance). After their workouts, Efron would also do a two-hour lifeguard-training program before working out again. He also owned an “awesome road bike” and would go on 20- to 30-mile bike rides. And as you might expect, the secret — including a dedicated trainer, nutritionist, and money — is “consistency over time.” Zac Efron was working out all the time. “Imagine the calorie expenditure,” says Murphy. “Remember, high heart rate is directly related to calorie burning, so he’s burning close to 1,000 calories for every workout.” At this point, I estimate that one workout could amount to a solid basket of fried chicken, two sides, and a biscuit. This sounds pretty good to me.
But our former Link Larkin wasn’t eating a two-piece and a biscuit. “The foundational idea I put him on is the whole food diet,” says Murphy, which means avoiding processed foods, including any and all flour products. Not only were pasta, cookies, and tortillas verboten, but also those trendy “gluten-free” flours. He could have an apple, but not apple juice; brown rice, but no brown rice pasta. “Nothing from a box,” says Murphy. “All the greens, all the veggies, all the lean protein and the majority of foods he ate were alive and could spoil fairly quickly, because if it spoils quickly, it’s going to be a healthier product than something with fillers and preservatives.” (In a Men’s Fitness interview ahead of Baywatch, the writer reports that Efron was so committed that he brought his own beverage to a juicery, as prescribed by Murphy — a “yellow-brown liquid with a foamy head.”)
I’m wondering what all of this is for — all the diet restriction and constant workouts — but the answer, according to Murphy, is obvious. Murphy explains that he and Efron wanted to create “the most ripped look we could achieve in Hollywood history.” He adds, “When I said, ‘Let’s go for this Bruce Lee look,’ he said, ‘Yes, I love Bruce Lee. Let’s go for it.’” This is, apparently, a new Hollywood game — a competition where an actor is able to leverage all available resources to create a body that we haven’t seen before and create a new fitness ideal.
Indeed, in that same Men’s Fitness interview, Efron said that he wanted to “drop the last bit of body fat” and “get into the best shape of his life.” “The goals were basically to let’s see how far we can take this and create the leanest body possible. He was all game for it,” Murphy says. “I’ve never seen anyone as ripped as him for that shoot and I’ve been training for 20 years and done a lot of movies.” If this sounds appealing to you, you’re in luck: Average people can attempt a version of Efron’s training program and download a 17-page PDF at Baywatchbodyworkout.com for $149.99.
My 15 minutes with Patrick Murphy is winding down, and I can’t help but take stock of our responsibility as cultural consumers in the abnegation of Zac Efron’s body fat. We cheered him on as he took his shirt off in Neighbors, lustily applauded as he took off his shirt at the MTV Movie Awards, and nodded tastefully as he played a hot DJ in We Are Your Friends. These now feel like grossly naïve times. Long gone is the dancing youth with the floppy hair from High School Musical, or even the peeing youth with the floppy hair in The Paperboy. In their stead has emerged a new Zac Efron, veined, tough, and leathery.
But before I get off the phone with Murphy, I have to ask him: Is this Zac Efron’s final form? “Zac achieving what he did for this movie shows [us that nobody] knows where he’s going to go with his career,” Murphy says. “He may be the next Bourne Identity guy; he might be the next John Wick. Who knows what movie he’ll get after showing his physicality? We’ll see what happens.” Meanwhile, we’ll be waiting here with our buttered popcorn, thinking about our choices.