300 Work Out

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knowledgeTHE MIND IS PRIMARY.

Gym Jones / Knowledge http://www.gymjones.com/knowledge/article/3/

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disclaimer(/knowledge/article/1/)

private (/knowledge/article/2/)

philosophy(/knowledge/article/4/)

clarity (/knowledge/article/31/)

"300" (/knowledge

"300"The So-Called Program

BY MARK TWIGHT

Buzz about the movie "300" increases in volume as its release date approaches.

Because we were responsible for the fitness and appearance of the barely-clothedprotagonists we are fielding calls regarding the training undertaken by cast and stunt

crew. Since it was a Hollywood gig assumptions are made about the preparation, with a

50-50 split between accuracy and utter madness. The following explanation should help

to rectify the more erroneous ideas about what actually happened.

There's a decent introduction to the project here: http://www.moviesonline.ca

/movienews_11337.html (http:/ /www.moviesonline.ca/movienews_11337.html)

Part of the Warner Bros press kit reads, "To support fight preparation the training

emphasized athleticism by combining compound movements, lifting, and throwing.

Primitive tools - medicine balls, Kettlebells, rings - were used instead of machines. Each


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/article/3/)

300 opinions(/knowledge/article/36/)

hard work (/knowledge/article/37/)

walk it (/knowledge/article/51/)

should i?(/knowledge/article/43/)

why (/knowledge/article/21/)

talent (/knowledge

/article/26/)will and suffering(/knowledge/article/23/)

attitude(/knowledge

/article/25/)

session was competitive, with a penalty-reward system tied to performance and results

posted daily for all to see."

This sort of training seems perfectly normal to us but others find both the work and our

language unusual. Gerry Butler commented that, "the first time anyone ever told me I

was 'fat' was after I got this part." Many observers got hung up on the penalty part, or the

fact that one penalty session was called "Loser's Redemption". One individual

commented, "You call people 'losers'? That's unkind." And the answer is that we're not

here to make friends; there's a job and it's got to be done.

The typical interviewer wants to know about the "magic" workout the cast did to make

them look so good. Some were disappointed to learn that hard work is magic, while

others marveled - as did we some days - that the actors would work so hard.

Vincent Regan pulling 295# blindfolded

The first misconception is that we used a bodybuilding-type program of progressiveoverload and over-feeding with the goal of making the guys look huge. We took the


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testimonials(/knowledge/article/10/)

testimonial "300"

(/knowledge/article/22/)

twitching(/knowledge/article/15/)

warning

(/knowledge/article/18/)

tnstaafl (/knowledge/article/44/)

coach or trainer?(/knowledge

/article/53/)

opposite route of calorie restriction to make them look like they lived off the land, in the

wild, all sinewy and ripped. The diet was adequate to fuel effort and recovery, barely.

And we prescribed random physical challenges to keep them off balance, to ensure they

never knew what was coming, to cause a stress-reaction, to break them, to make them

look bad in front of each other, which eventually led them to trust one another. Trust

made them willing to go all the way to the edge in each other's company because that's

what the film was about: laying it on the line. Because fight training and conditioning and

eating took place in the same facility - essentially in the same room - the actors and thestunt crew did everything under the watchful eyes of everyone else. Dietary slip-ups

were noted, nods given when a particularly hard effort put forth, and general awe

expressed when complex choreography was executed without flaw.

Andrew Pleavin in the midst of a Man-Maker and Knees-to-Elbows countdown session

Our general approach and attitude, the movements and activities were new to many.

Some, of course, resisted while others took to the process with unusual zeal. Our goal,

outlined by director Zack Snyder was to "turn them into a gang," a unified force whose


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trust and belief in one another would be obvious on the screen. The first step of any

such project is to earn the respect and belief of the trainees. Zack helped by charging

the cannons himself, training with us 3-5 days a week. On those days cast and crew

arrived in the gym at 8:30am to find Zack's workout already posted on the whiteboard.

Knowing he got up and had already earned his calories for the day spurred them to

higher levels of effort. "Some of us wake up, others roll over ..." (PIL)

Zack fighting through a workout called "Louder Than 11"


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And dragging the big tire

The cast and stunt crew also had to be fit and athletic enough to handle the fight

training, choreography and execution led by Damon Caro and Chad Stahelski. To

achieve the objectives we adopted the following mission statement: appearance is a

consequence of fitness and this ideal guided our work. My assistant, Logan Hood andI were part team-builder, part corruptor, part coach, and part punisher. We led by

example and despite some overuse injuries, which are to be expected since we were in

the gym 10-12 hours a day, five days a week for four months, our own fitness improved

along with the men we trained. In one interview Gerry Butler summed up his experience

with us when he said, "Pretty much anything Mark Twight offered up was so difficult in

the kind of way where you wish you had never been born - and even more than that,

wished he had never been born."


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MFT with Robert Maillet who played the Uber Immortal ... he and his wife live with 7 or 8 rescued

racing greyhounds

To ensure that the guys would last for the entire project we addressed recovery as well

as hard work in our process: we had a massage therapist on-site every day and a

kinesiologist visited twice per week to treat anyone ailing. Our work had the unintendedconsequence of keeping the stunt crew healthy. "It was a tremendous help as far as

injury prevention, stamina, and overall focus," says Caro. "With fight choreography, you

only have a certain amount of time for physical training because it sometimes doesn't

mesh with the functional application. What Mark brought to the project was functional

strength, not just sculpted biceps or ripped abs." In this case, "functional" means fitness

appropriate to the task, and the positive result means the artificial training was highly

transferable. The methods we used were right for this job. A different objective would be

achieved by different means. In our work the task drives the method.

The method was sometimes harsh - anyone who fell off the bus over the weekend got

smashed in the gym on Monday - the pressure turned some rough raw material into realgems. And this is apparent on the big screen.


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Mathieu, one of the Montreal stunt crew. He worked hard and paid attention.

The second misconception surrounds the idea of the Spartan workout, aka "300", how

frequently it was done or who actually finished it. "300" is a one-time test, an

invitation-only challenge undertaken by those deemed ready for it. By the end of our

four-month project 17 people had done the workout (Logan and I were two of them). Thisconstitutes about 50% of the cast and stunt crew. We supervised every test, evaluated

each rep for quality and only counted those that achieved our standards for form and

range of motion. Like many workouts "300" is not hard once you've done it but the

apprehension built up ahead of it - something we encouraged - was enough to make

some guys fear it to the degree that performance was compromised. This workout was a

crucible that some passed through and others still have hanging over them.

"300"

25x Pull-up +

50x Deadlift @ 135# +

50x Push-up +


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50x Box Jump @ 24" box +

50x Floor Wiper @ 135# (one-count) +

50x KB Clean and Press @ 36# (KB must touch floor between reps) +

25x Pull-up

300 reps total

Stephane, another Montreal stuntman, and part of the Fast Motion crew (with Mathieu and Yan)

As for the training done on a regular basis there were no consistent, structured

workouts. In fact, very few ever repeated a workout during the four-month voyage. The

point was to improve fitness and facility across a variety of movements and through the

three-dimensional range-of-motion required by the fighting. We did this by constantly

changing the challenges, and focusing on athleticism to build a balanced foundation of

general physical capacity. Butler commented that my idea of a workout is to "go until you

are actually in fear of your life and then go further. Then, you do more." He drew the

connection between the physical and the psychological when he said, "It was

preparation, too, for the mindset of King Leonidas. The Spartans were trained to be the


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best, and why be bashful about being the best? We, the Spartans, know who we are so

completely that there's no way an outsider can understand." And, I suppose, this is more

or less the way we described and prescribed the training for this project: the physical

difficulties prepared the mind for the role.

Did it work? It worked for those who did the work, who paid attention, and who controlled

what they put in their mouths. We reinforced those who started with their own

self-discipline but we could not give discipline to anyone who didn't already have it. In

the end Vincent Regan shed 40 pounds in eight weeks, and took his deadlift from less

than bodyweight (205) to more than double-bodyweight (355). He could pull 85% of 1RM

blindfolded and recite Shakespeare in the midst of the toughest training session. Andrew

Pleavin trained with us for just five weeks. He increased his maximum number of

pull-ups from 6 to 23, rowed 500m in 1:25.6 and 5000m in 18:12, and he finished "300"

in 18:11. Some of the stunt crew experienced similar changes, and their work capacity

was - in most cases - higher. Even the ones who were relatively fit when they showed up

increased their overall fitness by having weaknesses exposed and prodded.


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Zack with the Stunt Team shirt ... it's better to die on your feet than live on your knees

This was an absolutely incredible experience and one I don't think could be repeated.

From writers to director, and actors to stunt crew, it would be difficult to reassemble such

talent, dedication to craft, the willingness to work hard, and to work terrible, long hours

when necessary. I am happy to have had an influence, and to have taught an ideal to

some of the younger stunt crew. I learned as much as I taught. Yes, it's the movie

industry, and it's make-believe, but the energy and effort behind it is human, and in thiscase some of them were very good humans indeed.

The Gym Jones shirt for the movie, earned by a chosen few

To see descriptions of what the cast and stunt crew of "300" were subjected to during

filming search the calendar in the Schedule section. The workouts described there are

not a recommendation, and this is not a program. What you see is a tool we used to do a

job. There are many tools in the box. If you decide to do any of the workouts take

responsibility for your decisions and for the load you use. You make your own bed. Be


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willing to lie in it.

Finally, read the essay about Quality (/knowledge/article/20/) because the notion of full

ROM affects the quality of any movement, and we don't count short-stroked reps no

matter how fast they get done. Even if you're a Hollywood star.

Read next article (/knowledge/article/36/)

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