hi everyone i'm henry cavill and i play
geralt orivia in the witcher
i'm here today to talk about some of my
training and how it has differed over
the years especially from movies like
immortals and superman up until now in
the witcher
i'm going to show you some of my
movements with my trainer that applied
to my weights regime every morning i
started with fasted cardio and then i
did a weight training regime which
happened whenever i could fit the
workout in with my schedule and i'm
going to show you some of those
movements now
this is my trainer dave rienzie and he
has guided me through
a couple years now of various programs
and for the witcher in particular we had
to focus on things which
would support the level of stunt work
that i was doing
absolutely and really with all the stunt
work he's doing the key foundation
movement we're going to incorporate is a
romanian deadlift to strengthen the
posterior chain he's doing a four second
negative with this and then a two second
pause at the bottom and then coming back
up contracting the glutes and the whole
key here is just maximizing time under
tension so he's able to fatigue the
muscles more but not over stress his
nervous system and his adrenals
yeah which helps because uh the days are
long and it's
important for me as an actor to go
through all of this whether it be in the
morning or the evening and still have
the ability to come to set and perform
as an actor to the highest level to have
the endurance to
do all the stunts without getting
injured and to have the neurological
capacity to be a great partner to my
showrunner
he's doing a four second negative with
this and then a two second pause at the
bottom and then coming back up
contracting the glutes
what we do with this technique here is i
have him utilize a hip circle above his
knees so basically with incorporating
that he's activating his glute medius
and really keeping the glutes activated
and fired the whole time
so the next exercise we're utilizing
here is a hyperextension we're actually
doing this on a glute ham machine which
is going to be more challenging than a
traditional hyper extension machine and
what we're focusing on here is isolation
really contracting the glutes at the top
holding each repetition for two seconds
and really continuing the conversation
and making sure the posterior train is
as strong as possible
when it comes to the posterior chain and
the kind of stunts i have to do
especially when it's
pirouettes with swords anything which is
based upon
one leg movement where a knee can have a
bad injury if you don't have that glute
medialis engaged or that posterior chain
this stuff is what saves me
and the focus here is again isolating
the posterior chain really activating
the glutes in the lower back he's
performing the repetitions by pausing at
the top for two seconds and really
squeezing and engaging those glutes and
then his hands are behind his head which
actually makes the movement a little bit
more challenging engaging a little bit
more of the erectors as well
another key to henry's training here is
really focusing on core strength so this
movement we're doing here is an oblique
static hole and what he's doing here
he's extending his arms he's holding in
his core tight and basically what this
is allowing us to do is activate the
transverse abdominals and the obliques
at the same time he's also keeping his
glutes engaged
by extending his arms out and then
inward he's making the movement even
more challenging so typically what we'll
do is he'll hold it out here for about
30 seconds and then he'll go into
extensions
and with this especially this helps with
one endurance when i have to do a fight
scene over and over and over again with
a sword if i'm using the real sword real
weighted sword it's very heavy and
requires lots of endurance to do the
moves
safely and perfectly each time and also
allows for nice explosive movement which
is
which is very typical for the witcher
[Music]
for this role henry needed to do a lot
of sword fighting so with the sword
fighting the key for the training was to
really focus on the shoulders making
sure the shoulders are strong and then
also that muscular endurance is there
for the shoulders this movement here is
a variation of side laterals and front
raises so each repetition is actually
three repetitions he's starting out in a
traditional side lateral for the first
rep then he's coming a little further
forward for the next one and then doing
a traditional front raise for the next
one so this allows us to target the
medial deltoid and the anterior deltoid
in one movement
as they said
this really helps with the sword
fighting aspect
swords are typically very very heavy and
when you're using them
all day long over and over and over
again every day um it really does help
to have that muscular endurance in the
shoulders and the strength to be able to
move in explosive movements and also
control because when you're film
fighting you're not going through for
kill strikes you're pulling the blow at
the last second but you have to keep
that speed up between the striking
moment and the stopping moment to make
it look realistic and so the extra
strength and endurance in the shoulders
really helps with that
he's starting out in the traditional
side lateral for the first rep then he's
coming a little further forward for the
next one and then doing a traditional
front raise for the next one
so this exercise we're performing here
is going to be a dumbbell curl
alternating from a static hole
yeah for the sword work in particular
again it's
what this really helps with is my
forearms that that constant time under
pressure when you're holding a sword
the first few takes are fine when you're
into take 16 of the day and you're doing
very complex movements with your wrist
your your forearm does start to die and
you then end up throwing swords across
the room rather than making a swing and
so it does make a big difference to have
that muscular endurance in the forearm
especially
with horse riding also this can make a
difference
because if you have a particularly
powerful horse
whether it be a stallion or anything
else which is really really going for it
to have that necessary heave back on the
bit
it does help it does help to have extra
strength there
what's unique about this exercise is it
allows us to keep the biceps under
tension for a longer period of time it
allows us to get more activation out of
the forearms and then also continue
working on that muscular endurance that
is so important for his role
right everyone well that's it and uh
what we've shown you today has been a
selection of moves that is not a workout
in particular but those are moves which
we put into workouts depending on which
muscle group or muscle groups we are
working
for that particular day
the most important thing to remember is
that you are you everyone has a
different genetic makeup everyone is at
a different stage of fitness or training
or even has a different amount of
calories going in so you do you and just
make sure each workout is the hardest
that you can do it don't look at the
person next to you just work out whether
you worked as hard as you could for that
workout