Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson said he uses moderate weight and a technique called supersets to pump up his upper body workouts, and shared an intense workout for fans to take on.
Johnson posted a clip of his Saturday session in his gym, "the Iron Paradise," on Instagram, challenging followers to try the routine.
The workout involves eight exercises total, split into four supersets of two exercises performed one after another with little rest in between, and resting 60-75 seconds between each superset. In the clip, the Rock does dumbbell incline bench presses and cable rows.
Supersets can be used to get a great workout in less time by pairing exercises that involve different muscle groups — in this case chest and back — so you can allow one muscle group to rest while the other is working. Other examples of supsersets include a bicep curl to triceps extension, working the front and back of the arm, or a leg extension to leg curl, alternating between the quads and the hamstrings.
For chest and back workouts, you might pair push-ups and pull-ups, chest presses and bent-over rows, or chest flys and lat pulldowns.
The Rock's routine also calls for 20 reps of each exercise, ending with a five-second hold on the last rep, and the high number of reps means he has to use a moderate weight (for him, that's 75 pound dumbbells on the bench — most of us would need to go much lighter).
The strategy is known as high volume. It can help build strength and size by keeping your muscles working for a longer period of time with better control than if you maxed out the weight for just a few reps, according to Johnson's strength and conditioning coach Dave Rienzi.
"Lifting a little bit lighter weight with slower, more controlled movements can really make the muscles do more work and have less strain on the joints," he previously told Insider.
Slowing down the movement on the last rep, when your muscles are already tired, can also help create more tension, which leads to better gains, he said.
Rienzi said he also uses a technique called eccentric or negative reps to ramp up the Rock's gains even more, focusing on the lowering portion of each exercise to maximize tension and build more muscle.
To allow adequate rest and recovery for muscle tissue to grow back bigger and stronger, Johnson's routine for staying ripped uses a workout split focusing on different body parts each day.
