Sylvester Stallone is one of modern cinema’s great action heroes. He first shot to fame in Rocky in 1976, and then continued his success through the Rocky franchise as well as the Rambo series, which started with the drawing of First Blood in 1982.

Stallone’s physical appearance altered significantly between his first and second Rambo films, from 1982 to 1985. Sly Stallone actually only started working out for Rambo: First Blood Part II, six weeks before filming started. He hired Franco Columbu, an Olympic weight lifter who won the title Mr. Olympia several times from 1974 to 1981, to help him bulk up and develop his muscular body that he became most famous for in Rambo: First Blood Part II and the later Rocky films.

Sylvester Stallone’s weight training routines were intensive, and therefore split over the week. He also trained twice a day, training different body parts each time. To undertake such a training program strict adherence to diet, rest, sleep and good form in training is essential to avoid over-training and injury. Read more: Sly Stallone’s diet.

Stallone’s Split Training Schedule:

On Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays he split his training into two sessions per day as follows:

Morning:
Chest, back and abs workouts, including bench presses, lateral pull downs and crunches.

Afternoon:
Shoulders, arms and more abs, including military presses, lateral raises, bicep curls and tricep extensions, and more crunches and leg raises.

On Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays he also trained morning and afternoon;

Morning:
Calves and thighs, including calf raises and squats.

Afternoon:
Rear deltoids, traps and more abs, including rear delt / bent-over rows, shoulder presses, upright rows and more crunches.

Stallone’s routine was a very intensive six days per week with a double split, which is the style of weight training that professional bodybuilders use when competing – not surprising seeing that he employed a professional bodybuilder to guide him.

Sly followed a standard 8-12 repetition with 3-4 sets pattern. He did 3 to 4 exercises per body part. Each day he varied the exercises using instinctive training, to keep the muscles form falling into a routine, and ensuring a plateaux was not reached too soon. He also exercised his abs furiously, with abdominal routines daily.

His ab routine consisted of a total of 1000 repetitions, by training four different areas with combinations of sit-ups, leg raises, side leg raises and side bends. Often 50 reps of each exercise would be done for each for 5 sets, i.e. 5 sets of 200 exercises. This was old school circuit training done to the extreme, which any military training instructor / drill sergeant would be proud of.

Sylvester Stallone learnt how to train like a professional with the help of Franco Columbu, and he built on these training routines throughout his career to build himself up into one of Hollywood’s greatest action heroes.

In 2002 he brought out a book on fitness and weight training, called Sly Moves. Here is one readers review of the book:

“I am a fitness instructor and a huge “rocky” fan and wanted to see what sly recommended in his training guide. As expected we get the usual, “exercise changed my life” comments and a few really interesting insights from the man who was once named “body of the 80’s”.
The book itself is excellent reading, with good exercises. Even the diet is humane, with none of the “egg-whites only” expected from a Hollywood star, and he even recommends seeing a trainer before beginning the exercises shown. All in all, thoughroughly worth buying, please write more SLY!” Buy in the UK / Buy in the USA

Slyvester Stallone’s is certainly one of the 20th Century’s great action heroes, and by following his workouts and nutrition advice, you too can sculpt the body of an action hero.