I Joined The Rock's #TeamHercules Challenge and Saw a Bunch of Naked Old Men Watching Reality TV

The second installment in my journey to get as ripped as Dwayne Johnson

By John Boone Jul 04, 2014 5:15 PMTags
The Rock, InstagramInstagram

Dwayne Johnson, aka the Artist Formerly Known as The Rockannounced that leading up to premiere of his film Hercules, he would share "the most grueling, the most intense" workouts he did to prepare for the role. It's the #TeamHercules challenge and somehow—by coercion? By decree of my boss? By my own free will?—I've agreed to be a part of it. Hopefully I won't live to regret it.

This is the second installment in my journey to get as ripped as The Rock (you can read the first account of pain and no gain here). Spoiler alert: I still don't have a six-pack. But I think I can see one (1) ab. Progress!

Workout No. 3:

For some reason I've always thought I had decent triceps. My biceps might not always bulge and my lats don't look like I have weird, sexy growths coming out of my back (yet!), but I do have that "V" when I flex and that's how you know you have fairly decent triceps, right?

When I YouTubed the workouts beforehand (because "preacher curl" means absolutely nothing to me), one of the YouTube fitness personalities said tri sets are for "experienced lifters only." I am certainly not that, but I do have a deadline. And this ended up being my favorite workout so far. You can really get into a rhythm and, as I may have mentioned, my triceps be banging. So I'm sure I looked truly sexy doing triceps dips to failure.

Of the two sets, my favorite exercise was the preacher curl, because the bench was facing the mirror so I could watch myself while I did it. On a serious(ish) note: This was the first workout where I was, I guess, proud of myself for finishing the whole thing. The standing barbell curl and dumbbell curls started to get very hard and very heavy during the third set, but I managed to finish all four. If that makes me your new workout inspiration, so be it.

Workout No. 4:

Here is a ranking of the shoulder exercises, from my favorite to my least favorite:

1. Reverse Fly Machine: I like this machine! 10 out of 10, would use it again!
2. Seated Dumbbell Shoulder Press: Simple. Standard. A weightlifting classic.
3. Standing Side Lateral Raises: I like how quickly you can feel the effects of these. (Raising your arms in the same way without weights afterwards. Burns so good.)
4. One Arm Cable Side Lateral Raise: Better than...
5. Bent Over Lateral Raise: I prefer standing or sitting, not somewhere in between.
6. Hammer Strength Shoulder Press: Hammer Strength machines hate me.

Almost more important: I have perfected the art of identifying people at the gym that kind of maybe look like a celebrity. "Celebrity" sightings: That Smallville guy who got arrested for murder or tax evasion (I Googled it when I got home and found out that it he was arrested for hillbilly heroine, so still not great); if Henry Cavill and James Franco had a baby, but hotter.

Progress So Far: I'm not good at tracking my body mass index or fat percentage or using those scales where you have to move the weights over until the needle balances in the middle. When I've workout out consistently in the past, I've always gauged my progress on how my clothes fit. And I am now down one belt loop.

By request, here are 100% more selfies than were in the last post. I took these photos to showcase how glowing I looked covered in post-workout sweat. I hope you enjoy them:

John Boone

P.S. This is one of my favorite things I have ever seen: I started at a new gym this week and there is a lounge area in the locker room—a coffee pot, a TV, a few love seats and a couch. I don't know why, but it's there. After my workout, I was getting dressed and heard someone talking about "turning down for what" and being "the baddest bitch there ever is." I looked over and there were a bunch of old and naked Eastern European men watching—actively watching—Love & Hip-Hop: Atlanta. If I were to publish this story as a novela, I would title it, A Tale of Two Tri-Sets and Six Old Men Watching Love & Hip-Hop: Atlanta.

If you'd like to be my #TeamHercules workout buddy, keep checking back to tell me about your results or tweet me @jtyboone. And feel free to use the comments section to give me music recommendations, or just bitch about your own workouts. You're in a safe space.