If you the last thing you saw of Zac Efron was High School Musical, he looks A LOT different now.
The American actor is no longer the floppy-haired, permatanned, teenage hearthrob. He is absolutely ripped.
He was in pretty decent shape to begin with – but then he landed a role in the new Baywatch movie alongside the king of iron Dwayne Johnson.
If you’re going to be sharing a screen with The Rock, you’d better bring your A game – and that’s exactly what Efron has done.
The 28-year-old has been training like a madman for the role and recently took on the WWE superstar in series of beach workouts.
"Blood, sweat & respect. The first two you give, the last one you earn." Learned that from @TheRock #Baywatch pic.twitter.com/pRekrSVhWg
— Zac Efron (@ZacEfron) March 6, 2016
He took on The Rock at a pull-up contest, and narrowly lost out by one single rep. Not bad at all.
But Efron has been speaking exclusively to Men’s Fitness about how he has trained and dieted to get in shape for the film.
Efron told the US magazine how his training is constantly evolving depending on the film roles he is working on.
“The more you learn, the more your workouts evolve and change.
“A couple of years ago I was trained by a military guy. I trained strictly to put on size with some Navy Seals and heavy powerlifting moves and I started to notice I was getting more injuries.
“I’ve slowly changed my workouts to include a lot more plyometrics and isometrics. I stretch nearly as much as I workout these days.
“Cardio is good too. I do a lot of cardio.”
His diet is pretty strict, as you’d expect. Sadly there’s no shortcut or magic pill to get in that kind of shape. Just dieting hard and training harder.
“Lately, the most important thing I’ve learned in terms of diet is to stay away from processed foods and stick to organic as much as you can,” he told the magazine.
“I am a firm believer in not eating chemicals and really try to isolate where your food is coming from. Try to keep it healthy, organic and unprocessed.”
Men’s Fitness say that Efron managed to diet down to an incredible 5% body fat in just 12 weeks.
Looking at the photos of him on the Baywatch set, we wouldn’t disagree.
Honestly I have a hard time with paparazzi but s/o to this dude 🕶 pic.twitter.com/VYn8CbdsGI
— Zac Efron (@ZacEfron) March 6, 2016
His trainer Patrick Murphy implemented a whole foods, all-organic diet for over the 12 weeks.
Murphy said the star had to drink a minimum of three litres of water a day and supplemented with unflavoured whey protein with no additives.
While he wouldn’t reveal the specifics of Efron’s daily diet plan, he did say that his proteins, fats and carbs (macros) were altered every two weeks.
This is the food that was on his nutrition plan shopping list…
In the run up to his shoot on the set of Baywatch, Efron went zero carbs for nine days – presumably to get rid of sub-cutaneous water to look extra ripped.
9 days of absolutely zero carbs & sugar. Only organic grass fed/free range protein and organic leafy greens. This lead to…
— Zac Efron (@ZacEfron) March 9, 2016
#Cheatday ! Devoured a steak, 4 side potatoes/veggies, macncheese, 3 desserts, bread/butter, brick o cheese & caviar pic.twitter.com/q9hXSoq4us
— Zac Efron (@ZacEfron) March 9, 2016
This article originally appeared on JOE.co.uk.
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