Deconstructing The Robert Downey Jr. Avengers and Iron Man Workout

Fitness After 40
/ By DD Kelsey

Have you seen pictures of Robert Downey Jr lately?

The guy is solid. Like Bruce Lee solid. Just a really dense, muscular build and the few clips I’ve seen of him in his upcoming film “The Avengers”, he moves like a tiger. Strong, smooth, quick, agile.

A lot of men (and maybe some women too) get inspired by someone like Robert Downey Jr. He’s 47 years of age and let’s be honest, many men at that age have a belly big enough they can’t see their shoes. And agile and quick are not words that come to mind when describing their movements.

So, they get excited and join a gym or buy P90x, or hire a trainer thinking that if they “workout”, they too can don the Iron Man suit, fight the bad guys, and generally be a true bad ass.

But there’s one really big difference between you and Robert Downey Jr.

It’s his job to look and perform a certain way.

How much time do you have to devote to your fitness; to training daily or a certain number of days per week?

An hour a day? Maybe 3-5 days a week?

Now, with that answer in mind, let’s walk through Robert Downey Jr’s “workout” for the Avengers and Iron Man.

Here’s the routine, according to his trainer, Brad Bose. It’s divided into upper and lower body.

Upper Body Routine

Weighted Pull Up – 3 sets of 8 to 12 repetitions
Weighted Dip – 3 sets of 8 to 12 repetitions
Bench Press on a Swiss Ball – 3 sets of 8 to 12 repetitions
Low Row – 3 sets of 8 to 12 repetitions
Dumb Bell Shoulder Press – 3 sets of 8 to 12 repetitions
Bosu Push Up – 3 sets of 15 to 20 repetitions
Suspension Trainer Push Up – 3 sets to failure (a category name for a product like the TRX)
Suspension Trainer Row – 3 sets to failure
Lateral / Front Shoulder Raise – 3 sets of 8 to 12 repetitions
Kettlebell Swing – 3 sets of 40
Sand Bag Power Throw – 3 sets of 12 to 15 repetitions
Ab Circuit – 4 to six “ab” exercises; 2 minutes of each exercise

Lower Body Routine

Hamstring Curl
Leg Press
Suspension Trainer Lunge
Suspension Trainer Superman Squat
Romanian Deadlift
Sandbag Squat

Okay, first of all, this is a LOT of work. And, why split your work into “upper” and “lower” body when many of the drills are both? Maybe this was the journalist’s choice because that’s how the majority of people think about “working out”. My view, it’s a complete waste of your time. If your goal is body building / body image, then splitting your drills up is what most trainers suggest. But I’ll bet that you’re more interested in super health & fitness than whether you have super biceps.

Robert Downey Jr’s Ironman Workout has to take at least 75 to 90 minutes to complete and has well over 250 repetitions in just the upper body with loads at the high end of the training spectrum.

If you can comb your hair after this one, you’re doing really well.

The PROS

Eight of the twelve upper body drills are safe, scalable, and functional enough to use and five of the eight will drive your metabolism up substantially (pull up, push ups, suspension drills, kettlebell swing and sandbag throw). Scalable means you can make the drill easier or harder with relative ease.

Weighted Pull Up – 3 sets of 8 to 12 repetitions
Dumb Bell Shoulder Press – 3 sets of 8 to 12 repetitions
Bosu Push Up – 3 sets of 15 to 20 repetitions
Suspension Trainer Push Up – 3 sets to failure
Suspension Trainer Row – 3 sets to failure
Lateral / Front Shoulder Raise – 3 sets of 8 to 12 repetitions
Kettlebell Swing – 3 sets of 40
Sand Bag Power Throw – 3 sets of 12 to 15 repetitions

The drills in the upper body routine that are more body building in focus are the Shoulder Press and Lateral/Front Shoulder Raise. Those drills are typically used to increase muscle mass and definition of the shoulders but at the expense of much lower metabolic demand.

The CONS

There are four drills I would remove from the routine completely:

Weighted Dip
Bench Press on a Swiss Ball
Low Row
Ab Circuit

Dips are very stressful to the front of the shoulder and elevate the risk of injury substantially. You just don’t need them.

Doing a bench press on a swiss ball does is supposed to make your arms work harder because of the unstable base. But, it doesn’t happen. To push more weight, you need a stable surface to create a counter-force. The soft surface of the ball may make it more difficult to balance on the ball which may recruit trunk muscles but that’s not why most people use this drill. If you want to push arm strength with a bench press then use a bench.

A Low Row is risky because most people do not have the hip and hamstring flexibility to properly position the lower back. Because of tightness in the hips, the lower back will tend to be rounded into a more flexed posture. Now, when you load up the weights, the spinal tissues end up taking way more load than they’re intended for.

And if you’ve been reading this blog for a bit, you know my take on “ab” drills (sit ups, crunches, etc). Not only are they a waste of time, they raise the pressure inside your spine to dangerous levels.

I would drop the leg press and hamstring curls from the lower body routine. You’ll get plenty of hamstring and leg work with the Romanian Deadlift and the Suspension Trainer drills.

Bottom Line

You can’t argue too much with the outcome of Downey’s training. It appears that he has both the performance he needs and the physique. But, my question is, could he have achieved this with less work? Less exposure to high loads? Less risk? Less time in the gym? And if he continues to train with risky drills, will Iron Man rust out?

What do you think?

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Joewaring says

Thanks for the reply, DK. Your info is always helpful. I’ll try the rows standing up. There is equipment at the gym I go to that I can adjust and use for that. I’ll also check out your assessment for body mobility.

Oh, and thanks for the info in your article about the dips and related stress on the shoulders. I use to do these, but stopped when my shoulder bothered me. My intention was to return to doing dips after my shoulder felt better, but I now I know better.

Joe

DD Kelsey says

Joe –

Happy tp help. Glad you discovered the down side to the dips. This is one of the reasons I started Fusion – to help people train hard but train smart.

DK,

I just wanted to make sure I understood what you meant by a fexed posture of the lower back if one’s hips are tight when doing a low row. Flexed as in rounded out away from the front of your body or flexed as in rounded in towards your the front of your body? I try to keep a neutral spine similar to sitting on a chair with no back, and believe I am fairly flexible in the hips (what is a good test for hip flexibility?).

I don’t have a suspension trainer and do seated rows at the gym using strap handles so I can postion and rotate my hands as I perform the row to minimize stress on my shoulders. I used to do pull ups, but currently cannot due to a shoulder injury. And I don’t care for doing the rows on a machine like Nautalis. Is there a better option or is the low row OK if I can determine I have adequate hip flexibility?

Thanks,
Joe

A flexed lower back means that it is rounded away from the front of your body in a similar way to what happens when you bend forward to touch your toes. This happens in the low row because the either the hip lacks mobility or the posterior musculature – hamstrings, gasctrocs, gluteals – are tight. So when you sit down with the feet out in front of you, it forces your lower back to flex; sort of tugs it into a rounded position. Bending the knees slightly, as in the image in the article, sometimes frees up the tension in the legs to allow for a more neutral spine.
I don’t suggest the drill because there are a number of other ways to train your upper body and trunk with lower risk of injury and with a greater transfer to everyday life, sport, hobbies. So, you could do the same movement – row – but in standing. This makes a lot of muscles work – so it increases the metabolic demand – and it’s a lot safer. You won’t be able to pull as much weight as in the sitting position since you no longer have the counter force of your feet but that’s actually a good thing.
And to answer your question about hip mobility, have you taken our assessment? If not, there are some tests in it for lower and upper body mobility.
Thanks for commenting Joe.

Omar –

Yes, the STAMINA series is designed to do exactly that. You manipulate load and speed to achieve more work per unit time.

Omar says

Hi DK-

I’m confused. You just described “power” (work per unit time). I was asking whether the STAMINA element improves “efficiency” (work per unit energy consumed). If so, then with STAMINA training I might loose less weight on the hike.That would appeal to me.

Sorry, I’m probably stretching the blog/comments beyond it’s intended function and not so clearly at that….Thanks again for the great article.

Yep, you’re right. Power. My bad.

STAMINA is the ability to resist fatigue – so yes, you’re performing more work using less energy overall; less energy required to get the work done (which is what I meant when I mistakenly used the POWER reference).
Hope that helps.

Awesome article DK. Question: From your discription, It seems like there is a tradeoff between body-building and increasing-metabolism. Did I read you right? In laymans terms, what distinguishes a body-building drill from a metabolic-demand drill? Why did you single out the shoulder-focus drills as the body-building drills?

I actually have a reason for wanting to build up my body (or maybe just “gain weight”). I’ll be going on an adventure in August which will be very physically demanding and from which I’ll likely return smaller than I already am (which is already pretty small)….I free the need to increase my reserve stores! So articles about safe ways to gain mass are very much of interest….THANKS!

Hi Omar –

Thanks for commenting and for your questions.

“Body Building” type drills are almost always body part oriented or focused. So the shoulder drills, for example, don’t require much from the rest of the body. The focus is solely the shoulder. Yes, you have to stabilize to a degree but the work load is low (now, if you did those drills Flamingo style, different story). Compare that to a Fusion 45 Degree Lunge and Lift – much greater use the body and multiple muscles so the energy demand is a lot higher.
For your trip, IMHO, you likely don’t need mass. You need STAMINA (strength + endurance) so the Stamina series would be helpful. I would also bump up your intake of fats and protein too. Then about seven days before you leave, you will want to go into a recovery phase – low energy expenditures, rest, allowing your body to super-compensate.

Thanks DK! You are absolutely right that having more stamina would help me perform better. Adding mass would not. My starting assumption is that I won’t be able to consume enough calories on the trip and that mass would be lost. Do the Stamina Elements generally improve efficiency (ie; more work done with less energy expenditure)?

BTW, the Fusion 45 Degree Lunge and Lift is a great drill. Thanks again, oz