AGE 24 – 167CM | 62KG Max Whitlock
GYMNAST, GOLD-DIGGER MENSHEALTH.CO.UK
At 24 years of age, double Olympic champion Max Whitlock should be past it. In gymnastics terms, he’s an old man. “Gymnasts generally retire at about 27,” says Whitlock, whose two gold medals in Rio last year made him the most decorated athlete in British gymnastics history. “But I want to do two more Olympic cycles, so I need to be clever about how I train.”
That means focusing his efforts in the gym on the two events in which he most recently exerted dominance: the floor and the pommel horse. “I spend a great deal of my time doing apparatus-specific conditioning,” he says. Whitlock’s training might otherwise seem surprisingly familiar to the average gym-goer: Hiit-style efforts of 30 seconds on, 30 off, plus lots of bodyweight exercises. The fact that calisthenics is now a mainstream fitness craze, with muscle-ups a symbol of gym status, is something that tickles Whitlock. After all, he’s been tending the bars from the age of seven, and has had abs ever since. “We’ve got gymnasts in our club who are 10 and absolutely shredded,” he says. “Even I’m shocked when I see it, but I guess I was the same. When you’re in the gym 20-odd hours a week, it doesn’t take long to get that sort of body.”
But size isn’t everything. In fact, Whitlock has to be careful not to pack on too much muscle. “Bigger lats, biceps and triceps would affect my pommel horse, which has always been my main focus,” he says. “Pommel horse is all about flexibility. You see the big guys and they can’t touch their hands behind their backs. The fact is, the bigger you get, the less flexible you become.”
Talking through Whitlock’s routine, it’s clear that being one of the greatest gymnasts of your generation isn’t all gold medal glamour. Spend that much time on a pommel horse and your palms will take a pummelling. “You build up big calluses that you have to file down,” he says matter-of-factly. “If they get too big they can catch and take a chunk out of your palm. Then you’re starting from square one again.” And when you possess a drive like this South Essex old hand, such setbacks aren’t an option.