The Christian Bale workout helps you achieve a well developed, lean and muscular hollywood physique like that of Christian Bale in American Psycho. His well developed musculature combined with minimal body fat results in an astonishing look.
This is by far the most impressive Christian Bale has ever looked in his acting career.
The chiseled american psycho look takes a whole other level of dedication and it’s the exact physique I teach people how to build in my Warrior Shredding Program.
On the other hand, the Christian Bale body in Batman Begins was much more muscular, but he also was carrying around quite a bit more body fat. A bulky appearance is nothing special and quite easy to attain with a big appetite and few hours in the gym every week.
This body type requires an intense, shredded workout program in conjunction with a strict diet. Many people lack the will power to do either of those, let alone both.
This was no problem for method actor Christian Bale who possesses the will power of 1000 shaolin monks. In fact, Christian Bale is notorious for putting his body through intense, unhealthy measures in order to portray a character.
There is no doubt that Christian Bale trained intensely to achieve his physique in American Psycho.
The following is the Christian Bale workout for American Psycho.
The American Psycho Workout
Strength Training – Monday and Friday
1. Incline Dumbbell Bench Press: 3 x 4-6 reps (2 mins rest)
2. Pull ups (add weight if necessary)*: 3 x 4-6 reps (2 mins rest)
3. Lateral Raises: 3 x 8-12 reps (60 seconds rest)
4. Standing Dumbbell Curls: 2 x 6-8 reps (90 seconds rest)
5. Bar Dips (add weight if necessary): 2 x 6-8 reps (90 seconds rest)
*Make sure you use a high-quality weight belt once you add weight to prevent discomfort and distraction from training.
Strategic Cardio Training and Abs – Wednesday and Saturday
1. High Intensity Interval Training: Perform on Treadmill, Stationary Bike or Elliptical or Sprinting outside
Option 1: 30 seconds hard / 30 seconds easy x 12
Option 2: 60 seconds hard / 60 seconds easy x 8
2. Low Intensity Cardio – perform on any piece of cardio equipment
15-30 minutes at a pace similar to walking
3. Core Training
Hanging Leg Raises: 3 x 8-12 reps (90 seconds rest)
Kneeling Abs Wheel Roll outs: 2 sets x 8-12 reps (90 seconds rest)
Rest Days – Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday
On rest days the goal is to let your body recover.
There is no need for any intense training on these days. Simply go about your life as normal and take full permission to avoid the gym.
There is no need to kill it in the gym day in and day out. A great physique is built off intense workouts, ample recovery and solid nutrition.
You’ll do more harm than good if you are working out intensely each and every day.
Moreover, you’ll likely ramp up your appetite, this will make it next to impossible to stick to a strict diet.
steps for a Christian bale body transformation
Step 1 – Proper Mindset
Christian Bale immersed himself into his role as Patrick Bateman, a high powered investment banker with a psychopathic ego.
I can only imagine that tapping into this character would make it easier to summon the dedication to achieve an extremely defined physique.
It is almost like his character, Patrick Bateman lacked human qualities making it effortless for Christian Bale to eat strict and exercise rigorously.
One of my favorite quotes from the book goes like this, “All it comes down to is this: I feel like shit but I look great” Bret Easton Ellis, American Psycho.
Of course, that’s not my approach. You can look great AND feel great with the right mindset and approach.
One of my tricks to reaching extremely low body fat is tapping into the present moment and accepting where I am.
This puts my mind in a state of empowerment, where I can easily make good choices to propel me towards my goals, without all the negative self-talk.
My accepting where you are, right now, you can start to move towards your goals. If you hate where you are, you’ll only stay stuck.
Step 2 – Heavy Strength Training
The Christian Bale workout is composed of heavy weight and low to medium reps with long rest periods.
This style of training is the most effective way to build dense muscle without causing excessive muscle growth.
In addition, lifting heavy will allow you to maintain muscle mass and increase strength as you strip away body fat from a low calorie diet and strategic cardio.
The volume should be kept low (around 2-3 sets per exercise) because when you’re on a shredded workout plan, recovery abilities are reduced. Too much volume is unnecessary and counter productive while cutting fat.
I also recommend performing the reps in a controlled manner to maximize tension, resulting in greater muscle tone. Stop each set a rep or two before muscle failure. Training each set to failure will lead to burn out and stalled strength gains.
The areas of the physique we really want to focus on include the shoulders, upper chest, arms and upper back.
The legs need to be kept lean and defined, as opposed to curved and bulky.
For this reason I recommend strictly sprints and cardio to develop your lower body while avoiding lower body lifts altogether. Heavy squats and deadlifts tend to add too much size to the legs and butt.
This can make it awfully difficult to fit into nice, slim fitting pants. By focusing on intervals and cardio for the legs, you can rock GQ outfits like Patrick Bateman.
Step 3 – Strategic Cardio Training
The Christian Bale workout also includes strategic cardio, which is the most effective way to burn fat.
It involves performing high intensity interval training followed by steady state cardio. The high intensity interval training boosts your metabolism, elevates fat burning hormones and triggers the release of stored fat cells into your blood stream.
Follow this off with 15-30 minutes of walking and you will have one of the best fat burning workouts of your life.
In addition, this form of interval training will build the legs to the perfect size while also making them fit and athletic.
Furthermore, strategic cardio is very effective when you’re at those last 5-10 lbs and you’re having trouble dropping fat. The combination of intervals followed by lower intensity walking is an absolute wicked combination for mobilizing stubborn body fat.
That said, you have to have your diet dialed in for this to work.
Step 4 – Effective Yet Sustainable Diet
The Christian Bale diet for American Psycho helps you achieve very low levels of body fat.
This is precisely why Christian Bale looks so damn good. Low levels of body fat allow for incredible muscle tone, chiseled facial features and great proportion.
To achieve this state you need to be taking in less calories than you’re burning, this is what forces you to tap into stored body fat for fuel.
I recommend setting calories around 10-12 calories per pound of goal bodyweight, which is my approach in my extremely popular Aggressive Fat Loss program.
This will ensure you drop body fat while still being able to support training and feel good. If you go too low in calories you will sacrifice muscle and be miserable.
You should be consuming plenty of protein to support muscle growth, increase fullness and boost metabolic rate.
That’s right, protein is not just to help you build muscle. Protein will also keep you full on a diet and will elevate your metabolism. This is because protein has a very high thermogenic effect.
When you consume protein, 25-30% of the calories are burned through the process of digestion. This is one of the reasons why high protein diets tend to outperform low protein diets for fat loss.
I recommend setting protein to being around 0.82 grams per pound of bodyweight.
How TO Make This Even Easier
Getting down to 12-15% body fat can be achieved with a solid diet and exercise program.
However, getting to single-digit body fat like Patrick Bateman requires a more deliberate approach. I share all of my favorite strategies for leaning down in my shredded workout program.
Here are a few tips from the program that will help you break through any fat loss plateau.
1. Cut out so-called health foods such as nuts, milk, protein shakes and dried fruits
These have very little effect on fullness and make it easy to overeat.
Instead, you should be basing your diet predominately on satiating foods like lean meats, cottage cheese, veggies, fruits, and sweet potatoes or russet potatoes.
2. Cut out breakfast
Most people are under the false assumption that breakfast is the most important meal of the day.
This couldn’t be further from the truth. The idea that breakfast is the most important meal of the day has largely been pushed by big cereal companies to increase the sales of an otherwise useless food product.
When you skip breakfast, getting to a low body fat becomes easier than ever. This is because you’re finally able to eat big, enjoyable and downright satisfying lunches and dinners while keeping calories low to drop body fat.
Furthermore, the process of fasting in the morning actually boosts the metabolism from an increase in adrenaline, raises growth hormone (this helps preserve muscle and burn fat) and improves mental alertness.
Not to mention, intermittent fasting has wide array of health benefits ranging from life extension to cardiovascular disease and neuroprotective mechanisms.
After a few days of skipping breakfast, you start to adapt and dieting becomes easier than ever.
3. Refeed once per week
Eventually, dieting will become a grind. To counteract this you’ll want to throw in refeed days once per week.
When eating low calories for an extended period of time, the hormone leptin will start to drop, this, in turn, will down-regulate your metabolism and up-regulate your appetite.
By performing high carb days you can boost leptin and get the ball rolling again. As well, these high carb days will help with workouts and muscle retention.
My advice is to add about 150-200g of additional carbs on your refeed day once per week. You’ll probably feel like a million bucks.
Warrior Shredding Program
For a complete workout routine to get ripped, I recommend my Warrior Shredding Program.
This will allow you to effortlessly drop body fat while building strength in the gym and getting more chiseled than ever. This is the program I use when I want to cut down to very low body fat without going crazy.
