Joe Rogan has revealed what it is like to work out with The Rock, and where the muscle-bound wrestler's fitness is lacking.
The UFC commentator talked about training alongside the movie star, whose real name is Dwayne Johnson, during an episode of his podcast in 2023.
Rogan, a former kickboxer turned stand-up comedian and podcaster, is renowned for his own fitness regimen, with a bespoke gym inside his podcast studio in Austin, Texas.
The 57-year-old put the WWE icon through his paces with an intense kettlebell workout.
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“We’re with The Rock. We worked out for three hours,” Rogan told his podcast guest, the hunting expert and author Cameron Hanes.
"He did pretty good. Except for the mobility stuff. Like windmills, he struggled with windmills, and he struggled with a couple of things.
“They require flexibility, they require range of motion and core strength… those apply very well to functional strengths like martial arts.”
Johnson has also previously discussed how, in the mid-1990s, he toyed with the idea of making a switch from wrestling to MMA.
At the time, having recently joined the WWE (then still known as the WWF) and competing under the ring name Rocky Maivia – an amalgam of his father Rocky Johnson and his grandfather the High Chief Peter Maivia, who were both star wrestlers – Johnson was earning around $150,000 per year.
PRIDE, the Japanese fight promotion who were a rival to the UFC for much of the 90s and early 2000s, were offering professional wrestlers contracts to compete in MMA. Johnson learned he could earn up to $500,000 a year to fight in Japan.
“I start talking to Ken Shamrock, who was wrestling with us. I run into Mark Kerr, and I start talking to him. He tells me a little bit about Pride, and I have this idea in my head – well, maybe I should train for MMA and go to Pride, make real money.” Johnson said during an appearance on Rogan's podcast in 2023.
"Then I don’t have to smile. I’m sure I’m gonna get fu**** up over there and maybe knock one of my lungs loose, but maybe I could do something like that. Find the right coach and train. So, I had this whole thing in my head. I was talking to my wife at that time, and I said, 'I think that’s the way to go ’cause those guys are paying real money, and these fans are booing me over here for 150 grand.'"
Ryan Baldi