We’ve already seen Natalie Portman at SHJ before, but last time it was to discuss roles that were looking to go in the opposite direction in terms of weight loss and muscle gain.

As you’ll see from my research below [in the workout research section] Portman actually talks about how for Black Swan she was instructed to get as tiny as possible – while for Thor: Love and Thunder her goal was to tack on as much muscle as she could, while keeping a lean and toned physique.

And everyone wants to know her arm workout, so don’t worry…we’ll be covering that, on top of much more.

Natalie Portman’s Thor: Love and Thunder workout is a huge topic right now, so we’re lucky enough to have a ton of interviews and sources to go through. For that reason I’ll be piecing it all together for us and building out a full routine from all different interviews with both her and her trainer.

Natalie Portman Stats:

Real Name: Natalie Portman

Height: 5’3

Weight: (approximate) 125 lbs.

Age: 41 years old

Natalie Portman comes in below average height that we’ve seen around female celebs, missing it by about an inch or two.

She also is listed around 115-120 lbs. but we also know her goal was to tack on 10-15 lbs. of muscle for Thor.

Normally the average height we see for women is around 5’4-5’6 with ladies such as Jennifer Aniston, Margot Robbie, Olivia Munn, Alicia Vikander, Sophia Bush, Tatiana Maslany, Evangeline Lilly, and a ton of others.

But then there is also that taller range, and among the tallest (even taller than the 5’7-5’8), are ladies like Gwendoline Christie, Gal Gadot, and a few others – with Phoebe Tonkin, Gabrielle Union, Brie Larson, Nina Dobrev, Daisy Ridley, and so many more coming in around that 5’7-5’8 range.

And, let’s not forget the shorter ladies of SHJ like Ariana Grande, Scarlett Johansson, Mila Kunis, Emilia Clarke, Lucy Hale, Julianne Hough and a good handful of others.

But, either way, don’t worry.

I write these routines for anyone and everyone.

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Natalie Portman Thor Diet and Nutrition

I’m going to be pulling as many sources as we need for this one, but by far the best source I found is an interview Variety did with Portman’s trainer, Naomi Pendergast.

I’ll be adding a TON of resources from that interview in the Natalie Portman Thor Workout Research section below, but for now I want to start with what Pendergast tells us about Portman’s nutrition:

Natalie is an extremely healthy person with a very wholesome and clean diet, so we did not have to make any major changes to her food. Natalie is a vegan, so for her to get enough protein to bulk up the way she needed we had to increase her daily amount by adding vegan-based protein powders a couple of times a day.

So to break that down a step further I want to zoom in on the only change they made for Portman to tack on muscle and bulk up:

to bulk up the way she needed we had to increase her daily amount by adding vegan-based protein powders a couple of times a day.

For our vegans in The SHJ Army, I always tell you that you’ll likely need some help with supplementing protein if you want to tack on mass, and this backs that up.

I’ve personally done Vegetarian for a few months, as a test with members, and had no problem hitting my daily protein goals, but Vegan is a different story.

To build on this I just want to bring in a couple more quotes from Portman before we move into her training. Here’s what she says in an interview with Jimmy Fallon:

“I’m vegan, and a lot of people think we’re eating alfalfa, so I like showing that there’s really delicious, varied, easy things that you can do at home that your kids will eat that are plant-based. And I’ve been lucky enough to learn a lot of other people I admire a lot,”

She also goes on to finish up the conversation about her vegan diet with:

“I don’t really have a lot of skill, so I always feel like if I can do it, anyone can do it,” she said. “I’ve gotten so many great recipes from Instagram from other people that I follow. And it’s definitely easier that we’re cooking every meal pretty much.”

We see a lot of celebs opt for a sustainable approach like this.

That’s why our Academy Nutrition Classes (Monks, Minimalists, SuperHumans, Vikings, Spartans, Hunter Gatherers, Greek Gods, Samurais, & Eat Fat, Lose Fat) revolve around helping you find the specific diet that is right FOR YOU.

Of course, there are a lot of reasons to HAVE the strict guidelines.

We’ve seen a lot of celebs opt for specific restrictions. 

For example: Dwayne Johnson and Kevin Hart incorporate 80/20 dieting with big weekly cheat meals, Hugh Jackman, Benedict Cumberbatch, Tom Hopper, and Terry Crews utilize intermittent fasting(something I use daily as well), Mustafa Shakir and Madelaine Petsch are vegans, Brandon Routh and Frank Grillo opt for paleo, and tons of others utilize their own variations as well.

And, that’s just to name a few celebs from each, by the way.

You can check out our Nutrition Pillars for more information and articles on all of the above and more.

Curious what the Top Diets Among Celebrities actually are?  Check it out.

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Natalie Portman Thor Workout Routine Research

We have a lot of information to pull from Variety regarding Portman’s Thor Workout, but for now I want to start with some information from Portman herself.

In an interview with Vanity Fair they ask her what kind of training she went through for the role:

It was really fun. I worked with a trainer, Naomi Pendergast, for, I think it was, four months before shooting, and then obviously all the way through filming. We did a lot of weight training and a lot of protein shakes—heavyweight training that I haven’t ever done before. Of course, I’ve never really aimed to get bulky. It was very physical, so it was a lot of both agility work and also strength work.

We knew about Pendergast and the protein shakes already, but it’s nice to hear some extra information right from Portman.

Jumping into the interview with Pendergast we’re able to get a TON of information, starting with their main goals for the workout:

What muscle groups did you focus on with Natalie for the film?: The goal and initial brief for working with Natalie was to develop arm and abdominal definition. However, to safely get Natalie to this goal without injury we worked to condition her body first for about four months. This meant we could safely up the load to bulk her up without negatively affecting her joints.

From there Pendergast goes on to talk about the fact that they had 10 months to prepare for the role, as well as the warm up they used (which I’ll provide within the workout), the fact that she was lucky enough to not really have any injuries during the transformation (small or large), and into what she says here about preparing for such a transformation:

Initially, it was about prepping Natalie’s body for the heavy weights to avoid injury.  We worked on building her upper body three times a week, which included arm, back, chest exercises, boxing, skipping and running. The other two days were dedicated to injury prevention work, which included Pilates-based exercises, stretching, release work and balance exercises.

We’ve already seen our fair share of Pilates-based workouts and PPL splits with boxing, skipping and running (Portman loves running), and I’ll give you all the information Pendergast gives for their skipping routine – but for this one I want to stay on track with the precise routine Portman used AFTER she was ready for the heavy weights. The training that really got her Thor-jacked!

From there they get into her diet a bit, which we’ve already covered, and then they discuss how many hours she trained, and a bit more about the actual training:

How many hours would you work together? We worked every day for around 1½-2 hours, depending on her schedule. Once filming started, Natalie’s schedule was very busy so we would train early, around 4:30 a.m., before she started for the day.

What went into her workout regime — squats, lifts equipment? On the days we lifted weights, we would focus on the quality of the reps and the gradual increase in load. On the other days that we trained, we would mix the workout up to keep it fun and interesting. A typical strength session for her upper body would include:

•  A good warmup using body-weight exercises, bands and gliding discs, which focused on bringing the upper body into alignment so we could maximize the strength benefits.
• We would then do a main set of exercises which would include supersets with around a one-minute stretch rest between each set.

Pendergast then goes into a full breakdown of the workout with four supersets, boxing and skipping, and even their core work and stretching – which I’ll break down for you piece by piece below.

Pendergast also did an interview with Us Magazine, which she shared similar information, but I’ll also be pulling anything unique from there to give you guys the extra scoop for the workout.

Natalie Portman Thor Workout Routine

Training Volume:

5 days per week

Explanation:

For this one we’re going to be hitting our upper body and arms 3 times a week like Portman (including boxing, skipping and core work), and then 2 days a week will be “injury prevention work”, which for Portman included Pilates-based exercises and stretching – but we also know Portman loves yoga and running if you’d like to add those things in as well.

Resources Explanation:

Below you’ll find resources broken down by source and variation. I included the routine that Pendergast shared with both US and Variety to give you a look into how even coming from Portman’s trainer we can see that the routine varied a bit . On any given day Portman would do the warm up, the upper body work, AND the boxing/skipping and core work to finish up. That was her training 3 days a week to become Thor!

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Natalie Portman Thor Workout Routine: Warm Up (from US)

Marching arms x 30 seconds

Lat stretch x 30 seconds

Beast crawl x 30 seconds

Roll down walk outs x 10 reps

Power band kneeling reverse fly x 25 reps

Natalie Portman Thor Workout Routine: Upper Body Workout (from Variety)

Superset 1:

Dumbbell row — 10 slow reps

Body-weight offset pushup — 10 slow reps

Lat stretch (rest exercise)

Superset 2:

Dumbbell reverse fly — 10 slow reps

Dumbbell seated shoulder press — 10 slow reps

Back stretch (rest exercise)

Superset 3:

Standing dumbbell arm raise (palms up) — 20 slow reps

Assisted pull ups — 6-8 controlled reps

Roll up (rest exercise)

Superset 4:

Dumbbell bicep curl — 10-12 reps

Dumbbell triceps press — 15 reps

Upper body rotation stretch (rest exercise)

Natalie Portman Thor Workout Routine: Upper Body and Arm Workout (from US)

Banded pull ups

4 sets of 12 reps

Dumbbell straight arm lateral raise

4 sets of 25 reps

Rest for 90 seconds

Straight arm raise with palms up

4 sets of 20 reps

Reverse plank

4 sets for 1 minute each

Rest for 90 seconds

Seated dumbbell Arnold press

4 sets of 10 reps

Kneeling banded tricep press

4 sets of 20 reps

Rest for 90 seconds

Dumbbell bicep curl

4 sets of 12 reps

Banded kneeling rotation

4 sets of 20 reps

Rest for 90 seconds

Dumbbell tricep press

4 sets of 12 reps

Squat jumps

4 sets for 1 minute each

Rest for 90 seconds

Natalie Portman Thor Workout Routine: Boxing and Skipping Workout (from Variety)

4-5 Sets of:

2 minute boxing

1 minute skipping

2 x 50m sprints

Rest 1.5 minutes

Natalie Portman Thor Workout Routine: Boxing and Skipping Workout (from US)

Boxing (2 minutes) followed by skipping (1 minute)

Repeat for three sets, resting for 90 seconds between each

Natalie Portman Thor Workout Routine: Core Work and Stetching Workout (from Variety)

Abdominal plank on elbows — 1 minute

Side plank on elbow — 1 minute each side

Basic curl focused on pelvic control

Foot, leg and hip stretches

Natalie Portman Thor Workout Routine: Core Work (from US)

20 reps of basic abdominal crunch (feet down)

20 reps of abdominal crunch (feet up)

20 reps of abdominal crunch with a twist

1 minute weighted overhead arm raise (do three times, pausing between reps)

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