It’s an understatement to say that Ahn Bo-hyun is a sight for sore eyes. Jisoo’s new boyfriend is making waves on the internet now because of his romance with the BLACKPINK star, but it’s really his acting chops in Itaewon Class where he played the hot-tempered villain Jang Geun Won. While Ahn Bo-hyun’s on-screen supremacy definitely floored us, it’s his chiselled physique that’s low-key the star here, thanks to his intense workout regimen.
Despite the actor’s packed schedule, he stays dedicated to his fitness. Ahn Bo-hyun not only loves to get his adrenaline high after a good workout sesh, but he’s also a big adventure junkie who performs his action scenes without the assistance of stunt doubles. We’re in awe of Ahn Bo-hyun’s discipline, so much so that we dug out his workout routine for all curious souls.
The actor, who has maintained a healthy relationship with exercise all his life, found his first love in boxing. Did you know that Ahn is an alumnus of the Busan Sports High School, where he used to participate in various amateur boxing competitions and even bagged many gold medals in tournaments? Even his workout routine comprises boxing drills and burpees, planks, ab, and bicep workouts. Sorry Jisoo, Ahn Bo-hyun has captivated our hearts too! Get over your workday blues as we take you through the actor’s workout routine for some major fitness inspo.
Try out Ahn Bo-hyun’s workout routine for a sculpted physique
Home workout
In a YouTube video, Ahn Bo-hyun shared his easy go-to home workout routine which targets almost all muscle groups. Let’s take you through all the exercises one by one:
1. Burpees
Burpees is one of the most challenging exercises, especially when starting your fitness journey. However, by targeting major muscle groups in your body, this versatile exercise helps build massive endurance and strength while shedding calories. It involves a jump squat and a push-up or a squat, push-up, and vertical jump in a sequence.
Burpees offer a total body workout, helping you strengthen your shoulders, arms, core, glutes, quads, and hamstrings. It’s a high-intensity workout that gets your heart thumping and lungs working, strengthening your cardiovascular system. By improving your blood flow, burpees lead to better brain functioning, which gets your creative juices flowing. Moreover, you don’t need any equipment to perform this exercise — a little space to move around and the ability to handle your body weight.
If you want to ramp up the difficulty level, try burpees with a Bosu ball/dumbbell. You can also do a pull-up every time you jump at the end of a burpee.
2. Squats
Squats are the best way to fire up those glutes and make everyday tasks easier! By targeting the legs, lower back, and core muscles, squats improve your balance and posture, help prevent injuries and boost calorie burn. Especially if you’re into sports, this exercise will strengthen your athletic performance by building the body’s strength and speed.
As for Ahn Bo-hyun, he opts for a combination of regular and sumo squats. For those unversed, a sumo squat is a variation of the traditional squat, wherein you take a wider stance with your feet turned out slightly. You can do it as it is or make it more intense by adding a dumbbell or kettlebell.
If you’ve mastered the basic squat, spruce up your routine with wall squats, box squats, squat jumps, goblet, lateral, or pistol squats.
3. Lunges
Another exercise to work up your lower body, lunges work wonders in strengthening, sculpting, and toning the hips, glutes, quads, hamstrings, and calves. Regularly performing lunges will help you get closer to achieving the buttocks you always dreamed of!
It’s a compound exercise that works together multiple muscle groups, and joints instead of isolated movements like bicep curls or calf raises focusing on one area. Furthermore, lunges give our bodies much-needed flexibility amid the sedentary lifestyle most of us lead today. If you’ve any muscle imbalances, lunges will improve your balance and give you a stable core.
If you’re bored of the standard forward lunge, there are many variations to try out. These include side lunge, twist lunge, walking lunge, reverse lunge, and curtsy lunge.
4. Arm Walking
If you’re bored with your walking routines, try incorporating arm movements to make it a full-body workout. By adding an upper-body element, you not only strengthen your arm muscles but improve your posture and build cardiovascular health. Whether you’re walking outside, on a treadmill or strutting around the house, there are many arm movement variations to try out.
You can choose from forward, upward or side-to-side punches, 90-degree arm swings, straight arm shoulder circles as well as bicep curls.
5. Planks
Ahn Bo-hyun rounds up his home workout with plank variations. Plank is one of the best exercises to strengthen your core and abdomen. By involving your arms, legs as well as abs, planks make for an all-encompassing workout. If you’ve strained your back from sitting at your office desk or developed a slouch by lying in your bed all day, planks will help you improve your posture. Since it targets your core abdominal muscles, you’ll be able to get rid of stubborn belly fat soon. Additionally, planks boost flexibility and even improve the body’s metabolism.
The easy-to-modify exercise can be practised in interesting ways. Challenge yourself by indulging in arm or leg lift planks, side plank crunch, resistance plank, knee touches or front, side, and reverse planks.
Gym Workout
If you’ve successfully completed Ahn Bo-hyun-recommended home workout, let’s give you a sneak peek into his gym outings. While the actor hasn’t revealed his detailed gym plan, one of his Instagram posts showcases him training his biceps. So, why should you try this weight-training exercise?
Strengthening the bicep muscle will help you fulfil your daily routine more effectively as it results in stronger arms as well as improved forearm grip and strength. Strong biceps help you perform other major exercises including vertical and horizontal rows, chin-ups, and pull-ups, which is why they’re especially important for deadlifters and Olympic lifters. Bicep exercises also improve flexibility, muscle function and athletic performance as well as increases your range of motion.
Some of the best bicep exercises are bicep curls, barbell bicep curls, cable curls, hammer curls, reverse-grip barbell rows, incline curls as well as zottman curls.
Boxing
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Ahn Bo-hyun is a boxing enthusiast
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The Busan Sports High School alumni indulged in many amateur boxing tournaments back in the day. In a conversation with Soompi, the actor mentioned that because of his inclination towards sports, he was very keen towards doing his own action scenes on-screen.
“I don’t know if it’s because I did sports before, but I’ve always had an interest in doing action scenes. I’d watch boxing movies and think, ‘This person isn’t a boxer but they’re good. Since I used to be a boxer, I’d be good at boxing scenes’,” he mentioned. Ahn further stated that he never thought of becoming a professional boxer because of the sport’s ‘extremely challenging’ nature.
Combat sport is an effective way to improve your cardiovascular health, as it requires a lot of rapid movement like throwing punches, moving across the ring, footwork drills and whatnot. Apart from defining your muscles, boxing makes your bones stronger and denser which keeps degenerative diseases like osteoporosis and osteoarthritis at bay. As boxing requires strong visual-motor coordination, it leads to improved reflexes, sharp hand-eye movement, and increased concentration.
By releasing feel-good hormones like serotonin, boxing and other workouts will elevate your mood and lead to improved overall sleep quality.
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(Hero and feature image credit: bohyunahn/ Instagram)
This story first appeared on Lifestyle Asia Singapore
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Answer: Ahn Bo-hyun's workout routine comprises boxing drills, in addition to burpees, planks, ab and bicep workouts
Answer: BLACKPINK's Jisoo is dating K-drama star Ahn Bo-hyun, who's known for his role in the 2020 series 'Itaewon Class'.
