WHEN TAKASHI NISHIYAMA created Ken Masters for the original ‘Street Fighter’ game in 1987, he probably wasn’t thinking about how difficult it would be for an actor to portray the character on screen. Masters is a mound of lean mass, with rounded shoulders, bulging biceps and muscles where muscles usually don’t grow. And yet, he’s still incredibly acrobatic and capable of delivering high-flying roundhouse kicks as quickly as you can press a button.
Noah Centineo was presented with quite a challenge, then, when he landed the role as Masters in the upcoming live-action Street Fighter film. Growing up, his cousins had ‘Street Fighter 2’, and he would spend hours at their house playing it “over and over again”. That was his first run-in with Masters – but back then, his characters of choice were “Blanka and Dhalsim”, and Masters and delivered plenty of KOs against Centineo.
So he was familiar with the character, which only made preparing for the role all the more intimidating. Centineo had a timeframe: “We got six weeks in Sydney for prep before we started shooting,” he says. With the clock ticking, he got to work as soon as possible.
He pulled it off, as you can see in the trailer below. Keep scrolling to see how he did it.
How did Noah Centineo train for Street Fighter?
When we ask Centineo if Street Fighter was the hardest he’s ever trained for a role, he doesn’t hesitate. “One hundred percent,” he says. “I was training for like four hours a day.” Those four hours were spent doing a mix of weight and combat training. “I did six weeks of weight training at home,” he says. “And for the last three weeks I did martial arts training.
“I split it into push, pull, legs. And then sometimes I would do a day just for arms in there,” Centineo continued. “That was my split.”
It sounds like a fairly standard training split, with some extra emphasis on arms sprinkled in. What differentiated Centineo’s training from the norm, however, was the intensity. “Every set, every exercise was to failure,” he says. “It was hectic, heavy hypertrophy training, a lot of callisthenics. I did drop sets for pretty much every exercise.”
In the past, Centineo has told Men’s Health that he prefers bodyweight training over spending all day in weight room. Back then, he also shared his favourite bodyweight exercises that require minimal gear. He also put an emphasis on training until failure. Here’s the workout.
Pullups
2 to 3 sets to failure
Pushups
2 to 3 sets to failure
Suitcase Carries
2 to 3 rounds til grip failure
Multidirectional Lunges
3 rounds per leg
Barbell Loaded Reverse Lunge to High Knee
3 sets of 8 to 10 reps per leg
What was Noah Centineo’s diet for Street Fighter?
While Centineo’s training was intense, he insists the real reason for the success of his prep was his nutrition. “It was all diet, just eating whole foods,” he says.
Eating clean, whole foods was his priority – and he cut out carbs almost completely. Often, that meant repeating one simple (but effective) meal. “I did two and a half pounds (1.1kg) of ground beef, 12 eggs, and one and a half onions with beef tallow and salt every day,” he says.
Like we said, simple but effective. That meal would provide roughly 360 grams of protein. Or, in other words, 4 grams of protein per kilogram of Centineo’s bodyweight. That might sound a little over the top, but it’s hard to argue with the results.
Street Fighter is in cinemas from October 15.
