As SVT Edit's documentary The Swede behind the Hollywood body hits screens, we take a look back at our profile with Magnus Lygdbäck, the man who helps keep the likes of Alicia Vikander, Harry Styles and Katy Perry in shape
Ever wondered who helps Alicia Vikander prepare for those action-packed Tomb Raider stunts, ensures Gal Gadot is ready to channel Wonder Woman or helps Alexander Skarsgård transform into a real-life Tarzan? Magnus Lygdbäck is that guy.
With over 20 years of experience, the Swedish personal trainer and nutritionist has built a career coaching celebrities with bespoke workout routines and nutrition plans, getting them ready for the biggest movie roles of their lives. Not that Lygdbäck is keen to be typecast. “I don’t love the term ‘celebrity trainer’," he says. “For me, it’s about how you train, not who you train.”
Related: Alicia Vikander opens up about family, fame, and her road to becoming Scandinavia's biggest star
Fitness has always been at the centre of Lygdbäck's life, having grown up in a sporty family and trained as a professional hockey player in his adolescent years. “I've always been an active person. I started going to the gym with my dad when I was three,” he says. “Not to work out, just to watch while I played with my toys. Sports is something that has always been a part of me.”
After a short stint as a holiday tour guide after high school, Lygdbäck made the decision to pursue personal training. “I started training a lot of athletes because of my own background in the field and then I got a few local pop artists in Sweden as clients too because I realised that no one was providing the right type of training for them,” he says. Following a successful start in Stockholm, he packed his bags and headed stateside to expand his roster and elevate his business 11 years ago. “I made the decision to sell off everything and move to Los Angeles with two empty hands. And the rest is history.”
Today, Lygdbäck’s clients not only include the aforementioned Scandinavian stars, he has also trained the likes of Harry Styles, Ben Affleck and Katy Perry. Over the years, he has had multiple career highlights but a few have stood out more than others. “Samuel L. Jackson once flew all the way from New York to London to have a consultation with me because the director of a movie he was working on wanted him to consult me,” says Lygdbäck. “That was such a shocking moment for me because it’s not every day you get a star like that to change his schedule.”
His first time working on a big Hollywood movie was in 2016, when he trained Alexander Skarsgård for Tarzan. “It was so nerve racking and stressful because you get six months and you don’t know if you’re going to get there. But I remember that first time we saw his shirt come off on the big screen, that was super emotional because we pulled it off.”
For Lygdbäck, it’s all about finding the right training programme for the specific goal and need of each of his clients, which means creating a routine that enhances them physically in the way they want. “No one was looking at pop artists and breaking down what they needed back then so I started doing that,” he says. “If Katy Perry's got a 90 minute concert, and a three and a half minute interval, which is the length of the standard pop song, how should she work out? What should she be doing to handle choreography as well as lung capacity and stamina for singing?”
This is what led him to create the “Magnus Method”, a training philosophy that embraces the ethos of an athlete. “I go all in for my clients. I take it upon myself to be in charge of their nutrition as well as their physical wellbeing, and if they need me there 24/7 I’m available to them, especially if they’re training for a movie.”
His number one piece of advice for anyone trying to incorporate consistent fitness into their lives is the use of what he calls the “123” strategy. “When you create your weekly programme of the physical activities that you should do in a week, you should look at three things: number one, what do I like to do? Number two: what does my body need? Number three: what do I want to master or get better at?”
This, Lygdbäck believes, is the recipe for an overall healthier lifestyle that will actually stick. And if it's good enough for Vikander and Skarsgård....