Patrick Schwarzenegger is having a time zone problem. He’s in a 500-person text chain of people who’ve made a suicide pact-esque commitment to wake up at 5 a.m. to work out for 50 days. The problem is, not everyone’s on the West Coast. So now his phone is blowing up at all hours of the night as the gym selfies roll in. He knows he could have some automated program handle the texting for him—but then, he says, “it wouldn’t be personable.”
The commitment to his fellow risers and grinders is all part of a 27-pound goal he set on his 27th birthday last year. He cuts a pretty slim figure compared to his Governator father—Arnold started his career pumping iron, Patrick began as a model, and doesn’t have any plans to truly bulk up unless it’s for a role. But after two years on the bench, thanks to a gnarly shoulder injury that eventually required surgery, Schwarzenegger knew he needed to set goals if he wanted to get back on the horse. So he’s hitting the gym, and he’s got 500 ambitious texters to help him do it. Oh, and, you know, one really famous body builder to do father-son lift sessions with.