There are a lot of great athletes who stop working out, and they get out of shape like everybody else in their 30s and 40s.

I try to keep the martial arts up. It's a good thing, not just physically but also for your mind.

Sports became a way for me to find my personality and identity in life. I had a lot of problems as a young kid like we all do with my own confidence, trying to grow up, and become a man and whatnot. Sports helped me get there. It helped me get my role in Rocky IV. It has helped me ever since in my movies and dealing with a lot of hard times between pictures and my life. I would say it's the one thing that's kept me going over the years.

In my career, whether it's a big or a small movie, when I've worked on something for a long time, like [Ivan] Drago in Rocky IV, they start to take on a life of their own.

At least once a week, I try to have one day where I have nothing planned so I can get up and just go back to bed and lay around and recharge my batteries.

No one can believe I might have a brain. Because I'm really tall, I'm really blonde, I have big muscles, and kill people for a living. There you go. If anybody's going to be assumed to be stupid, it's me. I don't know what my IQ score is, but I did study for five years at college. And I'm proud of my chemical engineering degree. I haven't done anything with it, but it's a card up your sleeve for later in life. It's nice to have, just in case.

I discovered martial arts, first judo and then karate, and I became quite good at it, because I had something to prove. And more than anything, I needed to feel safe.