‘Game Of Thrones’: The Mountain Eats 10,000 Calories a Day

If you’re a Game of Thrones fan, you know that there’s one actor who towers above the rest of the cast: Hafþór Björnsson AKA Gregor Clegane AKA The Mountain.

The actor won the World’s Strongest Man competition this year and it took more than just being six feet nine inches tall. According to Business Insider, the Icelandic strongman bulked up to 400 pounds of mostly muscle and earned his accolades through “hard work, disciplined diet and exercise, and a positive attitude.”

A part of the actor’s regime is eating up to 10,000 calories a day! “Diet is very important to stay in shape, to stay strong,” Björnsson told Business Insider. “So I’m very consistent with my meals. I eat six meals every single day.”

What’s in those meals, you ask? “I eat mostly steak, rice, carrots, with some peppers, sometimes chicken,” he adds. “I eat so much, really. And definitely the hardest part of being in these competitions really is the diet.” We find it hard to believe eating steak is more challenging than lifting all of those weights, but Björnsson is the expert!

“I have to eat every two hours, I have to fuel my body. And there’s a lot of timing, prepping meals, when I eat them. I think sometimes, ‘Is this worth it?’ I’m always eating, and I’m never hungry. I’m always eating and working out.” Okay, that does sound pretty exhausting!

In addition to chowing down and working out all day, the strongman also attributes his bodily success to staying positive. “You have to have your mind positive towards everything in life, and I try to be very positive. To be good at everything, you have to be positive towards it. I train and I work very hard toward my weaknesses, and I have any weaknesses, I work even harder to make them my strength,” he explained.

Björnsson shares a lot of his regimes on Instagram, which you can check out here.

Now that we know a little bit about Björnsson’s daily life, we’re left with one looming question: with only six episodes remaining in Game of Thrones, are we finally going to see the long-awaited Clegane Bowl?!

The showdown between Gregor and Sandor (played by Rory McCann) is something fans have been dying to see since the beginning of the series, long before Björnsson had the role. In fact, he’s the third actor to play The Mountain after Conan Stevens and Ian Whyte. However, it’s safe to say the other actors didn’t come close to living up to Mountain status.

The eighth and final season of Game of Thrones premieres on HBO in April 2019.