Taylor Swift's Trainer Says People Would 'Throw Up' If They Attempted Her Workouts
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Taylor Swift made key fitness and nutrition changes to train for the Eras Tour.
She worked out by singing on the treadmill and doing strength training sessions.
She just released The Tortured Poets Department ahead of the next leg of her tour.
There's no way you could've gone the past year without hearing any news about Taylor Swift.
Obviously, she’s dating Super Bowl-winning Travis Kelce. Plus, she just dropped a new album, The Tortured Poets Department. In a shock twist, she even made it a *double* release, sharing a whopping 31 songs for eager fans.
This is totally in line with Taylor's philosophy of wanting to do the most for Swifties. Ahead of the Eras Tour debut last year, Taylor opened up about wanting to make her show worth the price. "They had to work really hard to get the tickets,” she told TIME. “I wanted to play a show that was longer than they ever thought it would be, because that makes me feel good leaving the stadium."
Now, Taylor Swift's trainer Kirk Myers is opening up about how he got her in shape for the massive undertaking.
"Taylor is the most resilient person I have ever met,” Kirk told Vogue. “It's super inspiring to see her consistently overcome obstacles and become better and stronger in the end. This also translates into her training and throughout her workouts. I give her a difficult exercise or challenging workout, not only is she able to complete and push through it—but she also perseveres, moving forward into the next exercise. This ultimately makes her stronger, better, and faster."
In the interview, Kirk also revealed the exact details of he trained Taylor for the global tour. News flash: It's intense. Ahead, here are all the details on Taylor's workout routine.
Taylor started training six months before her first show.
ICYDK, each Eras tour show runs for approximately 3 hours and 15 minutes and Taylor sings 44 songs across nine albums—oh, and she's dancing pretty much the entire time.
But she was ready for it: “I knew this tour was harder than anything I’d ever done before by a long shot,” she told the magazine.
The "Anti-Hero" singer joked that she “toured like a frat guy” in the past, but that she needed to be in serious shape this time around. So, Taylor started training six months before her first show, adding that she “finally, for the very first time, physically prepared correctly.”
She trained for her Eras Tour by singing on the treadmill.
“Every day, I would run on the treadmill, singing the entire set list out loud,” Taylor said. “Fast for fast songs, and a jog or a fast walk for slow songs.” (This seems to be a ~thing~ for singers—Miley Cyrus and Lizzo have both belted out songs on a treadmill in the past.)
This is an impressive workout, even for a seasoned runner. Runner’s World estimated that Tay ran about 16 miles during each of her workouts, using beats per minute in each of her setlist's songs to guess how far she ran.
Taylor’s workout has even inspired a viral challenge: People are attempting to run the length of the Eras tour set, just like Tay did. One ultrarunner even said the workout "wrecked" her.
Kirk, who trains Taylor, doesn't undersell its difficulty, telling a Vogue reporter in April 2024 that she'd "definitely throw up" if she attempted her.
"It's really hard, some people would probably throw up or have to lay down on the floor if they trained like her," he said.
Taylor also did strength and conditioning workouts.
Taylor has been workout out with trainer Kirk Myers for nearly a decade. The two met through friends, though he told Vogue he "can't say what friend." The two hit his gym Dogpound, which has locations in New York and Los Angeles.
“Her work ethic is just incredible,” Kirk told the outlet. “I'm ready to be known as ‘Taylor Swift’s trainer.’ I don't think there's a cooler title out there.”
For some cross-training, Dogpound also created a tailored (get it!) program for the “Cruel Summer” singer, which featured strength, conditioning, and targeting her core. (Taylor did cardio on her own.)
“We approached her training for the Eras Tour with the mindset like a professional athlete," Kirk said. "There was an ‘off-season’ when she wasn't touring and ‘in-season’ when she was."
Sometimes, they'd even play her own music to work out. "I've never intentionally played her music while we are training, but I love it, so yes at times it's come on the playlist," he said.
And, even though the gym is a celeb fave (visited by the likes of Kaia Gerber, Karlie Kloss, Tom Holland and Jacob Elordi, among others), it's still open to the public, so you can work out like Tay Tay with a Dogpound membership, too!
She underwent three months of dance training, too.
Taylor worked with choreographer Mandy Moore (not that Mandy Moore) to nail down her Eras Tour dance routines. “I wanted to get it in my bones,” Taylor said of her choreography prep. “I wanted to be so over-rehearsed that I could be silly with the fans, and not lose my train of thought.”
Taylor admitted that learning choreography is not her “strong suit,” but that working with Mandy “completely changed my relationship to choreography, and somehow got into my brain and figured out exactly how I would think about things.”
It will come as no surprise that Mandy came from was recommended by Tay's close friend Emma Stone, who worked her for her 2017 Oscar winner La La Land. “I’ve known [Emma] since we were 17, and I told her all about the tour—I’m always bouncing ideas off my friends,” Taylor shared with TIME. “I wanted it to show people so many different types of dance and performance.”
“Em said, ‘Mandy’s your girl,’” she added. And the rest was history!
Plus, Taylor got even more comfortable with the routine by performing it on-stage in Glendale, Arizona—the site of the very first show. "We actually got to be in the stadium for almost a month running the show several times a week," she said. "So that was extremely helpful."
Taylor went sober.
The "Bejeweled" singer also shared in her Time interview that she stopped drinking during the Eras Tour, except for on Grammy night. (And thank goodness, because fans got some iconic Twitter memes of Taylor that night!) “Doing that show with a hangover—I don’t want to know that world,” she said. “I was really disciplined about drinking.”
She prioritizes hydration and doesn't make too many rules for her diet.
Taylor has always emphasized fueling her body. “I have so much water in my dressing room because I drink, like, ten bottles of water a day,” she shared in a 2012 interview with Bon Appétit. “I drink so much water my friends call me an alien.”
While Taylor hasn’t revealed much about her diet in years, but, in 2010, she did share that she tries to avoid creating too many rules for herself. “I try to keep it lighter, but it’s nothing too regimented or crazy," she told WebMD. "We know what's good for us, thanks to common sense."
At the time, Taylor added that she loves "baking anything" on the weekends.
"I bake pumpkin bread for everyone I know, and make ginger molasses cookies, and hot chocolate, and chai,” she shared with Bon Appétit. That is soooo Red-coded!
She journals for her mental health.
To take care of herself mentally as well as physically, Taylor lets out her emotions on the page. "From a young age, any time I would feel pain I would think, 'It’s OK, I can write about this after school,'" Taylor told WebMD in 2010. "As a young kid, I learned to process my emotions by writing."
She uses these notes for songwriting as well. "Anytime something hurts, like rejection or sadness or loneliness, or I feel joy, or I fall in love, I ask myself, 'Can I write a song about this so I know how I feel?'"
She also has a routine to make sure any hotel room feel like home, even after long days on the road. The first thing she does? Unpack. “I do it everywhere I go,” Taylor told WebMD. “I really like the way it feels to have my clothes put away in drawers and my shoes in the closet.”
Taylor also brings candles to each tour stop, she told the site.
The singer has a “dead day” to recover after shows.
By the way, Taylor's still human, so these shows take a lot out of her. The "Karma" singer told Time that after she plays three days of shows, she takes a full day to rest up.
“I do not leave my bed except to get food and take it back to my bed and eat it there,” Taylor said. (Relatable!) “It’s a dream scenario. I can barely speak because I’ve been singing for three shows straight. Every time I take a step, my feet go crunch, crunch, crunch from dancing in heels.”
But Taylor still works out between shows.
While rest days are a priority, Taylor still makes sure to exercise between shows to keep up her strength. Kirk told Vogue that she worked out two times per week, using LA-based chiropractic physician Amin Javid, DC, to implement recovery techniques.
"In-season training was more about maintenance, and so it was more like stability, mobility, biomechanics,” he said. “If you've seen the show, you know how intense it is physically. Imagine doing that three, four days in a row and then you finally have a few off days and you're still showing up to gym. That's Taylor.”
Taylor does it all for her fans. “I know I'm not drinking on tour. I know I'm working out in between shows. I know I'm keeping my strength and stamina up. I know I’m going on that stage whether I’m sick, injured, heartbroken, uncomfortable, or stressed,” she told Time. “That’s part of my identity as a human being now. If someone buys a ticket to my show, I’m going to play it unless we have some sort of force majeure.”
Love to see a dedicated cardio and strength queen crushing it on and off the stage!
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