Former WWE Champion Dave Bautista sheds 80 pounds body-weight, gets slim & satisfied
The wrestler turned actor David Bautista, has addressed his incredible weight loss and revealed the reason behind shedding 80 pounds.
In WWE, he was known by his in-ring name "Batista" with a formidable size and muscular physique. At 55 years of age, the former WWE Champion and now established actor has opened up about his sudden change in size and weight.
Dave Bautista has shed an impressive 80 pounds, by reducing his weight from 320 pounds to 240 pounds. While he is visibly no longer as muscular as he once was, Bautista is content and at peace with his current body. He believes he had become too "fat" and big which was costing him acting roles. Popular for playing the character Drax in the "Guardians of the Galaxy" movie series under Marvel universe, Bautista's upcoming film, the Killer's Game, is due to release on 13-September. He aims to explore and venture into new projects and he knew he had to be lean for this new ambition.
Preceding Bautista, famous sportspersons turned actors such as Arnold Schwarzenegger and recently Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson (a WWE alumni) have succeeded in acting roles beyond the Hollywood action movie and typical summer blockbuster cinema. Both having done comedies and romance and Schwarzenegger even finding success in dramatic role in his senior years in movies such as Maggie (2015) and now having made his TV series debut through Netflix in an action-comedy titled "FUBAR".
WWE Champion John Cena has also been appearing in more comedy and action-comedy roles such as "Ricky Stanicky" (2024) and "Jackpot" (2024) than when he made his debut as a tough silent-type in "The Marine" (2006) or "12 Rounds" (2009). Did Cena's team-up with veteran Jackie Chan in "Hidden Strike" (2023) change his perspective about on-screen persona, action and acting? That's something we wish to find out. But it is common occurrence in movie industry and with film critics to give more acting credibility to someone who can make you laugh rather than the typical action hero.
Bautista told Chris Van Vliet on his podcast--"I started trimming down for a particular reason. Why I did it is because I got fat. I got really big for a role, rather uncomfortably big. I was around 315 pounds and put on weight really fast. When I was younger, I was carrying lots of muscle. This weight I put on between films and gained it rather quickly with French fries and pancakes. The director told me 'I don't want you to look like a power-lifter. I just want you to look like this great big guy' And now looking back, I think I overdid it. It took me forever to shed it off,"
The actor continued, revealing his satisfaction with a dramatically different image, "Then I noticed the more I trimmed down, the better I look on camera, next to other actors. The more I trimmed down, the better I feel. People tell me 'you're skinny'. I saw online that people are worried about my health. I say it out loud to people I am 6'4 and 240 pounds. But to me, because people have seen me so much over the years, I am still a big human being. I am killing myself to be this trim, I am training hard. My calories are pretty restricted. Maybe 2500 a day."
A four-time World Heavyweight Champion and a two-time WWE Champion, 'Batista' was always weighed about 320 pounds as he feuded with the who's who of WWE superstars including Triple H, Shawn Michaels, The Undertaker, John Cena, Randy Orton, Edge, Rey Mysterio and many more. His last WWE appearance was WrestleMania 35 in 2019. He had left WWE in 2009 to pursue an acting career but returned in 2014, finally leaving on his own terms in the 2019 match against Triple H.
