Former England and Manchester United footballer Rio Ferdinand has displayed his remarkably toned physique during an intense workout session in the expansive Dubai desert. The 47-year-old sports icon participated in a special photoshoot for Men's Health magazine, where he demonstrated his upper body strength and agility while wearing only a pair of purple gym shorts against the dramatic Arabian backdrop.
Mental Health Benefits of Exercise
While maintaining peak physical condition was essential during his professional athletic career, Ferdinand now approaches fitness with a different perspective. He explained that the gym has transformed into a sanctuary for his mental wellbeing. "Now I concentrate more on going in a gym for my mental peace of mind and for my mental state of mind really," Ferdinand revealed. "But also then to look aesthetically the way I want to look and try and be in as good a condition as I can be, within reason, within keeping it in a normal lifestyle."
Functional Training for Longevity
The father-of-five maintains a structured weekly exercise regime that includes dedicated days for different aspects of his fitness, ranging from physiotherapy sessions to heavy lifting workouts. Ferdinand emphasized how functional training enables him to keep up with his active family life. "It enables me to run around after my kids and play and mess around without having to feel the little pains or areas that 'oh I can't go down on that knee or I can't go that far in that position because of my back or whatever'," he said.
Ferdinand continued: "Doing functional training just allows you to stay and feel as young as you possibly can, do you know what I mean? For as long as possible. And I think that before I started doing the functional training, yeah, I was training, but I was really feeling a lot of aches and pains based on wear and tear and just getting older."
Family Motivation and Future Goals
The former footballer shares his eldest children Lorenz (19), Tate (17), and Tia (14) with his late wife Rebecca Ellison, who tragically passed away from cancer in 2015. With his current wife Kate, 34, he has two younger children: five-year-old Cree and two-year-old Shae. Ferdinand's fitness journey is deeply connected to his family aspirations.
"It's made me definitely think about longevity," Ferdinand explained. "I want to be here when my kids are having kids and I want to be here to enjoy that and I want to be mobile. I don't want to be one of them old granddads who's just like, 'oh granddad can't do nothing. Like, don't bring the kids near him'. I don't want to be one of those granddads."
Blended Family Dynamics
Meanwhile, Kate Ferdinand recently opened up about the challenges of navigating their blended family dynamic during an appearance on the Blended podcast. She admitted to occasionally "butting heads" with her 14-year-old stepdaughter Tia and expressed concerns about getting things right within their complex family structure.
"It's hard when you've got young kids because they take up a lot of your time, so you've got to make sure you've got that time [for the older ones]," Kate explained. "Kids go through phases. It's okay to have one or two weeks where you're at each other, you're butting heads a bit."
She continued: "Like me and Tia, she won't mind me saying, but we have these moments where we just butt heads for three or four days and we both don't know what's going on. Then it's like 'We're alright now aren't we' and we're fine. But it's just like emotions, different times of the month. There's so much going on."
Emotional Regulation Challenges
Kate candidly discussed the difficulties of maintaining emotional stability while managing a blended family. "Even though you say you're an emotionally regulated adult, it's hard, you have to practice that as an adult as well," she acknowledged. "Because hormones are flying all over the place, you can't always get it right. Like I know I don't always get it right. I'm not going to sit here and say 'I'm always really emotionally regulated'. I am not."
The family made a significant lifestyle change in August last year when they relocated permanently to Dubai, bringing along their children Shae, Cree, and Tia. Kate expressed her ongoing concerns about navigating family relationships successfully, stating: "I am so scared to get it wrong, because I really have tried so hard, like you have, for so many years, and you don't want to ruin anything."
