The Most Motivational Training Montages

Motivation is a funny thing; it comes and goes in peaks and troughs. When it is there, you can feel driven to accomplish the most difficult of tasks. Contrastingly, when you are lacking motivation, tasks can be harder to begin and complete to the best of your ability.

One aspect of life where many feel the need to find motivation is training. Whether it is an early morning run or post-work gym session, finding the drive to dig deep and give it your all can be difficult. Motivation can be found everywhere; from inspirational quotes to upbeat tracks, everyone has their thing to help conquer their goals.

Some of the most motivational mediums can be found in movie training montages. I'm sure that many can relate to watching a film and feeling their heart rate elevate as they see the movie protagonist overcome adversity push through their own struggles in a classic training scene. Often accompanied by an inspiring soundtrack, these scenes can compel you to get up and channel your best effort in your next training session.

For this article, we decided to compile a list of the top 10 most motivational training montages. We did this by conducting a survey which received 149 responses. The survey itself consisted of one question: What is the most motivational training montage ever?

So without further ado, here are the ten most motivational movie training scenes.

1. Rocky 4

Perhaps unsurprisingly, taking the top spot as the most motivational training montage ever is Rocky 4. Released in 1986, the movie follows Rocky Balboa as the underdog in his boxing match with the seemingly unbeatable Russian athlete, Ivan Drago. The difference in this installation of Rocky is that he is fuelled by the death of his once-rival turned best friend, Apollo Creed, which no doubt added to the intensity of his training. The montage itself is accompanied by Heart's On Fire by John Cafferty, which comes in midway through the scene, adding an uplifting and inspirational tone as Rocky shows the gains he's made over the course of the training camp.

2. Rocky 3

Taking the second spot in the most motivational training montages is Rocky 3. There are actually two full length training montages in this movie, the first of which showcases Rocky at the pinnacle of his career following a series of wins after achieving the Heavyweight Champion title. The first training montage reflects the complacent attitude that many often have when reaching 'the top of the hill', with a lazy and unmotivated approach to training which follows with a staggering loss to Mr T's character, Clubber Lang. The second montage is the truly motivating scene in this movie, which shows Rocky hungry again to gain redemption again with a back-to-basics training style, coached by old rival Apollo Creed. It is both the character arc and the raw dungeon style training accompanied by the uplifting Gonna Fly Now song which makes this montage so motivational.

3. Rocky

Sylvester Stallone clearly mastered the art of motivational montages, with Rocky movies taking just over 30% of total votes for the most motivational training scenes. Taking the final spot in the top 3 was the original Rocky movie, a true underdog story of relatively unknown boxer on his way up to a once in a lifetime title shot against the current heavyweight champ, Apollo Creed. It is the inspiring message of this movie combined with the uplifting tracks throughout the film which fuse to create the perfect cocktail for a motivational montage.

Notable Mentions

Taking the 4th spot in the most motivational training montage was The Karate Kid. Although there have been two movies with the same title (1984 & 2010), both follow pretty much the same equally inspiring storyline of a young boy having just moved to a new city, bullied mercilessly and consequently coached in martial arts by a relatively unassuming older sensei.

The fifth most voted for montage was Creed, a spinoff movie series from Rocky, which follows Adonis Creed, the son of Rocky's rival turned best friend, Apollo Creed. Similar to the original Rocky movie, the story showcases the untested boxer get a once in a lifetime world title shot, whilst being coached by the legend himself, Rocky Balboa.