Sydney Sweeney is a prominent Hollywood star, best known for her role in the series “Euphoria.” She dedicated a significant amount of effort to preparing for her new role as Christy Martin, a famous boxer, in the film “Christy” directed by David Michôd and starring Ben Foster.
Sweeney underwent significant physical changes for this role. She gained 13 kilos of muscle by lifting weights, working with a boxing trainer, and following a dietitian’s advice. She began this training three months before filming started.
In a talk with Variety, she revealed that she consumed a lot of fast food, such as Chick-fil-A, and drank milkshakes to gain weight quickly. She trained up to three times a day. She said, “We increased my calorie intake and I started having a lot of protein shakes and supplements, and eating everything. I ate a lot of Smuckers, a lot of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, smoothies, just constantly eating because we were so active… I was burning off all the excess fat constantly at the same time. So keeping up was quite a challenge”
Sydney Sweeney also shared how tough boxing training was. While filming the famous 2003 fight scene between Christy Martin and Laila, Muhammad Ali’s daughter, she took a hard punch. “I got beaten up,” she said. “They put ice packs on my face between takes. I had bad bruises.”
Sydney Sweeney steps into the ring as Christy Martin in the upcoming biopic, 'Christy,' and the boxing legend says she "kicked butt." pic.twitter.com/az7wRYn7XT
— Entertainment Tonight (@etnow) September 5, 2025She filmed all the boxing scenes in one week, doing shoots for 12 hours and training for two more hours every day. She called that week very tiring. Sweeney said she is happy Christy Martin’s story is being told.
Christy Martin is one of the greatest women boxers in history. She helped make women’s boxing popular. In 1996, she became the first woman inducted into the Boxing Hall of Fame. A Netflix documentary, Untold: Deal with the Devil, told the story of Martin’s hard life. It revealed the abuse and threats she faced from her trainer and husband, Jim Martin.
Christy Martin was born in 1968 in Mullens, West Virginia. Her first trainer, Jim Martin, was tough on her—he even told his boxers to try breaking her ribs. They married years later. She started boxing professionally at 21. After losing two of her first four fights, she won 34 of the next 35.
She boxed from 1989 to 2012, winning 49 fights (31 by knockout), with seven losses and three draws. She was the first woman to sign with promoter Don King, who gave her the nickname “The Coal Miner’s Daughter.”
The biopic of boxer Christy Salters Martin just premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival, with Sydney Sweeney in a physically transformative role. https://t.co/6fAGQm3GFG
— TIME (@TIME) September 5, 2025Jim Martin, her trainer and ex-husband, stabbed and shot her in a brutal attack on November 23, 2010, while she was champion. Martin described the pain: “Every time I tried to get up, blood poured from the stab wounds. My calf was hanging off the bone. Then he shot me in the chest.”
Her ex-husband is now serving time for attempted murder. From jail, he called Christy tough, saying, “You could hit her with a mallet and she’d still be standing.”
Christy Martin also shared that she was sexually abused at age six. In her memoir, Fighting for Survival, she revealed her struggles with abuse, drug addiction, and violence. She makes it clear that Jim Martin was very cruel and that every year on November 23, she sends him a message. For 20 years, he threatened to kill her.
Christy told The Guardian in 2022, “My story is about sex abuse, domestic violence, and being the underdog. I’m a coal miner’s daughter from a tiny town, less than a mile long.”
