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"The October 10 series premiere of Arrow gave The CW its biggest audience since The Vampire Diaries debuted in 2009. Like the titular character he portrays, Toronto native Stephen Amell, 31, is a bit of a mystery. Here, Us Weekly uncovers five fun facts about the actor (who admits to crushing on Amanda Seyfried and Kat Graham).\r\n\r\n01. He squeezes in extra workouts before shirtless scenes. Amell was often shirtless in the Arrow pilot, but he was well-prepared to show off his six-pack abs. &amp;quot;I do peek at that on the schedule and try to get in a workout,&amp;quot; he tells Zap2It. &amp;quot;I like to give myself a nice run up to a shirtless scene. Physically, it really doesn&amp;apos;t make any difference. It&amp;apos;s about mentally feeling good about it.&amp;quot;\r\n02. He was once a spinning instructor. &amp;quot;When I first broke into the acting industry, I taught spinning classes to support myself,&amp;quot; Amell tells BULLETT. &amp;quot;It&amp;apos;s funny; I have a Facebook page and I have a Twitter account and I&amp;apos;m starting to get messages like, &amp;apos;We took your spin class way back when!&amp;apos; or &amp;apos;We miss you as a spin instructor.&amp;apos;&amp;quot;\r\n\r\n03. He&amp;apos;s becoming a skilled archer. &amp;quot;I want to shoot the show for awhile, and then go into archery competitions and see how good I can get,&amp;quot; Amell tells Collider. &amp;quot;You have to relax when you&amp;apos;re shooting an arrow. You can&amp;apos;t be tense. And that just helps, in your day-to-day life.&amp;quot;\r\n04. He filmed a racy sex scene on his first day of Hung. &amp;quot;When actors are asked about doing nudity for a role, they&amp;apos;ll often say, &amp;apos;Well, if the role calls for it,&amp;apos;&amp;quot; the star once told Complex. &amp;quot;I played a hooker, so I knew going in that it&amp;apos;d call for it.&amp;quot;\r\n\r\n05. The Vampire Diaries&amp;apos; Candice Accola schooled him during a game of Scrabble. &amp;quot;I like vocabulary and I actually read a book called Word Freak, which is about a guy who basically went into competitive Scrabble for a year. But having a big vocabulary and being good at Scrabble are not the same thing,&amp;quot; Amell tells After Elton. &amp;quot;There&amp;apos;s a strategy to Scrabble which I didn&amp;apos;t fully understand, which is not to put too fine a point on it, but Candice just destroyed me in Scrabble, and I maybe haven&amp;apos;t gotten over it.&amp;quot;\r\nArrow airs Wednesdays at 8 p.m. EST on The CW."^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.usmagazine.com/entertainment/news/stephen-amell-shirtless-gallery-20121710>