Glen Powell was astonished by Tom Cruise's approach to the flying scenes in 'Top Gun: Maverick'.

The 33-year-old actor stars in the long-awaited sequel as Hangman and was amazed that Tom could cope with more demanding flight sequences than anybody else.

Glen told CinemaBlend: "It's incredibly painful. Every time we went up there you just have to sort of brace for a fight. You get on the ground and you're just exhausted when you fly two or three times (in particular).

"That's the thing about Tom. He's flying more than everyone else in the movie. You know, we'd fly one time a day, and you're gassed and he would fly three."

The 'Hidden Figures' star also revealed how Cruise supported the rest of the cast in their aviation training and would reward them when they accomplished various feats.

Glen said: "Tom put together the entire training programme so we wouldn't be passing out in government assets. Which was very nice of him.

"We started in the Cessna 172... and then the F-18. So that was just a gradual process in order to get our G-tolerance up so that we could act and ride around on these jets."

He continued: "Then after that I just kind of had a love of aviation and Tom was a great cheerleader in terms of saying, 'Hey, you passed your ground yet? You get your check ride?'

"The day that I passed my check ride, I got on the ground and there was a gift that said 'Welcome to the skies' from Tom. And it was hours and hours of race car driving classes."