Dwayne Johnson is People's sexiest man alive for 2016

Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson has become People's first non-white sexiest man alive in 20 years. The Baywatch actor is only the second man of colour after Denzel Washington to receive the title.

The 44-year-old actor took to social media to reveal the news. "Still up at 4am trainin' hard & takin' care of my babies.. sexily;). Thank U @people & all the fans. Grateful for the luv! #SexiestManAlive," the actor wrote on Twitter.

Johnson, who was named world's highest paid actor for 2016 with $64.5 million (£49m), has never forgotten about the struggles he has faced in his life.

"Failure is obviously something that we don't want, we're always averse to failure because it's not the end goal," Johnson told People.

The former WWE wrestler attended the University of Miami and dreamed of playing in the NFL to support his family financially. He then joined the Canadian Football League after graduating in 1995 but was cut two months later.

"I played football for 10 years with one goal, which was to play in the NFL, which meant we'd never be evicted again. It meant that I could buy my parents their first home, their cars, whatever they wanted. So that failure was tough; that was a tough pill," he said.

After his goal of becoming a NFL player did not materialise, the actor took stock of his life with just $7 in his wallet.

"I literally looked in my wallet and I had a five, a one and change. So I rounded it up to seven. It was a real rock bottom for me and I didn't know how defining or how meaningful seven bucks would be only until years later in my life," he explained.

Johnson then made a bold move into WWE, where he was initially "met with skepticism".

"I was met with skepticism and some cynicism of where I came from and the world of wrestling. Because you've got to prove yourself," he said. "But there wasn't a blueprint for me to follow. It wasn't like, 'Oh, there's this half-Samoan, half-black wrestler and you just do it like him.'"

Johnson , however, is glad that no one paved his path for him.

"What's even better is that no one did it before me," he said, adding. "I've got to make up my own rules myself."