Usain Bolt dumps junk food for vegetables

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Why fix what isn't broken?

The old saying has a lot of truth to it, but world-class sprinter Usain Bolt has made a personal change ahead of his preparation for next year's Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro. Bolt has admitted on numerous occasions that he has a love for junk food — especially chicken nuggets — but will give his beloved foods up for healthier alternatives.

"Food wise, I have to eat a lot more vegetables," Bolt told CNN. "I have to cut junk food out. I think that's one of the biggest things for me, because I get a lot of urges at late nights, just to eat junk food. For me, that personally is one of the biggest sacrifices.

"Sometimes you do think about just going out or just not training, or just eating a million hot wings. It's hard sometimes, because you crave it, because you're used to doing a certain thing.

"It's hard to just walk away and not slip up sometimes. So it happens, but I try to not make it happen on the regular. I try to just contain myself as much as possible."

He estimated in his autobiography "Faster than Lightning," that he ate 1,000 McDonald's chicken nuggets during his 10 days in Beijing, which, if you're doing the math, is an astonishing 5,000 calories a day. This all happened because he found Chinese food "odd."

Bolt, now 28, is ready to eat healthier, but won't be preparing his own meals anytime soon.

"I can't cook, that's the one thing I can't do, though I can make scrambled eggs," he said via CNN. 

Bolt, a six-time gold medalist, will be competing in his final Olympics next year.

"I think the closer it (Rio) gets, I think about it way more," he said. "Initially, it wasn't that much, I didn't think about it. But now it's really been on my mind. I think it's because it really means so much to me, I really want to go to Rio and do so well.

"It's going to be all work next season. I think there's going to be zero fun next season for me. That season is very important to do the Olympics back-to-back. For me, that's the biggest thing in my career. So I know what it will take and I know what I have to do."

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