Joey Graziadei has opened up about the toll competing on Dancing with the Stars took on his body.
Last week, The Bachelor alum took home the Mirrorball alongside his partner Jenna Johnson, making him the first male Bachelor contestant to ever win the show. Recently he revealed during an episode of the Lightweights Podcast with Joe Vulpis that because of the constant high-intensity rehearsals, he ended up losing a lot of weight.
“I definitely got a little too thin quickly,” he told the podcast host. “Initially you’re doing steps like the jive. We lost so much weight during that week because we were just kicking and flicking and doing so much.”
“Same thing in the samba. You have to move so much in those dances that — Kelsey’s the one that tells you… ‘You’re looking pretty thin,’” he continued.
Although the former reality star admitted that he was building muscle throughout the competition, he was continuing to lose weight and even needed to buy a smaller pants size.
“… I’m losing a lot of weight and my size 32 pants, I need a 30 all of a sudden it feels like, ‘cause I’m having to buckle it up so tight,” Graziadei said.
The former tennis pro explained that he noticed the most amount of changes in his body during his later weeks on the show when he was performing the Argentine tango or a contemporary dance because they required practicing lifts over and over again.
“I’m actually holding up Jenna [Johnson] and having to do a lot of reps,” he said.
“And it feels like, the only thing I can compare it to is like I just worked out, like an upper body workout,” he continued. “Every single time we do those lifts… there’s a lot of legs and upper body you have to do to kind of be strong during that.”
He went on to joke that if he could rehearse with Johnson every day, he would just for the health benefits.
“If I could do this every day, I would because I would never be out of shape, and it’s amazing,” he said.
Throughout the season, Graziadei’s scores were consistently near the top of the leaderboard, with their number one competition being Disney star Chandler Kinney and partner Brandon Armstrong.
In the finale though, Kinney and Armstrong ended up in third place despite two perfect score performances after the fan votes were counted. The other couples in the final were Olympic rugby star Ilona Maher and Alan Bersten, who came in second; Olympic gymnast Stephen Nedoriscik and Rylee Arnold, who came in fourth; and NFL star Danny Amendola and Witney Carson, who came in fifth.
Following his win, Graziadei made sure to reflect on his overall experience on the show. “It means everything. This experience has been unbelievable, honestly. Everyone from the beginning,” he said.
“Ilona, you have been amazing this season. I love you. All the finalists, the judges, thank you for bearing with us. I tried my best, I promise. Thank you.”
