Olympic champ Rulon Gardner: Reality TV is not reality

Olympic champion wrestler Rulon Gardner, who was a contestant on this season's "The Biggest Loser,," says he left the show early because he had accomplished what he wanted, because "there were a lot of issues here at home that needed to be addressed" and because "I wasn't there to play the games."

"My health was back, my weight was back — I was three pounds heavier than when I won the Olympic gold medal," Gardner told USA TODAY in a phone interview Thursday, two days after the NBC reality show's finale aired. "Everything was back, and it was time for me to get back to my wife and my business."

Gardner, 39, owns a health club in Logan, Utah.

The 2000 Olympic gold medalist from Wyoming, who weighed as much as 474 pounds before signing on with The Biggest Loser, also is back on the wrestling mat.

He has been to the U.S. Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs three times in recent weeks to train, he said. He is working out at home almost daily, with an eye toward possibly competing at next year's Summer Olympics in London.

"The Biggest Loser, was only a steppingstone to my comeback, to my ultimate success," he said. "It was a vehicle to give me my life back. It was a vehicle to give me my health."

The statements were Gardner's first since a show that aired in late April revealed that he had unexpectedly left for "personal reasons." He did not appear on the show's finale.

"They asked me to come back, and I had already moved on," Gardner said. "I wasn't eligible for the money (the show awards $100,000 to the voted-off contestant who loses the most weight at home), I wasn't eligible to win the show. My life and my business here are more important than being on TV."

He learned a lot about TV, he said, including that "reality TV is not reality."

"They try to make it interesting," he said. "Well, what about making it real? What about telling the story of somebody losing weight and becoming healthy? Isn't that what life is really about?"

Gardner said he currently weighs 290 pounds; he left the show at 289. He weighed 286 when he beat the seemingly invincible Alexander Karelin of Russia for the Olympic gold medal in Greco-Roman wrestling.

He had to beat the odds again to win bronze at the 2004 Games. He nearly froze to death in a 2002 snowmobile accident in the Wyoming wilderness and lost a toe to frostbite.

He retired after the 2004 Olympics but made headlines again when he survived a 2007 small-plane crash at Lake Powell.

In recent years, his weight ballooned. He sought out a spot on The Biggest Loser "for my health and my nutrition and my diet and just my overall well-being." Despite all the theatrics, "I'd do it again," he said.

A comeback at the London Olympics at age 40 would add another dramatic chapter to Gardner's story.

"Ultimately, I didn't look at The Biggest Loser as being my defining moment," Gardner said. "I wasn't there to compete and win the money. I wasn't there to win The Biggest Loser. I was there for my health."

He has it back. And now he could be back.