Via Vice
While the video above gives you plenty of time to get to know him, it's pretty clear right off the bat that Byamba Ulambayar, a four-time World Sumo Champion, loves what he does. His sport is tough, rigorous, and tradition-driven, and his training routine reflects that intensity. To stay in champion-worthy shape, Byamba sticks to a diet of 10,000 calories a day (or, around 10,000 calories, as he earnestly admits in the video). Byamba says it best: "My life is this sport."
Thanks to athletes-turned-celebs like Michael Phelps, we're no strangers to performance diets that clock in at around the 10,000-calorie mark for the sake of packing on muscle. But, a glance at Phelps' daily diet reads like an assignment sheet and feels worlds away from Byamba's approach to performance dieting. The pro-sumo wrestler trains in the ring, leaves tired and hungry, and recovers with a big bowl of Chankonabe, a Japanese stew and his go-to source of fuel. While he prepares the Chankonabe in the video, he talks about how he began wrestling as a teenager and was inspired by watching previous champions practice.
Watch the video above for more details on the impressive training regimen of one of the toughest athletes around.