Ryan Lochte is Michael Phelps’ rival in the pool and at the kitchen table. Inside Lochte’s super high-calorie diet

Ryan Lochte and Michael Phelps are friends and big rivals in the pool. The pair will swim in the Olympic finals of the men’s 200-meter individual relay Thursday night at 10 p.m.

But they are also rivals somewhere else: at the kitchen table.

Much has been made of the 10,000 calorie-a-day diet that Phelps has used to propel himself to being the greatest swimmer who ever lived.

Lochte, however, isn’t far off. In the latest issue of Bon Appetit, Lochte -- who has dyed his hair into a grayish-blue color for the Olympics -- reveals that he has been eating nearly 8,000 calories a day, eating so much that his jaw used to hurt.

"I don’t get sick of it," he said in the article. "When I first started [professionally swimming], I was eating peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and now I’ve stopped. I was just constantly eating, and I was getting tired of eating. My jaw was getting sore. But I guess I’ve been doing it for so long—I’ve been doing it for 12 years—that it’s eerie now. If I’m not eating, then something is wrong.”

The 8K diet includes five or six eggs in the morning -- five or six eggs, spinach, tomatoes, ham, pancakes, oatmeal, fruit. Oh, and French vanilla coffee with sugar and milk.

Click here to read more about Lochte’s diet.

This story was originally published August 11, 2016 at 11:51 AM with the headline "Ryan Lochte is Michael Phelps’ rival in the pool and at the kitchen table. Inside Lochte’s super high-calorie diet."