HANGZHOU, China, November 12. IF the last few weeks of China’s Sun Yang has been headline-inducing enough, the top male swimmer in Chinese history has a new high watermark for a crazy storyline according to the Wuhan Morning News and later translated by the South China Morning Post.
According to the reports, during Sun’s weeklong stay in jail for driving without a license last week, Sun refused to eat any of the meat products provided by the Hangzhou based jail. Sun, and officials there, were worried that chemical additives typically added to meat in China “could interfere with Sun’s health or later doping tests.”
Since the facility would not make a specific change in diet just for one person, the jail decided to move in the other direction and serve a full vegetarian diet to all of the inmates during Sun’s stay, much to the frustration of his fellow inmates.
“The guards explained that the Olympian did not dare eat meat prepared in the detention centre for fear that bad meat would harm his health. Because the kitchen was not allowed to prepare a special meal for him, everyone else was forced to eat vegetarian food with him,” a man from inside the jail told reporters from the Wuhan paper outside the gate of the jail.
Sun has now finished his time in jail, and is currently serving his indefinite suspension from all training, competing and public events by the order of the Chinese Swimming Federation.
South China Morning Post
Wuhan Morning News