Rachel Recchia has responded to The Bachelor alum Clayton Echard's cryptic podcast comments about their breakup and explained the real reason why he had dumped her on Perfect Match.
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Clayton had asked Rachel to match on Perfect Match's third season only to end their romance 24 hours and leave The Bachelorette alum in tears.
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Clayton had told Rachel on the show that he was following his "intuition" things wouldn't work out between them, but during the August 7 episode of "The Viall Files" podcast, Clayton admitted "there were other things" that turned him off.
In addition to having different lifestyles, Clayton explained to the podcast's host Nick Viall, "I don't think I can [say my reason aloud] because I don't think she would receive them well. I think she would feel like they are an attack."
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When asked for her thoughts on Clayton's vague comments, Rachel shared during the Wednesday, August 13 episode of the "What's the Reality?" podcast, "So I called that man so many times and I have an answer!"
Rachel said after Clayton's podcast interview was released, she woke up the next day to her inbox "flooded" with messages from friends about how Clayton had alluded to there being an issue with Rachel.
"I was like, 'What could it be? Do I smell? Do I have bad breath?' I could not figure out what he was talking about! It scared me. My friends were calling him all day and he wouldn't answer," Rachel recalled.
"And finally, he calls me. I was like, 'Why are you making people speculate like this? This is more evil than just saying what it is.' Because now people think I'm doing weird stuff behind closed doors or whatever."
Rachel went on to reveal, "The reason why Clayton feels we are incompatible -- and that he was so sure -- is because I am not a gym girly and he wants someone that lives a very active lifestyle and goes to the gym and hits the weights."
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Rachel insisted that's simply "not me" and "it's never going to be me."
Rachel therefore clarified how her disinterest in the gym was what Clayton had been referring to when he said their "lifestyles will never align."
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While Rachel may not pump iron, she said she likes to "travel and to shop and to sit at the bar."
"I go on a hot-girl walk!" the Bachelor in Paradise alum quipped, before adding, "I'm like, 'I do work out. I just do not go to the Equinox!' Equinox membership needed to date him! That is the reason."
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When asked why she believes Clayton felt the need to play coy on "The Viall Files" about such a minor thing, Rachel replied, "He thought if he said that, the public would take it as an attack on my body, or that I'm lazy or something."
Rachel suggested that Clayton was "probably" just grasping at straws when trying to justify why he had dumped her -- for the third time, from Rachel's perspective -- on Perfect Match.
"I'm like, Clayton, it would be so much nicer if you just said, 'I don't like her, I'm not attracted to her. I brought her in the house because I wanted her to go to next week.' He should've said that," Rachel complained.
Rachel admitted her friends were concerned that Rachel had done or said something very wrong.
Clayton, however, apparently assured Rachel that he meant no offense and certainly wasn't taking a jab at her physical appearance.
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"He wants to clarify, though -- and I will give him this -- it's not that he thinks I have a bad body," Rachel explained.
"It's just that my lifestyle of not liking to hike or go to the gym is not compatible with him. And if you want to date Clayton Echard, you better be hitting the weights!"
But Rachel insisted that she does, in fact, exercise.
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"And for me, it's just not something I need in a partner. I want my partner to have their own hobbies, and I think I bring a lot to the table, and I have a full life, and he does too," The Bachelor alum said.
Rachel added, "If we're not going to the gym every day, that's fine. But for him, that is a requirement."
Rachel also couldn't recall ever talking to Clayton about their fitness routines when they had filmed The Bachelor's 26th season, which aired in early 2022.
"So maybe I wouldn't have gotten as far on Day 1 when I was like, 'Oh, by the way, hot girl walks and yoga only -- no dumbbells,'" Rachel concluded.
On The Bachelor's 26th season, Clayton had professed his love to Rachel, and also slept with her in the Fantasy Suite, before dumping her in favor of Susie Evans.
Because Rachel and Gabby Windey both left Clayton's The Bachelor season heartbroken, they went on to co-star on The Bachelorette's 19th season.
After Rachel failed to find lasting love on Bachelor in Paradise's ninth season in 2023, she appeared on Netflix's The Perfect Match.
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Rachel has said that Clayton humiliated her on Perfect Match, but Clayton defended his decision to end things after a single day of being matched up.
"I was surprised by the intensity of her emotional response," Clayton said on "The Viall" Files.
Clayton apparently thought Rachel was going to handle the breakup better since he didn't drag things out.
"I had to do what I had to do. It wasn't going to work, and that's why I tried to cut it as quickly as possible," he said.
Clayton also unfollowed Rachel on social media after filming Perfect Match and recently explained why.
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