Colton Underwood's Romantic Journey Was Dramatic

A healthy dose of humility is a good look on any Bachelor. Viewers would like to believe the show's leads can maintain a humble nature even when a slew of polished, attractive women are literally competing for their time and affection, making moves to "steal them away" whenever an opportunity presents. 

And Colton Underwood would be the first to admit he wasn't formed into being as a 6-foot-3 former pro football player with perfect abs just begging for nonstop shower sequences. "Grade school Colton probably would be really shy and timid by the fact that he was just named the Bachelor," he shared on the Jan. 7 premiere of ABC's beloved love hunt. "I was at a Christian school and I was always, like, the fat, chunky, awkward weird kid." 


While the Indianapolis native had a bit of an ugly duckling emerging into a swan transformation when he discovered his football skills at Illinois' Washington Community High School, ditched his bottom retainer and found a way to clear up his skin, before then there were a lot of days he wished he could call out sick, often struggling to fit in with the other kids. And romantic prospects were certainly out of the question: "I didn't have girlfriends."  

Now he's courting some 30 potential wives, weeding through a mix of professional dancers, models, realtors and so very many pageant queens in the hopes of crowning one Mrs. Underwood.

And while he's done a fine job thus far of decisively handing out the roses, he's admittedly a bit inexperienced in the love department. (Did you hear that he's actually a virgin?) Before taking on the mantle as the franchise's 23rd star, the 26-year-old had just a handful of steady relationships—two of which were born from the series itself. 

Still, he's heard all of the criticism about how he's not ready to get down on one knee and ask one lucky final rose recipient to agree to forever and he politely disagrees. "I know I have a lot of room to grow, but I also have an idea of what I want now and that's what's so exciting about this," he insisted on the premiere. "It's just the perfect time for me to focus on finding the person who I'm going to be spending the rest of my life with." 





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