Former Republican congressman Tom DeLay has dropped out of Dancing With the Stars.
At Wednesday's results show, the politician, 62, announced that he would no longer compete on the hit ABC series due to stress fractures in both of his feet.
Although he and partner Cheryl Burke were safe from elimination, DeLay said that he won't continue with the competition because he "can't practice."
"If you can't practice, you'll make a fool out of yourself out there, and I don't want to do that to Cheryl," the Texas-born congressman said on the show.
He added that he was most upset about missing out on dancing next week's Texas two-step, but DWTS host Tom Bergeron promised that if he recovers, he can do the routine on the show's season finale.
"I'd love that," DeLay said. "That'd be wonderful."
Despite his serious injuries, he performed the samba — against the advice of his doctors and DWTS producers — on Monday night's show.
"It's starting to hurt a little bit," he told Usmagazine.com after Monday's show. "It doesn't hurt when you're dancing… It's because of the adrenaline, you don't feel the pain, and that was the case. But I'm going to really feel it tomorrow, I bet you."
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He told Us that when he woke up Monday and felt like he couldn't dance, he went to his doctor and "worked on it."
"We just decided we're going to take it one rehearsal at a time and see how far I got," he said. "I reached my goal of actually dancing tonight which was my goal from the very beginning."
How was he motivated to stay in the competition as long as he did?
"I did so poorly last week, and I wanted to show people that I could dance," he told Us. "I never quit at anything! And the reason I came on this show is for the challenge, and I want to face the challenge."
Some of DeLay's DWTS' castmates told Us that they were proud of how hard he worked.
"As a dancer, I'd say it's awful to dance on an injury like that, but … you have to do it because you love it, and he really loves being here," pro dancer Lacey Schwimmer told Us.
Burke, 25, said she thought her partner "was crazy" for getting on the dance floor this week.
"I don't think I'd be able to do anything with two stress fractures, let alone in your feet," she told Us. "I told him over a million times not to dance. I told him you've already gone out there and shocked America, showed them what you can do already. But he's a stubborn man, and he's very determined!"
