NFL

Tebow laments lack of ‘relax’ time with Jets

CORTLAND — He’s a prisoner of his own fame.

Tim Tebow said yesterday his celebrity status as one of the NFL’s most popular stars can make trying to lead a normal life difficult.

“Sometimes it is [tough],” Tebow said following yesterday’s practice here at SUNY Cortland. “If you just want to go watch a movie, ‘Dark Knight’ or something, it’s something you just have to think about and plan for.

“It’s not that I get frustrated doing it, it’s just sometimes you just want to relax and be normal because that’s how I view myself, you know? Sometimes you just would like to be able to do more normal stuff that you can’t.”

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Tebow’s enormous following has led to his every move being scrutinized and analyzed. Because he’s Tim Tebow, he was still dealing with the fallout from his shirtless run through the rain following Saturday’s practice.

“I was running and my shirt felt like it was 20 pounds because we’d been in the rain and I was signing autographs for 20-30 minutes,” he said when asked why he did it. “I didn’t really think that you all would be filming and taking pictures.”

He said the most ribbing had come from fellow quarterbacks Mark Sanchez and Greg McElroy.

“It was funny,” Tebow said. “A few guys gave me a hard time, but honestly, I don’t think anybody knew until they saw it that night on ESPN. It was funny. More than anything, it was probably Mark and Greg giving me a hard time. Everybody else catches on after that.”

Sanchez said that when he ribbed Tebow about it, Tebow had a quick response.

“Tim reminded me that I’ve done those kind of spreads already,” Sanchez said with a smile, referring to his GQ photo shoot. “There’s a time and a place.”

Tebow admitted he hadn’t seen the slowed-down footage of him running through the rain with the “Chariots of Fire” music playing in the background. But he said he does find himself laughing at times at the way his every move is scrutinized and analyzed by the media and the public.

“Sometimes it does get a little comical and funny to me,” Tebow said. “For the most part, I really just try not to think about it or worry about it or pay attention to it. I really just try to be myself and lead as much of a normal life as I can without having any of this change who I am or what I do or why I do it.

“I think that’s something that I kind of take pride in — not changing, especially my values, my faith, anything like that, but also what I do, how I do it. I try to be the same person all the time, and just being someone that’s authentic and genuine and real and not someone that does one thing in front of the cameras and something different when I’m not. … I don’t want to change based on what anyone writes about me.”

That, he said, includes taking his shirt off.

“I’m not gonna change that,” he said with a laugh. “I’m taking my shirt off.”

tbontemps@nypost.com