Carla Bruni was used to a rock 'n' roll lifestyle with former boyfriends who included Mick Jagger and Eric Clapton. She partied, grooved and by her own account hopped from bed to bed.

Not so today. According to President Sarkozy, her husband, Ms Bruni's new existence could hardly be more domestic.

The 54-year-old head of state painted himself and his glamorous, Italian-born spouse as a home-loving social recluses, as he broke with tradition to chat with journalists after his weekly Cabinet meeting today.

The president’s unprecedented display of openness on the steps of the Elysée Palace was an attempt to scotch rumours about his health, prompted by his collapse whilst jogging on Sunday.

Mr Sarkozy insisted that he was in good health despite the scare, and needed nothing more than rest – medical advice which he claimed would have no impact on an already Spartan lifestyle.

Raising eyebrows in Paris, he said it would be easy for him to obey his doctors since he and the 41-year-old model turned singer whom he married last year had metamorphosed into a stay-at-home couple.

''Frankly, my wife and I never go out in the evening, we never go to dinner parties, I don't drink, as you know, I don't smoke cigarettes, even if I have a weakness for a cigar from time to time, and therefore I don't need a considerable structural change.''

In comments which may be designed to shed his bling-bling image, he added that he had never led une vie de patachon, defined in the dictionary as a disorderly life of pleasure and debauch.

Although the 54-year-old president is known to be a teetotaller and a non-smoker, his claims came as a surprise to commentators, who have portrayed him as a stalwart of the Parisian dinner-party circuit.

He met Ms Bruni at a dinner organised by Jacques Séguela, an advertising executive, shortly after his divorce from Cécelia Attias, his second wife, in 2007, for instance.

On the evening of his election earlier that year, he held a party for friends from the worlds of showbusiness and industry at Fouquet's, a chic restaurant on the Champs Elysées.

If Mr Sarkozy's self portrait is accurate, it could be a sign of how he has changed since his marriage to Ms Bruni, who persuaded him to take on a personal trainer to follow a strict fitness regime.

He is known to have given up chocolate cake and chocolate between meals. Friends claim he has cut back on cheese in a bid to remain thin.

Patrick Balkany, a member of the ruling Union for a Popular Movement, blamed Mr Sarkozy's strict diet for his collapse whilst running in the grounds of the Château de Versailles.

In his intervention - the first time a French president had answered media questions after a cabinet meeting - Mr Sarkozy had a simple explanation for what happened: ''I ran out of petrol.''

He went on: ''I wanted to tell the French that my health was good. I am a human being, I got tired. Was it due to dehydration, to heat, to tiredness? I don't know. I've run thousands of times like that without anything at all going wrong.''

''I'm always careful about what I eat, the way I nourish myself and I will continue like that.''

After a 21-hour stay in Val-de-Grâce military hospital in Paris, where he underwent a series of cardiovascular tests, he was given a clean bill of health, he said.

''I simply need to rest,'' said the President, who looked tanned but drawn, with dark rings under his eyes.

He is due to begin a three week holiday with Ms Bruni at her home on the French Riviera this week.

In a rare admission of weakness, the all action politician known as Speedy Sarko conceded that seven years in high office, as Interior Minister, Finance Minister and President, had left their mark.

''It's been tough. I haven't had much respite.''

But in a break with French tradition, he pledged to be open about his health. ''That part of my life belongs to the nation and it's right that I should make it public,'' he said.

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