Olympics-Athletics-Tamberi's gold medal defence in doubt due to return of kidney pain

By Lori Ewing

PARIS (Reuters) - Gianmarco Tamberi's defence of his Olympic high jump title is in doubt after the Italian experienced the same stabbing kidney pain that led him to visit the hospital days before the preliminary round.

The 32-year-old shared gold with Qatar's Mutaz Barshim at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics but said he awoke at 5 a.m. on Saturday experiencing "stabbing" pain from kidney colic -- acute pain in the kidney area caused by an obstruction -- that had bothered him a few days earlier.

"It's all finished," the Italian posted on Instagram. "I hoped until the very end, I believed in spite of all that had happened.

"It's been 5 hours and the pain is still not over. I managed to beat fate once after that injury in 2016 (an ankle injury that required surgery), this time unfortunately I really think he won.

"I'm speechless, truly, so sorry. Will I take to the stage anyway this evening? Yeah, but I really don't know how I'm going to jump in these conditions."

Tamberi and Barshim both advanced to Saturday's final but it was anything but smooth as the Italian had three fails at 2.27 metres while the Qatari cleared it only after lengthy treatment for an injury.

Three days earlier, Tamberi had posted a picture of himself in a hospital bed after being taken ill with kidney pain, which delayed his travel plans to France.

(Reporting by Lori Ewing; Editing by Christian Radnedge)