(Reuters) -Australian swimmer Sam Short will skip the men’s 800 metres freestyle final at the world championships in Singapore later on Wednesday upon receiving medical advice following a bout of food poisoning, the 21-year-old said.
Short was part of a stacked field that included Ireland’s Olympic champion Daniel Wiffen and Tunisia’s Ahmed Jaouadi but said he had to take the “extremely emotional” decision as his illness escalated quickly.
“After an awesome heat swim which I felt phenomenal, I got very ill very fast, which we believe is food poisoning from my hotel lunch,” Short wrote on Instagram.
“I have only been consuming meals from the hotel. My afternoon and night has been full of vomiting and all the other nasty stuff that comes with food poisoning. Not pleasant and extremely draining.
“I had full intention of competing if I started to show signs of improvement. However this has not happened. I am going to try my best to recover as well as possible to help my team in the 4x200m relay on Friday. Sorry Australia.”
Short had qualified for the 800m final with the second-quickest time of seven minutes, 42.22 seconds behind Jaouadi and ahead of Germany’s Sven Schwarz.
(Reporting by Shrivathsa Sridhar in BengaluruEditing by Christian Radnedge)
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