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Speared jumper Sdiri discharged

French long jumper Salim Sdiri was discharged from hospital in Rome on Saturday, the morning after he was speared by a javelin in a freak accident at the Rome Golden League meeting.

Sdiri was hit by the javelin which had been launched by Finland's Tero Pitkamaki at the other side of the arena at the Olympic Stadium.

French team physiotherapist Marc Michnowski said that Sdiri had been discharged from the Gemelli Clinic overnight and was resting at the athletes' hotel on the outskirts of Rome before returning to France.

"Salim is resting at the moment, he left the hospital at around 2am in the morning. He's trying to sleep. I'm taking care of organizing the medical side of his return home during the day," Michnowski added.

Sdiri suffered no damage to the pleural membrane or liver as had initially been feared.

The 28-year-old admitted that he had been ill at ease because the men's javelin and long jump events were taking place at the same time.

"I had my worries. We had begun our competition and the javelin throwers were warming up," Sdiri said. "The javelins were falling not too far from our area and I saw one landing near my foot."

Sdiri, a bronze medalist at the European indoor championships, collapsed to the ground before being taken to hospital.

Pitkamaki appeared to lose his footing as he launched the javelin which veered off course, landing in Sdiri's side.

When he saw what had happened, Pitkamaki held his head in his hands in shock.

"Sdiri had a 4cm injury in his right side," said Giuseppe Fischetto, one of the medics at the scene."The point of the javelin partially penetrated his side and he was taken to hospital."

Sdiri was lying in fourth place at the time of the incident with a jump of 7.88m from his first attempt.

Friday's incident was not the first time such an accident had occurred.

In January, former Olympic decathlon champion Roman Sebrle was hit in the right shoulder by a javelin thrown by an athlete during a training session in South Africa.

The Czech decathlete was told that he had "escaped death by 20cm."

"If the javelin had hit me 10cm more to the left, it could have damaged a lung," Sebrle said.
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