{"id":140,"date":"2026-02-25T21:29:14","date_gmt":"2026-02-25T21:29:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost:8881\/2026\/02\/25\/olympic-biathlete-undergoes-heart-surgery-after-withdrawing-from-race-mid-competition\/"},"modified":"2026-02-25T21:29:14","modified_gmt":"2026-02-25T21:29:14","slug":"olympic-biathlete-undergoes-heart-surgery-after-withdrawing-from-race-mid-competition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/flamenet.io\/2026\/02\/25\/olympic-biathlete-undergoes-heart-surgery-after-withdrawing-from-race-mid-competition\/","title":{"rendered":"Olympic biathlete undergoes heart surgery after withdrawing from race mid-competition"},"content":{"rendered":"
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An Olympic<\/a> athlete was forced to undergo heart surgery after withdrawing from a race at Milan Cortina.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Italian biathlete Tommaso Giacomel decided not to participate in the 15-kilometer mass start due to breathing issues<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“A subsequent electrophysiological study revealed an atrial conduction abnormality, which recommended a subsequent ablation, which has already been performed and was a complete success,” the Italian Winter Sports Federation (FISI) announced Tuesday.\u00a0<\/p>\n

CLICK HERE FOR MORE SPORTS COVERAGE ON FOXNEWS.COM<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0<\/strong><\/i><\/p>\n

“Tommaso will be discharged on Thursday morning and will undergo further scheduled checks in two weeks. Once completed, he will be allowed to return to regular training.”<\/p>\n

Giacomel wrote on his Instagram story that he was “gutted” that his season was “over.”<\/p>\n

“I\u2019m okay – if I can say I am okay when I had to DNF while I was leading an Olympic race\u2026” Giacomel wrote in an Instagram post last week with a photo of himself from a hospital bed.<\/p>\n

WHO IS CONNOR HELLEBUYCK? TEAM USA GOALIE WILL RECEIVE PRESIDENTIAL MEDAL OF FREEDOM AFTER OLYMPIC GOLD<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

“Right after the second prone my body somehow stopped working properly and I was really struggling to breath and to move, therefore I had to stop. Worst feeling I have ever experienced in my life so far. I tried to ski really slow the first part of the third lap but my body wasn\u2019t allowing me to ski anymore.<\/p>\n

“A lot is going through my head at the moment\u2026 frustration, anger, disappointment\u2026 It\u2019s devastating. It\u2019s devastating to stop but there wasn\u2019t anything I could do against my own body today. Absolutely not the end of the games I was hoping for but I will never give up. 4 years fly by fast and I will try again in France. I will do some medical checks<\/a> the next days to find out what went wrong today.. I\u2019ll keep you posted. Thank you for the tremendous support.”<\/p>\n

Earlier in the Games, Giacomel earned a silver medal in the mixed relay. He has three other silver medals from world championships and five victories in Biathalon World Cups.<\/p>\n

Follow Fox News Digital\u2019s\u00a0<\/strong><\/i>sports coverage on X<\/strong><\/i><\/a>,\u00a0and subscribe to\u00a0<\/strong><\/i>the Fox News Sports Huddle newsletter<\/strong><\/i><\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An Olympic athlete was forced to undergo heart surgery after withdrawing from a race at Milan Cortina.\u00a0 Italian biathlete Tommaso Giacomel decided not to participate… [more]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[62],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-140","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/flamenet.io\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/flamenet.io\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/flamenet.io\/api\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flamenet.io\/api\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flamenet.io\/api\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=140"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/flamenet.io\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/flamenet.io\/api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=140"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flamenet.io\/api\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=140"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flamenet.io\/api\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=140"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}