"I can't look forward: today I feel lost, and Chiara with me." At the end of an endless and painful day , yesterday Gianmarco Tamberi was no longer just the disappointed champion , but the man who knows he has lost three years of his life, together with his wife Chiara Bontempi .

" I've given my whole life to sport, I don't deserve all this ," he said after finishing eleventh in the Olympic high jump final, which he shouldn't have even competed in, after 10 hours of excruciating pain from renal colic.

" If I think that three years ago I could have started a family... ", he says crying in front of the cameras, he who with his life partner had given up a child so as not to see his energy sucked away. And who instead finds himself today without a medal , a dehydrated mask, with many doubts about a preparation made up of many kilos lost, a manic diet and very low intake of liquids in the last few days , perhaps the very one that led to the renal colic that cost him the race of his life.

"I understand the criticism - he then defends himself from those who attack him for being too present on social media -, but in these days I have received an infinite number of messages of encouragement, there were so many asking me how I was today: it seemed respectful to communicate, I did not do it hourly but in the turning points . I assure you that writing a message on Instagram was the last thing I wanted to do..".

He did it with Chiara who was holding his hand in the ambulance. « My whole life, all our lives have been dedicated to sports . She is a great woman, I said it in front of Mattarella when we handed over the tricolor. All the choices we made were together, to pursue this dream. I am so sorry for myself and for her ».

"I had worked so hard for this race, I'm always hypercritical - adds Gimbo - but not this time. I can't think, not only about the future, not even about what has been, otherwise I'll cry again".