Usain Bolt needsurgent treatment after Olympic scare

Usain Bolt's management team insist the triple Olympic champion has nothing more serious than a tight hamstring muscle - even though the athlete was in Munich yesterday (Friday) receiving treatment at the hands of the celebrated sports doctor, Hans-Wilhelm Muller-Wohlfahrt.

Concerns have been raised about Bolt's ability to defend his Olympic crowns next month after his coach, Glen Mills, revealed in a statement on Thursday that the sprinter had "a slight problem" and was being withdrawn from the Diamond League meeting in Monaco on July 20, where he had been due to compete in the 200 metres.

The race was meant to be Bolt's final dress rehearsal for London and it means he will not compete again until the first round of the 100m in the Olympic Stadium on Aug 4.

Bolt's withdrawal followed his surprise double defeat by training partner Yohan Blake at the Jamaican Olympic trials last weekend, where he was given hamstring-stretching treatment on the Kingston track immediately after the 200m final.

Tyson Gay, the American sprinter who is one of Bolt's key rivals for Olympic 100m gold, was among those who observed something different about the Jamaican's running style at the trials.

"I found Usain to be a bit laboured," said Gay. "He gave the impression that he was forcing it, which is unlike him."

A source close to Bolt confirmed the athlete had flown to Germany for a consultation with Muller-Wohlfahrt yesterday but said the appointment had been "scheduled as a check-up long ago, before he had the problems of last weekend". The source added that Bolt was suffering only from tightness and was expected to be fully recovered within days.

In an interview with BBC Radio 5 Live, Bolt's agent, Ricky Simms, played down the seriousness of the injury and said he would be fit and ready for the Olympics.

"He had a slightly tight hamstring during the trials and that's why possibly didn't push as hard as he could have," said Simms. "He was just protecting that. The main thing at the trials was to get through and get on the team for the Olympic Games.

"His coach decided that he needs to get a little bit of massage and treatment on that and rest up, and then train again hard next week so that he's ready for the Olympic Games."

Bolt, who has a congenital curvature of the lower spine which caused persistent problems with his hamstrings at the start of his athletics career, has been seeing Muller-Wohlfahrt since he was 16 and flies to Germany for check-ups at least twice a year.

The back and hamstring problem is kept under control by daily exercises, though a flare-up in 2010 forced him to cut short his season a month early and was also blamed for his sluggish start to 2011.

Bolt's latest trip to Munich comes just a day after marathon world record holder Paula Radcliffe visited Muller-Wohlfahrt's clinic for treatment on a painful osteoarthritis condition in her left foot which could threaten her participation in the London Games. Like Bolt, Radcliffe is a regular patient of the doctor, having first consulted him 17 years ago.

Muller-Wohlfahrt, who has a pair of Puma spikes signed by Bolt in his surgery, told ESPN in December that over the years he had become a fringe member of the Jamaican's support team, treating his aches and pains and providing biomechanical analysis.

"The first time he came nobody knew him but his coach sent him here to ask me whether it was worth it to train him," said Muller-Wohlfahrt. "He [the coach] was not sure whether he was able to train very, very hard. I said, 'If he does this and this exercises, then yes he can'. So he started to do exercises and then the success grew more and more."

Nicknamed "Healing Hans" for his restorative powers, Muller-Wohlfahrt has become the doctor of choice for numerous sporting A-listers including footballers Steven Gerrard, Michael Owen and Ronaldo, and the 2004 double Olympic champion, Dame Kelly Holmes.

Muller-Wohlfahrt has claimed that five of the eight 100m finalists at the 2009 World Championships in Berlin were patients of his.

But his methods are not without controversy because his treatment commonly involves injecting homeopathic preparations into the injured area, including the controversial substance Actovegin, which is derived from calves' blood.

Critics say Actovegin, which is not approved in the United States, should be classed as performance enhancing since it speeds up healing by promoting oxygen flow, though the substance is not on the World Anti-Doping Agency's prohibited list. Others say there is no scientific evidence that Actovegin has any healing properties because Muller-Wohlfahrt's work has never been peer-reviewed.

Travis Tygart, the chief executive of the US Anti-Doping Agency, has described Muller-Wohlfahrt's injections as "a Frankenstein-type of experiment".