Olympian sells Rio 2016 medal to pay for three-year-old's cancer treatment

  • Rio 2016

A Polish discus thrower has sold his Rio 2016 silver medal to raise funds for a three-year-old boy with a rare form of cancer.

Piotr Malachowski, 33, won his second Olympic silver medal of his career after finishing 82cm adrift of Germany's Christoph Harting earlier this month.

However he sold his medal to enable Olek Szymanski - a toddler with retinoblastoma (an eye cancer that affects young children) - to travel to New York to undergo treatment.

Malachowski said: "My silver medal is worth a lot more than a week ago. It is worth the health of little Olek."

Piotr Malachowski clinched silver in Rio with a throw of 67.55m Credit: Reuters

He said the child's fate had given him the opportunity to "increase the value of my silver."

"Winning an Olympic medal is one of an athlete's life dreams. Of course, the most precious is gold. I did everything in my power to get it. Unfortunately this time I did not succeed", he added.

The silver medallist in Beijing eight years ago made his original appeal via Facebook, where he said: "In Rio I fought for the gold. Today I appeal to everyone ― let’s fight together about something that is even more precious: the health of this fantastic boy.

"If you help me, my silver can be more precious than gold."