(REUTERS) – Olympic champion Usain Bolt was beaten by Justin Gatlin in the 100 metres at the Rome Golden Gala Diamond League meeting yesterday.

American Gatlin, bronze medallist at the London Games, ran 9.94 seconds to beat a sluggish-looking Bolt by 0.01 seconds in a race that showed the Jamaican has yet to fully recover from the hamstring injury that dogged him earlier in the season.
Bolt got a good start but Gatlin had edged ahead by halfway and the world record holder never looked like making up the ground.
“I think it was the fact I got a good start threw me off a little bit,” Bolt told the BBC with a laugh.
“Five steps in I stumbled a little bit … then it just wasn’t me. At least I got under 10 seconds this time,” he added with a grin, referring to his only other race over 100 metres this season, when he ran 10.09 in the Cayman Islands last month.