Olympian drops out of Summer Games to protect beloved horse

One Olympian's dream is sadly over after a nasty bug bite at the 2016 Summer Games in Rio.

Adelinde Cornelissen, a Dutch dressage powerhouse, stunned fans when she dropped out of the Olympics mid-competition to protect her best friend.

SEE MORE: Everything you need to know about the Summer Olympics

The trip to Brazil started out fine for Cornelissen, and her horse, Parzival, who is her partner in the equestrian sport -- but things quickly took a turn for the worse after the animal was bitten by some sort of insect and fell ill on Tuesday.

"Saying good morning to Parzival, I saw the right side of his head was swollen, he had been kicking the walls. I took his temperature: he had a fever," Cornelissen said in a Facebook post on Wednesday.

A team of veterinarians worked tirelessly to help bring Parzival's fever down and he showed signs of improvement.

The entire time he was sick, Cornelissen stayed by his side. "I slept at the stables, checking up on Parzi every hour," she wrote.

Dutch officials asked to change their team's starting positions to give Parzival more time to recover, but the request was shot down by the Fédération Equestre Internationale according to CNN.

Once the medical team gave the pair the green light, they decided to proceed with the competition.

However, when the pair entered the arena Cornelissen quickly realized something was wrong with the horse.

"In order to protect him, I gave up," Cornelissen wrote. "My buddy, my friend, the horse that has given everything for me his whole life does not deserve this ... so I saluted and left the arena."

And while the duo won't be going home to the Netherlands with any medals -- they have an incredible bond that can never be broken.

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