"I had a bad feeling, and it turned out to be right" - Remco Evenepoel's father talks through difficult moments at Giro d'Italia

Remco Evenepoel's abandon from the Giro d'Italia is the talk of the Giro d'Italia's first rest day with no doubt, with many discussing the conditions and already thinking of the next step. The World Champion's father admitted that he had a bad feeling over his son's health in recent days.

"I had a bad feeling, and it turned out to be right... We could see that he was not in his normal state. Agna had also mentioned it during the Walls stage: we didn't like really her look," Patrick Evenepoel told Le Soir. "Of course, we don't immediately think of the Covid because there had been this double fall a few days before. It's a shame but, on the other hand, we can also tell ourselves that there are worse things in life". 

Evenepoel tested positive for Covid-19, just hours after he won the second time-trial of the race and pulled on the pink jersey for a second time. He has been one of the Covid cases identified throughout the week in what is an active outbreak in the Giro d'Italia peloton. Other big figures such as Filippo Ganna and Rigoberto Urán abandoned in the previous 36 hours, with the race being heavily affected by the vicrus.

"Today, he is the one who pays the price. But I told him: 'It's not your fault. You've worked hard enough for this, you've done everything for it. There's absolutely nothing you can do about it, you're helpless'. Knowing him, he'll be struggling for a while," Evenepoel senior adds. "But I think very quickly he will be able to turn the knob to focus on new and different goals. First he has to take some distance from everything for a while."

Covid will remain a risk until the very last day of the race and he brings up a very valid point on the security measures the race needs at the time to prevent as much as possible more cases from showing up. "Everyone has to question themselves: the organizers, the riders, the media, the other followers of the Giro caravan... Because it is clear that we are not rid of Covid. To the outside world it might be next to nothing but, in sport, it's still relevant. Can't blame anyone for it, but it inevitably suggests new precautions."

"Riders have already abandoned. Today it was all Uran and Remco. And when you see how the riders had to come down from the Gran Sasso on Friday, for example," he says, referring to the fact that riders took cable cars down the mountain alongside press and fans.

"I think there will undoubtedly be other who knows, maybe they'll take a risk with Primoz Roglic? Personally, we didn't want that to happen to Remco. But when the team doctor says 'stop', we just stop," he concluded.