(Reuters) – The Mitchelton-Scott team withdrew from the Giro d’Italia on Tuesday after being notified of new positive COVID-19 results from a round of tests conducted over the weekend, race organisers RCS Sport said.
“Upon receiving the results, Mitchelton-Scott immediately withdrew its team from the race and will focus on the health of its riders and staff and their safe movement to areas of quarantine,” RCS said in a statement.
Organisers added that two riders, one each from Team Sunweb and Jumbo-Visma, had also tested positive along with four staff members from Mitchelton-Scott and one each from Team AG2R-La Mondiale and Team Ineos.
Sunweb did not immediately confirm who had tested positive, but Jumbo-Visma said on Twitter their rider Steven Kruijswijk had returned a positive result and would leave the race.
Mitchelton-Scott said the team were notified of the four positive results for staff members from tests done on Sunday.
“Unfortunately we received the news on Monday evening that we have returned a number of positive COVID-19 results to members of our staff after our third round of tests in three days,” the team’s general manager Brent Copeland said.
“As a social responsibility to our riders and staff, the peloton and the race organisation we have made the clear decision to withdraw from the Giro d’Italia.
“Thankfully those impacted remain asymptomatic or with mild symptoms.”
Mitchelton-Scott rider Simon Yates withdrew from the race on Saturday after testing positive for the new coronavirus.
(Reporting by Simon Jennings in Bengaluru; Editing by Peter Rutherford)
