Filippo Baroncini has started eating solid food and could leave Niguarda Hospital in the coming days, but what matters is that the 25-year-old Romagna boy is much better and his morale, after what he's been through, is simply through the roof. As Mauro Gianetti, who has been very close to him like the entire UAE Emirates team, said: "This guy not only has a great engine, but a champion's mindset. Will he come back? Of course he'll come back, he'll definitely return, he just needs patience. Now we just need patience."

Ciro Scognamiglio visited him at the Milan hospital, who today in the Gazzetta relaunched the first official words of the person directly involved - a guy who faced death but rejected it thanks to an extraordinary fighting spirit and a medical staff that did something extraordinary. It's clear that the boy, as well as his family and the Emirates team, are grateful to the Niguarda medical staff who did something unthinkable just a few years ago. So Filippo, through the columns of the pink newspaper, thanks Gabriele Canzi, head of maxillofacial surgery; Davide Colistra, neurosurgeon; Valeria Terzi, intensive care resuscitator; Giampaolo Casella, head of anesthesia and resuscitation; Pietro Giorgi, head of orthopedics and traumatology, who took care of his back.

Ciro was at Niguarda Hospital in Milan, "east sector, second floor. Neurosurgery department, at the end of the corridor on the right, double room, position number 18: Filippo is there, sitting at the table in front of his bed and smiling, despite everything," Scognamiglio recounts.

Then it's his turn to say something, Filippo's turn. "Yes, because I'm alive by a miracle. I didn't understand it right away, but slowly I'm beginning to perceive it," explains the 25-year-old from UAE-XRG "who spent (also) his birthday on August 26th in the hospital: twenty days earlier, on the 6th, the terrible accident in the Tour of Poland, when he crashed into a wall at 60 km/h: first taken to hospital in Poland, he was then transferred by private flight to Niguarda where he underwent complex operations".

Then the questions: Baroncini, do you remember anything about the accident?

"Almost everything. Until, basically, I was sedated. Diego Ulissi was in front of me, and another rider too. It was a bad descent section, because it was very narrow. At that point..."

What happened?

"Basically, a fairly sharp curve appeared and I hit the gravel. I crashed, bouncing, and when coming back I also touched my vertebrae a bit. And I felt pain."

What else did you perceive?

"I immediately felt the impact on my ribs because I was struggling to breathe. My legs were moving well, so I was calm from that point of view. But on my face, I felt something wasn't right. And thank goodness that by a matter of millimeters nothing happened to my eyes..."

How do you imagine the next few months?

"I would want to speed up the times, but at the same time I know I shouldn't. I know the recovery must follow the right times, and I must return to my level. We need to carefully check my mouth, jaw, future posture. Without forgetting that, inevitably, I've lost a lot of mass and weight."

Mauro is right, a lot of patience is needed, it's no coincidence that today Filippo is a patient. He must be.