Update: Mark Cavendish abandoned the Tour de Romandie because of illness

Two former World Champions, Mark Cavendish and Rui Costa have joined Simon Yates in abandoning the Tour de Romandie on the opening stage.

For Rui Costa, the knee injury he suffered when attempting to push off the start ramp of the opening prologue proved too much for the Portuguese to handle and after already being comfortably minutes down on everyone else in the general classification he decided to abandon.

The Manx Missile meanwhile was feeling under the weather and after alerting his Astana Qazaqstan Team car of his feelings, he also stepped off the bike and decided to call it a day.