Darren Rafferty starts Romandie with very solid prologue | Video | Sticky Bottle

*Maikel Zijlaard of Tudor Cycling team in action during the prologue at Tour de Romandie, winning after being aided by the dry conditions (Photo: Keystone-Laurent Gillieron)*

Darren Rafferty (EF Education-EasyPost) has started his Tour de Romandie with a strong TT effort that saw him finish just six seconds off the winner.

Rafferty (20) already finished on the podium in the O Gran Camiño (2.1) TT, which was neutralised for the general classification earlier this year.

Today the U23 Irish TT champion clearly signalled his intent to continue his focus with the TT discipline when he finished 25th of the 161-rider field in the World Tour event.

He was among a large group of 15 riders who were all six seconds down on surprise stage winner, Dutchman Maikel Zijlaard of Tudor Cycling team. Some of the favourites were slowed by drizzle that fell later in the day.

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However, late starter Cameron Scott (Bahrain Victorious) finished runner-up, just one second down, and in doing so pushed Julian Alaphilippe (Soudal-Quickstep) to 3rd at two seconds; a strong performance by the under-pressure Frenchman.

Aside from Rafferty, fellow Irishman Eddie Dunbar (Team Jayco AlUla) is also in the race and finished 144th at 20 seconds on what was a very short and technical course.