Ineos Grenadiers rider Filippo Ganna won stage five of the Giro d’Italia as Joao Almeida added to his lead in the general classification.

The Italian world time trial champion rode away from a breakaway group on the final climb to clinch victory by 34 seconds from the chasing pack.

Bora-Hangrohe’s Patrick Konrad took second place, with the pink jersey Almeida propping up the top three.

Ganna’s victory comes just over 24 hours after his team leader Geraint Thomas abandoned the race due to a crash which left him with a fractured pelvis.

"We wanted to make up for losing Geraint Thomas, so it's a good day for the team," said Ganna.

"I shouldn’t even have gone in break today, I was supposed to just help Salvatore Puccio. But after 40 kilometres of attacks, I told him to get on my wheel and we got away with the others.  

"They were attacking me on the climb so the only thing I could do was stay calm and then go for it myself. Last night Geraint told me to go for it and go in break, and so I did.

"It was hard on the climb. I’m 83 kilograms, so it’s not easy for me to climb but in the end I did a time trial to the finish. I had a problem with my radio and so just told myself to go full gas to the line."

As well as Almeida’s third place on the stage, he also increased his overall lead to 43 seconds after EF Pro Cycling's Jonathan Caicedo - who was second at the start of the day - was dropped and lost more than 16 minutes.

Almeida will be expected to retain his overall lead on stage six which is a rolling day that could suit a breakaway or the sprinters.