Filippo Ganna (Ineos Grenadiers) continues to surprise everyone, including himself.

Time trial world champion Filippo Ganna proved his dominance against the clock by winning the prologue of the opening stage of the Tour de la Provence.

On Saturday's second stage, he defended the leader's jersey on the Manosque climb, finishing third behind Brian Coquard (Cofidis) and Julien Alaphilippe (Quick Step-Alphaville).

Ganna had already shown he had the watts to match his 80 kg weight with a breakaway victory on the hilly stage of the 2020 Giro d'Italia, but Saturday's finish was a shorter, sharper effort. Coca-Cola took the lead with 400 meters to go on a climb with 2km to go, looked around and saw Pierre Latour (Total Energy) open and went into sprint mode.

Coca-Cola pulled away and Alaphilippe moved ahead through both sides of Latour, but third place was still much more than expected.

"Today was a complete loss. It's really hard to keep up with the players here. It was great to be at the front with a big rider like Lulu [Alaphilippe]," Ganna said at the finish.

"I wanted to win the stage, but the two riders were too strong.

Ganna really shouldn't have sprinted at all. Viviani was a question mark because of the finish and the hilly nature of the stage, but Ethan Hayter, who finished second in the prologue, looked perfect. However, they both fell on the Masco Pass with 25 km to go.

Ganna may have also hoped to take care of Richard Carapas in the finale, but the Ecuadorian, who was expected to contend for the overall win in Sunday's big summit finish, did not start the stage because he tested positive for COVID-19

"I didn't wake up very well this morning after an intense day like yesterday, but Salvatore Puccio worked long hours at the front of the pack all day, so it's the most we can do to reward him for his efforts," Ganna said.

Ganna will take the black leader's jersey for Sunday's decisive stage, which finishes at the summit of Montagne de Lure. After taking into account the bonus seconds, his lead over Alaphilippe was halved to two seconds, with Nairo Quintana (Arkea-Samsic) probably the strongest pure climber by 32 seconds.

Ganna, who had previously given up hope of winning the overall, was now Ineos' only card and said he intended to "test himself" on the 17km climb, which averaged 6%.

"I know it will be difficult, but I'm not starting just to start. For me it's one test to see where I can arrive. But there are certainly climbers out there who can kill me on the climb."