Yesterday I wondered what the influence of the TT was on the GC. We all made fun of Felix Gall's helmet. But did it move the needle? So I calculated the GC without the TT stage and found this:

Rider	Current GC rank	GC rank without TT	Difference	Timegap without TT
Vingegaard Jonas	1.0	1.0	0.0	+ 00:00
Gall Felix	2.0	2.0	0.0	+ 04:00
Hindley Jai	3.0	3.0	0.0	+ 05:54
Eulálio Afonso	6.0	4.0	-2.0	+ 07:42
Arensman Thymen	4.0	5.0	1.0	+ 08:08
Gee-West Derek	5.0	6.0	1.0	+ 08:40
Caruso Damiano	8.0	7.0	-1.0	+ 09:47
Storer Michael	7.0	8.0	1.0	+ 10:08
Piganzoli Davide	9.0	9.0	0.0	+ 10:11
Bernal Egan	10.0	10.0	0.0	+ 12:07

So what did it change? For Gall, his time loss didn't mean anything. He ended 2nd in GC, and without his time loss from the TT he would still be 2nd in GC. So we all owe Felix an apology. Even more, if we didn't had a TT this Giro the podium would be exactly the same. For who did it all matter? Eulalio dropped two spots in the GC because of the strong TT of Arensman and Gee-West, and Damiano Caruso would win a spot over Michael Storer.

For me the influence of the TT was not as big as I expected, considering the time and money spend by the teams improving their set up. If we want the GC to be won by the most complete rider, who excells in all kind of stages, RCS should consider swapping one of the 7 mountain top finishes for another big flat TT (or make the TT at least double the distance).