It seems like the only way the Tour can become "wide open" again is if they minimize the value of TT's.
Everyone is so close in terms of watts per kilo that no one can make much more than 5-15 seconds on any mountain top finish. The guys with bigger top line watts who also have good watts per kilo basically seal it up in the ITT/s. The amount of time gained on the TT's make it impossible to gain back on other stages barring some sort of misfortune.
My 2 cents...keep a prologue so that deltas remain small, and maybe a short 10-15K TTT in the third week where you get the time of your 4th man (which would mean a team than can buy a lot of guys who would otherwise be team leaders still may not make a lot of time). Then the mountain top finishes could mean a bit more especially with the time bonuses. Perhaps zero ITT in week 2, or a really short one like 15K.
Even with that, Froome and Sky would still probably win, but it would be a lot closer. There would not be enough of a buffer to play defence for most of the third week!
Everyone is so close in terms of watts per kilo that no one can make much more than 5-15 seconds on any mountain top finish. The guys with bigger top line watts who also have good watts per kilo basically seal it up in the ITT/s. The amount of time gained on the TT's make it impossible to gain back on other stages barring some sort of misfortune.
My 2 cents...keep a prologue so that deltas remain small, and maybe a short 10-15K TTT in the third week where you get the time of your 4th man (which would mean a team than can buy a lot of guys who would otherwise be team leaders still may not make a lot of time). Then the mountain top finishes could mean a bit more especially with the time bonuses. Perhaps zero ITT in week 2, or a really short one like 15K.
Even with that, Froome and Sky would still probably win, but it would be a lot closer. There would not be enough of a buffer to play defence for most of the third week!