Bradley Wiggins (Sky Procycling) won the 37-kilometre race against the clock, 56 seconds ahead of Fabian Cancellara (RadioShack Leopard), 1’14” ahead of Phinney and 1’20” ahead of Pinotti, the reigning Italian time trial champion.

Phinney said being the eighth rider of 109 starters did not affect his performance.

"At the end of the day, I was quite surprised that I got third considering I didn't feel very strong," he said. "I kind of blew up on the last highway coming back into Krakow. For the lack of preparation I've been able to put in for the time trial due to complications from saddles sores at the Giro, I'm pretty happy with being third. Being beaten by Cancellara and Wiggins ... that's not so bad."

Pinotti, who said his goal was a top five finish, had the best time at the intermediate check two seconds faster than Wiggins.

"The first part was probably the most technical and the hardest, with lots of rolling parts," he said. "But I lost more than a minute to Wiggins in the last 16 or 17 km, which was where the course was a highway."

Nerz's result gave him the BMC Racing Team's best finish overall – 13th, 3’12” behind race winner Pieter Weening (Orica-GreenEDGE) – while teammate Ivan Santaromita was 14th, 3’25” back. Nerz said he wasn't sure how he would recover after a tough stage Friday.

"When I woke up this morning, I was feeling pretty good," he said. "I was sure I could do a pretty good time trial, but this was unexpected. For me, it's a great feeling. I had a rest period after the Tour of Austria and one-and-a-half weeks of training before coming into this race. So to go like this is awesome."