Not a trip report, but a route comparison. I did the Baldy-3 T's loop from the village in both directions the last two Sundays:
-counter-clockwise: park car in the village > walk up to Ice House Canyon TH > 3 T's > Baldy > back down Bear Canyon to the village/car
-clockwise: park car in Ice House Canyon TH > run down to the village > Baldy > 3 T's > back down Ice House Canyon to car
Surprisingly, it only took me 15 more minutes to summit the last peak clockwise (Timber) than doing it counter-clockwise (Baldy). Could have been ~25 minutes, if it wasn't for the snow on the first Sunday (when I did the counter-clockwise).
The big difference for me was the descent. My knees were in bad pain coming down from Baldy to the village, much more than what I normally experience coming down after the regular village-Baldy hike. This way took me more than 1.5 hours longer than the descent from Timber to Ice Canyon, where I didn't have any more knee pain than expected after such a long hike.
The road between the village and Ice House Canyon didn't really effect the hikes as much as I thought it would. It's only 1.7 miles, 650ft elev difference, and if you start early enough (~630am), you don't have to worry about dodging cars. Turned out to be just a nice warm-up section.