Magnus Sheffield 🇺🇸

We're definitely not recommending you throw down any cash on the Tour de France 2024 this early - but if you wanted to place a cheeky bet you wouldn't be defenestrating your money by placing it on Sheffield. Especially given that Geraint Thomas will likely be riding as backup support for INEOS at the Tour next year, INEOS lost a bunch of other strong riders in the transfer cycle this year, and Pidcock showed he might not quite have what it takes to balance his MTB ambitions with a general classification (GC) attempt at the Tour.

So where does that leave them? Probably supporting Rodrìguez and another member of there team. Sheffield seems like a strong contender to be that other member.

Sheffield's 2023 season has been strong. Well. Other than his horrendous Classics where he couldn't seem to stop crashing. But we'll give him a pass given that he won mini La Flèche the prior year.

If you subtract the Classics season out then he's been rounding back into form nicely later in the summer with a 2nd in the GC at Tour of Norway and what would have been a strong GC result at the Tour of Suisse if he hadn't crashed out.

Earlier in the year he finished 4th at the World Tour level Santos Tour Down Under and was looking incredibly spicy.

Strengths

This man can time trial. We mean, he's young, so he gets that bonus of knowing about CdA, but he's still incredibly strong. Of the time trials he's done this year he's only finished outside the podium once. Make sure to press that each way button though on bets as he hasn't finished first in any of them either - still losing to big names like Ganna and Tulett.

Sheffield can climb quite well as well. Not great, and something he can work on, but take a look at this stage from the Tour of Suisse where he finished inside the Top 10 and beat out names like Romain Bardet and Ion Izagirre.

And we mean. Winning at mini Flèche in 2022 means he's got some punch for short steep and difficult climbs. Sheffield's sprint is half decent too, as he's shown at Tour of Norway where he had a number of top ten performances on rouleur based stages.

When to Bet

Laying down some money for Sheffield to podium time trials is currently always a safe bet in our opinion. We're thinking he'll only get better as he's still only twenty one.

Otherwise he's inconsistent in getting on the podium and more resides around the fifth to tenth range. Which while fine for GC ambitions is not okay for us as bettors. Sheffield's crash risk is still quite high and it's worth taking that into account that overall placement in GC is not guaranteed.

Sheffield may want to make a name for himself and come out swinging early in 2024, so be on the ready if he gets some long odds at races earlier in the year - specifically for a stage win. He hasn't had one for a while and we're sure he's missing the feeling of crossing the line first.