Sheffield wraps up seventh Down Under

Magnus Sheffield stayed out of trouble amid a hectic finale to secure seventh place overall at the Tour Down Under.

The INEOS Grenadiers were able to rally around the American to keep him well positioned across the 20-lap stage on the streets of Adelaide.

Sheffield would avoid a late crash and cross the line in 16th place, doing enough to retain his overnight position and kick off the season with a WorldTour top 10.

Sam Watson was piloted into a great position to contest the sprint on the final lap, but was left with nowhere to go with a crash directly in front of him. Happily the Brit emerged relatively unscathed, with a bruise to the knee and some minor skin loss.

Following victory 24 hours earlier atop Willunga Hill, the overall win went to Jhonatan Narvaez (Team UAE Emirates – XRG), by a margin of nine seconds. Sam Welsford (Red Bull – BORA – Hansgrohe) secured the sprint and a third stage win of the event.

A three-man breakaway of Kelland O’Brien (Jayco AlUla), Casper Pedersen (Soudal – Quick-Step) and Damien Howson (Australia) pushed out on front early on, and in doing so soaked up the mid-stage bonus seconds.

Lucas Hamilton and Connor Swift hit the front late on to set the pace, with Michal Kwiatkowski leading the peloton over the line at the bell with an impressive display on the run-in.