At 22, Artem Shmidt is carving out his place at one of cycling’s most prestigious teams. From leaving home at 18 to chase the European racing dream to now competing in monuments and classics with Ineos Grenadiers, the young American knows what it takes to survive — and thrive — at the highest level. We caught up with Artem fresh off Strade Bianche.

It’s my favorite race of the year. There’s no middle ground — it either goes really well or really bad. It didn’t go great for me this time, but I still enjoyed it. Five and a half hours of pure adrenaline, which is just awesome.

A lot of races are like: let the break go, ride around easy for two hours, then go full in the last 10k. With Strade, once the flag drops, everyone’s giving it everything. It’s a mix of gravel and road racing all at the same time. Super sick.

It depends on the lineup. Sometimes it’s all hands on deck for one rider. This time the race was pretty much open for us — anyone could grab their opportunity. I could have ridden my own race, but they wanted a couple of us to try to get in the early break before Pogačar does his attack. We got my teammate Jack Haig up the road, which was nice. After that, I completely destroyed myself trying to get in the break, so my race was over.

It’s team dynamics. We have a lot of good punchy climbing guys — Axel Laurance, Egan, Kevin Vauquelin — doing the Ardennes, so they’re shifting me toward the classics. I’m super excited. I’m doing E3, Gent-Wevelgem, and Flanders.

All World-Tour guys are good bike handlers. The difference is confidence. If you crashed the day before, you can be the best descender in the world and still not descend well that day. You still have the skills, but your confidence is knocked. For me, it depends what point of the year I’m at. If my confidence is high, I’m fairly decent. If I had a crash recently, I can be one of the worst in the peloton because I’m just not willing to take the risks I usually take.

Unfortunately, it just takes time. You can’t rush it.

From day one, it was my dream to join Sky — now Ineos. Riding with Geraint Thomas, Filippo Ganna, Josh Tarling — we learn from each other at every race.

For the classics, we have Ganna and our director Ian Stannard, who raced them. We’ll be doing recon for Omloop and Ian’s behind me in the car. He’ll come up and say, “This is a pinch point. This is your last chance to move up. If you don't move here, your race is done.” I remember him telling me this my first year. I was like, “Okay, this is the windmill, but I’m so tired. I’ll wait.’ There was no chance to move up after that. He’d also say, “Watch out, there’s always a crash at this corner.” I’d think, no chance. Then I go around the corner — huge crash. How did he know?

I’m quite versatile, which is a blessing because I’m good at everything. But it’s also kind of annoying because I’m mediocre at everything — to put it very blunt. I don’t have a superpower yet.

One thing I’d like to sharpen is time trials. I love them. Two, I really like being an aggressive rider — attacking style, always trying to go in breakaways or early attacks with 80k to go. I have the TT engine, so there’s actually a possibility of making it to the finish line.

I hate doing a race where you just ride around easy and weren’t really in it. I like to go to a race with a purpose.

When I was 18 trying to move to Belgium, it was really hard. You go from living with your parents, having a team in the US where everything feels like home, to Belgium where you have nothing. You have to learn how to cook, clean, take care of yourself — and while you’re doing all that, you’re also trying to get results in races. There’s just a lot.

Now as a 22-year-old, I love being in Europe. But for younger guys? It’s hard, man.

I joined because of the M3 Air — that’s an amazing shoe. Once you break them in, they’re welded around your foot. I’m super ‘if it works, don't change it.’

But I’m really excited about the new lace-up shoe. The trend is going toward laces and they’ve been really nice. I just haven’t figured out my strategy yet — I’ve always been on Dials and I love to tighten my shoes in and out of the race. With laces, I need to find the balance where it’s not too tight or too loose so I can race on them full time. For TTs though, for sure — you just tighten them as tight as you can and go.

That was a bad decision on my part. They told us no rain until 2 p.m. I figured by then you’re already going full — it doesn’t matter if you're cold. It started raining 10 minutes in. I was freezing. But I got you guys — no overshoes, full QUOC branding!

With Milan-San Remo on the horizon and a full calendar of classics ahead, Artem Shmidt is still writing his story. For a rider who left home at 18 to chase this dream, every race is a lesson, every monument a milestone — and he’s still searching for his superpower.


Photography by Piper Albrecht