'As long as I’m on a bike, I’m happy' - Zoe Bäckstedt is Cycling Weekly's Rider of the Year

Dusk is setting in when I connect with Zoe Bäckstedt over video call. She is in Belgium, where it’s early evening and turning gloomy outside; she sits down to talk to me under bright artificial light. Fresh from the photoshoot for this piece, she has a Red Bull cap pulled tight over her blonde waves, and gives off a sparky energy as we begin chatting. Just out of shot, her wrist is in plaster – a training crash at the end of October left her with two small fractures, delaying the start of her cyclo-cross season.

Until this very recent spot of bad luck, 2025 had been a year of interdisciplinary dominance for the young Welshwoman. From a double victory at January’s UCI Cyclo-cross World Championships, rainbow jerseys collected in the mixed team relay and the under-23 race, she went on to rule supreme in time trials, winning five out of the six she competed in, and earning a national and under-23 world title. “If I look back [to last year], compared to where I ended the road season [this year], it’s a day-and-night difference,” she says. “I had a lot of wins this year, which I didn’t expect. I didn’t expect to win a road race – that was probably one of the big things, and also to win Nationals… Everything just fell into a good place.”

Her first big victory on the road came in July at the Baloise Ladies Tour, a six-stage race that weaves through Belgium and the Netherlands. Riding for Canyon-SRAM zondacrypto, Bäckstedt won the overall and three of the stages, including the 3.1km opening prologue. “It was very interesting. You do a half-hour warm-up for three and a half minutes of racing,” she recalls. Aged just 20 at the time, she became the youngest winner in the race’s 13-year history.

Bäckstedt’s crowning achievement came in September, in her final race of the season and one of her biggest goals: the under-23 time trial at the UCI World Championships in Rwanda. “Before the race, before I even got into my kit, I went into the start area and watched the first rider go off,” she remembers of the morning in Kigali. “I was like, ‘OK, I need to take in all of the drums and the music and the lights.’” Bäckstedt wasn’t due at the start ramp for another hour and a quarter, but wanted to be there, soaking it all in.

When her moment finally came, amid the noise and the rumble of drums, she dropped onto the course, a 22.6km blast she had divided into chunks in her mind. She makes it sound like a piece of cake: after the climb, the Côte de Nyanza, came a “really, really, really long downhill, a cobbled climb, and then you were done”. The homework paid off. Before even the halfway mark, she caught and passed Czechia’s Julia Kopecký, who had started 1.30 earlier. Her next victim was Marie Schreiber of Luxembourg, who had had a three-minute head start and was tagged with a kilometre to go. So commanding was Bäckstedt’s ride that the next-best rider, Slovakia’s Viktória Chladoňová, was nearly two minutes astray.

Bäckstedt has competed with the elites on the WorldTour since graduating from the junior ranks in 2023, meaning fans won’t see her in her under-23 rainbow jersey next year Instead, she’ll wear the red, white and blue of the British bands, the spoils of a National Championships TT title claimed on home soil in Wales. “My whole family came up and we were all super excited,” she says. “The time trial course was absolutely savage. It was super hard, that climb.” Bäckstedt recalls her radio was buzzing with time gaps from her coach; she was up on the defending champion, Anna Henderson, but the climbing wasn’t done. “I think she’s a bit better at climbing than I am, so I knew that I was possibly going to lose time there. I just had to give it everything.” Twenty seconds separated the two at the finish, the rider from Pontyclun winning gold ahead of Henderson.

Before the Worlds junior TT in 2022, Bäckstedt recorded her entire recon with a GoPro, dictating notes on the course to study later. Is it this stringent preparation that makes her such a fine time triallist? Or is it physical, her huge power and ability to hold an aero position while at full pelt? “In a weird way, I think it has a connection to cyclo-cross,” Bäckstedt says, “which is also a very individual effort, you versus your body – how hard can you push, how deep you can go. I have that power that I can unlock when I’m on a time trial bike.”

Being a multi-discipline rider comes with its challenges, too. “When you’re just riding the road bike, it’s easy to forget how to ride in sand and how to do full-gas starts for 20 seconds. They’re such different disciplines.” It’s talking about cyclo-cross, the mud, pain and thrill of off-road riding, that brings the biggest smile to Bäckstedt’s face.

“Everyone thinks we must be a crazy bunch of people to enjoy racing in 2°C in the rain, when all the road riders are in the sun or on holiday. But that’s part of what I love about it, being in nature, among the trees.” She pauses, as if remembering her equal fondness for the road. “In the summer, I always say, ‘Oh, I love the road, but I miss cyclo-cross.’ And in the winter, I always say the opposite . As long as I’m on a bike, I’m happy.”

When cycling is your full-time job, it’s vital to enjoy it – something Bäckstedt’s parents instilled in their two daughters, Zoe and her older sister, Elynor, who rides for UAE Team ADQ. “I’ve had a bike since I could crawl,” Zoe tells me. “My parents gave me and my sister bikes, and if we wanted to ride them, that was up to us.” The two girls’ Paris-Roubaix-winning father, Magnus, and 1998 British road champion mother, Meg, would take them to the outskirts of Cardiff on weeknights to ride with Maindy Flyers, the legendary club that shaped the early careers of Geraint Thomas and Elinor Barker. Zoe’s memory of her first race is lost among a childhood full of social rides, hill sprints and circuit races. Lining up at the start of a race felt as natural as a long training ride with the family.

In 2021, aged 17, Bäckstedt won her first road world title in the junior women’s race in Belgium. She went on to claim a momentous double the following year, winning both the road race and time trial titles. In doing so, she earned her first Cycling Weekly Rider of the Year crown, the youngest rider to ever win this magazine’s biggest honour. It’s credit to her meticulous approach, and her love of cycling, that she remains at the top of British racing. “I’m happy with the season I’ve had,” she says at the tail end of another golden year, “not necessarily just the results, but the progress that I’ve made both as a person and a rider.”

From riding her lap “so full gas that you’re gasping for air” in the mixed relay at Cyclo-cross Worlds, to winning alongside her team-mates at Baloise, the thrill she gets from riding – in whatever form it takes, and getting to share it – continues to shine from Bäckstedt. At just 21 years old, she has nine rainbow jerseys, split across disciplines and age categories. And as soon as her wrist has healed there will, no doubt, be more to come.

HONOURABLE MENTIONS

Anna Henderson

The Olympic time trial silver medallist secured her first Grand Tour stage win and a stint in the pink jersey at the Giro d’Italia, and closed her year with victory at China’s Tour of Guangxi. “It’s really nice to finish the season like this,” she said after the race. “My first year with Lidl-Trek ending in a win – it’s been really good.”

Cat Ferguson

In her first full year as a pro, the Movistar rider earned a maiden WorldTour win at the Tour of Britain in June, finishing second overall. She also scored a podium at the Trofeo Alfredo Binda, a string of top-10s, and was part of the victorious GB mixed relay team at the UCI Cyclo-cross World Championships in January.

Anna Morris

Morris successfully defended her individual pursuit crown at October’s UCI Track World Championships in Chile, having earned national and European titles in the event earlier in the year. On the road, she shone in the UK’s crit scene, winning four rounds of the National Circuit Series.

Katie Archibald

Archibald’s year was a testament to her longevity and grit. The 31-year-old track rider opened her season with her first national title in six years – dominating the points race on the final day – and ended it with gold in the Madison alongside Maddie Leech at the UCI Track World Championships. She also took home silver in the elimination race.