Zoe Bäckstedt has signed with EF Education-TIBCO-SVB and after her first race with the American WorldTour team, she will step up to the senior ranks, combining road racing and cyclocross over the winter and into 2023.

Bäckstedt turned 18 on September 24 and joined EF Education-TIBCO-SVB as a trainee for the last few months of the 2022 season. She was part of the team that won the opening stage of the team time trial at the CIC-Tour Féminin International des Pyrenees and helped Krista Dobel-Hickok win the overall.

She is the current junior world champion in road and cyclo-cross and comes from a cycling racing family.

"My father (Magnus Beckstedt) won Paris-Roubaix, so he's been riding since I can remember. My mother (Megan Hughes) represented Great Britain in road racing and won a bronze medal in the track sprint as a junior. My sister won a medal at the World Championships and now competes on the World Tour. Cycling is in my blood," she said when EF Education-TIBCO-SVB announced the 2023 contract.

Bäckstedt will fight a dual road and cyclocross campaign for the team alongside American cyclocross champion Clara Honsinger.

Bäckstedt was a member of the Belgian cyclocross development team Acrog-Tormans as a junior. She finished the 2021-2022 cyclocross season with 10 wins, adding the Cyclocross European Women's Junior Championships to her World Championship wins.

On the road, she won the rainbow stripe, the individual time trial stage of the Watersley Ladies Challenge, and the overall at the EPZ Omloop van Borsle. On the track, she also won gold medals in individual Pursuit, Team Pursuit, and Madison.

However, her career as a professional cyclist is not a foregone conclusion; riding and training are now part of her life.

"It took me a couple of years to get into cycling. But now I love it. I absolutely love it," she said.

"Cycling gives me freedom. It gives me a little space to do what I do. I always try to go out with my sister Elinor, and a friend of mine who is very close to me at home also rides. She and I can ride bikes for five hours and we never stop talking. I laugh with her and come home with a sore face."

Zoe and Elinor also receive significant support from their parents and family.

"We are lucky to have the support of everyone, including our grandparents and cousins. I'm glad to have the support of everyone, my grandparents, my cousins. They're all happy to see us having fun," she said.

EF Education-TIBCO-SVB defeated Beckstead after team founder and owner Linda Jackson offered similar support.

"I spoke with several other teams. I had a Zoom call with Linda, the team owner. The way I talked to her, the way she talked to me, and the way we got along seemed to be working. After that call, I went downstairs and told my dad, "I want to sign with them. I want to sign with them," Beckstedt said.

"But the whole atmosphere was just what I wanted. Linda let me be myself. I think we hit it off a little bit then. I felt good and confident. I had already seen some of the riders on the team. I already knew Abi Smith, for example. Lizzie Banks, too. It's nice to know that if you find it a little difficult the first couple of times, you can talk to people you already know and they can help you."

The luxury of being able to race both cyclocross and road with one team was another reason she found EF Education-TIBCO-SVB attractive. [because] it's easy to get pulled in one direction for road training camps and then get pulled into cyclocross season and nothing goes right.

"At EF Education-TIBCO-SVB, you can do road and then switch to cross, race as much or as little as you want, then rest and get back to road.

"It's a 'do what you want and it works' approach. I can do a full season of cross as much as I want, and I can do as many road races as I want."