Retired pro cyclist Magnus Backstedt’s daughters have ensured a double cause for celebration in the family in Flanders tonight – with both winning their age-group races at Gent-Wevelgem.
In recent years, the Flanders Classic has expanded to comprise no fewer than seven races on the same day – including races for under-19 and under-17 women.
The latter was won by the younger Backstedt sister, Zoë, riding for Storey Racing, the all-female team set up by multiple Paralympic champion Sarah Storey and her husband Barney.
Aged just 14, she attacked the field at the end of the opening lap and rode away to win the race by three minutes.
Two hours later, it was the turn of older sister Elynor, also a member of the Storey Racing team but today riding in the under-19 race for the Great Britain Cycling Team – the family live in Wales, where the girls’ mother, the 1998 British women’s road champion Megan Hughes, was born – to also take a solo victory, by 16 seconds.
In what Storey Racing described as “a picture for the Backstedt family album,” the pair lined up on the podium at the end of the day alongside the winners of the other five races today.
Zoë, far left, was pictured standing next to her sister then, from left to right, women’s elite race winner Kirsten Wild, the men’s elite champion Alexander Kristoff, plus the winners of the men’s under-23, under-19 and under-17 races.
Their father, of course, had form over the cobbles – he won Paris-Roubaix in 2004, the same year he also achieved his best ever placing at Gent-Wevelgem, when he finished second to Tom Boonen.
In my sample size of one , I get 'given' much more room riding my mountain bike by passing drivers. On my road bike I get a lot of close passes...
3 hours ? Mine is good for at least 6 hours. Even the old just radar sensor could cope with that and the light + radar is meant to have a 10 hour...
I think space makes it more aero ? Like the Hope GB track bike ?
For the first time ever, I'm impressed with the overall weight of a Pinarello. Given this bike also tests very well aerodynamically, (and again...
I know! I've mentioned this before on here but in firearms training one of the first thing's one's told is that if you make an error that could...
Bike jackings -was rife in South Africa when i left and probably still is. Sad state of affairs, I hope the rider heals up quickly and suffers no...
What about Miguel Indurain?
Wow! I dream of getting 6,000km out of a chain! My bike has only just cleared 5,000km...
Maybe we need to take a note out of the drivists playbook and label the lack of secure bike storage as discriminatory against the disabled
Well, I passed this lot yesterday and they seemed to be enjoying the ride... (apparently it was the national chopper convention or something!).