BRIGHT YOUNG THING

I can’t do serious when everyone is looking at me,” says Zoe Bäckstedt as CW photographer Olly asks her to do a more mean face. “I can do fun,” she adds. Pretty soon there’s going to be a lot of people looking at her because if there’s one thing that is apparent after an hour in Bäckstedt’s company it’s that she’s every inch a superstar in waiting.

Even as she protests that she needs a break after a long road, track and cyclo-cross season, which she extended to allow her to wear her newly acquired CX rainbow jersey, the 17-year-old is a bundle of charm and energy; quick to make jokes, quicker to smile and quicker still to flash her rainbow themed nail varnish. It’s impossible to capture her energy through a lens but we’re confident she’ll shine brighter still in a year or two when the TV cameras at the world’s biggest