Magnus Bäckstedt

Early life

Born in Linköping, Östergötland, Sweden, Bäckstedt began as a skier, selected for the national team when he was 14.

Career

Bäckstedt began his professional career in 1996, riding for Collstrop before moving to Palmans in 1997. In 1998, having switched to GAN, Bäckstedt came seventh in 1998 Paris–Roubaix and won the 19th stage of the 1998 Tour de France between La Chaux-de-Fonds and Autun.

In 2002 and 2003 he rode for Team Fakta where he was the strongest rider in 2003. When Fakta closed he went to Alessio–Bianchi, where he won the 2004 Paris–Roubaix. The two favourites, Peter van Petegem and Johan Museeuw dropped out after crashes, leaving Bäckstedt to sprint on the track at Roubaix against two others. The manager of Crédit Agricole, Roger Legeay, had predicted that Bäckstedt would one day win the race. He said: "He's not a flahute. He's not especially the fastest, but after 260km on the cobbles, it's often the rider who feels freshest who wins."

In 2005 Bäckstedt moved to Liquigas-Bianchi, and came second on the 7th stage of the 2005 Tour de France. He rode for Slipstream–Chipotle in 2008. He was eliminated in that year's Tour de France for being too slow. He said:

I had been going OK, and on that stage we decided to make it hard from the start because we were close enough to yellow to get the jersey. The first 60km were up and down, but I was going fine. Then there was this fourth-category climb and about halfway up I was suddenly short of breath. It was like I shut down from the waist down. I went straight out of the back. I calmed down and got back on top of it. There was 100km to go, but I went OK. I could see the numbers on the power meter and they were normal for the kind of effort you need to get to the finish on your own inside the time limit. I think I would have made it too, but there was a real steep hill just before the finish and my breathing and legs went again. I ended up four minutes outside the cut-off.

Bäckstedt announced his retirement from professional cycling on 6 February 2009, citing a desire to focus on managing his developmental cycling team, Cyclesport.se-MagnusMaximusCoffee.com. Bäckstedt said he will also continue as a consultant with his former Garmin-Slipstream team. The Swede had struggled with a number of health issues during his career, including a serious knee injury, melanoma, and a separated shoulder and broken collarbone.

On 13 November 2010, Bäckstedt announced at the UK Youth Centenary Gala that he would be coming out of retirement to lead the UK Youth Cycling Team along with Nigel Mansell and his sons.

Bäckstedt rode for the MG Maxifuel team in 2013. Prior to round 8 of the Pearl Izumi Tour Series at Canary Wharf on June 6, 2013, he once again announced he was retiring and that the race would be his final one in professional road racing, his intention being to continue competing in triathlon and Ironman Triathlon events.

Personal life

Bäckstedt is married to a British former cyclist, Megan Hughes. They live in Wales, moving there from Zulte, Belgium. They have two daughters. Bäckstedt said: "We used to come back here [to Wales] every time I had a break. I prefer it to Belgium. You can ride 30 miles between villages here, whereas in Belgium you were stopping for traffic lights."

His sister Cecilia is also a racing cyclist.

Bäckstedt runs a coffee business with franchises in the United States and Sweden. Proceeds from the business support Swedish cycling. In 2013 he joined Declan Quigley to commentate on the Tour of Britain for Eurosport.