Massive talent got him where he is. A past tragedy that keeps him focused on the present will help him take the next step.
Cor Vos, Kristof Ramon
At Sunday’s Tour of Flanders, keep an eye out among the sturdy crew of Lidl-Trek riders shielding, supporting and teeing up Mads Pedersen for a tall, blonde Swede by the name of Jakob Söderqvist. The team believes the 22-year-old could be Pedersen’s long-term successor. That, of course, motivates an ambitious Söderqvist, who’s already had notable success on his time trial bike, not least winning the U23 World Championships last September in Kigali, Rwanda. “How I distribute power comes naturally to me which made time trialling an earlier speciality, but I’d like to progress to become a Classics specialist,” he told Escape Collective in a recent interview.
But Söderqvist has another – and entirely different – motivation to be the best possible bike rider he can be, perhaps to become the first Swede since Magnus Bäckstedt won Paris-Roubaix in 2004 to triumph in a major Cobbled Classic. Every time he rides – in a race, while training, or just recreationally – he does so for one of his best friends and regular cycling partners, Vilgot Lindh.
Lindh “was one of the kindest humans that I ever met,” said Söderqvist. “He was always the one, I think, who most enjoyed cycling and developing and trying to become better. I haven’t met anyone else who did it with so much joy, which was truly an inspiration.”
But that inspiration is indelibly marked by tragedy. In October 2022, Söderqvist – 19 at the time – found Lindh dead at home, an event Söderqvist called “the scariest moment of my life.” It was also one that had a profound effect on his own approach to racing and life.
“Vilgot was the same age as I am now – 22 years old – and we were really just simple people: no one had a big sponsor or was earning anything, we were just doing it as our biggest passion and he was enjoying it so, so much,” Söderqvist recalled, opening up for the first ever time in public about the loss of his friend.
‘He just loved always being on the bike’
Vilgot Lindh was born in May 2000 in Härnösand, more than 400 km north of Stockholm, the capital of Sweden. Härnösand is a town of 25,000, situated on the northwestern shores of the Gulf of Bothnia, known as the ‘Gateway to the High Coast,’ a UNESCO World Heritage site. It’s a popular summer destination for Swedes opting for a staycation. Like his twin brother Edvin and older brother Axel, Vilgot took up cycling (principally mountain biking) at a young age, and the pair joined their local club, Härnösands CK.
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