Lina Bo: The story of a cycling influencer

 

It is a statement that instantly reveals what passionate cyclist is made of. When she is out on her bike, her main goal is not necessarily to achieve results, but to have fun – an approach that brings her success both on and off the saddle. With around 160,000 followers on Instagram, Lina is one of the most well-known cycling influencers in the world in recent years. Under her nickname ‘Lina Bo’, she follows a simple recipe: authentic content that can be described as a creative mix of cycling and lifestyle. “I simply love cycling,” she says. “After I moved to Spain almost ten years ago, I mainly wanted to use Instagram to show how beautiful my new home area was – but then it all became much bigger,” she adds.

 

Indeed, Lina – whose full name is Galina Bodnaruk – Is not originally from Spain. “I am 50 per cent Ukrainian and 50 per cent Russian. But I see myself more as a Spaniard because I’ve been living here for so long and will soon get Spanish citizenship,” she explains, recalling her childhood in Bataisk, a town near the Black Sea. Even then, she often went cycling – a hobby that intensified after moving to Saint Petersburg. “In the early 2010s, there was a pretty cool fixed-gear community there – a scene that was laid-back and where I immediately felt at home,” she says, adding with a grin, “Sure – there was a beer or two, too. That was part of it.”

 

Her job as a designer finally took her to Spain in 2014. Again, it didn’t take long for her to get back on her bike and quickly find her feet in the new country. To be able to better master the many climbs on the Iberian Peninsula, she also bought her first road bike at that time. Then shortly afterwards, her second. This was when Lina fully discovered her passion for cycling and spent more and more time training, soon reeling off up to 15,000 kilometres a year. “As a designer, I work remotely from home. This way, I can work in the evening and cycle during the day,” she explains, and tells us that her Instagram channel perfectly combines her penchant for design with style and cycling.

Not only does Lina appreciate the freedom and closeness to nature that cycling gives her, but also the style of the sport. She likes beautifully designed racing bikes and fast components with curved shapes. At the same time, her followers like her storytelling, in which she uses her know-how as a designer to stylishly present her sport. Therefore, it is no coincidence that the number of her followers on Instagram soon increased and that the first cooperation requests from manufacturers were already arriving in her inbox back in 2017. Also Fulcrum became aware of her content early on. Over the years, numerous partnerships with well-known bike brands and equipment manufacturers have followed. Despite her success, she wants to retain her freedom – not only when it comes to her bike adventures but also on her channel. That’s why she still generates her main income as a designer, as she emphasises.

 

Over the years, Lina has also continued to develop athletically – for example, by participating in Gran Fondos, such as the Mallorca 312. “Until 2019, I was exclusively riding on the road. After that, however, I also appreciated gravel biking more and more,” Lina says. “The terrain around Mataró, where I live today, is very rocky – so gravel riding naturally lends itself to that.” This year’s results have shown that the hard training pays off: At The Traka – a gravel race around the Spanish town of Girona, considered the biggest gravel race in Europe – Lina successfully tortured herself over the long distance. After 360 kilometres, over 5,000 metres of climbing on gravel and more than 21 hours in the saddle, she came 14th in the women’s race. A few weeks later, she showed a great performance at the Ranxo Gravel, where she came second in the UCI Gravel World Series.

It is therefore not surprising that Lina has big plans for the future – even if she is “not good at making plans at all”, as she reveals at the end of our interview. Among other things, she wants to explore Bangkok by bike and compete in the Gran Guanche, a long-distance gravel event on the Canary Islands. “I’m looking forward to everything that is yet to come. There are still so many places to discover, races to ride and adventures to experience,” says Lina with bright eyes, knowing well that it is a question of having the right attitude if you want to successfully overcome the most difficult challenges. How that looks in practice was shown not least by her performance at the Ranxo Gravel this summer, when she scored an impressive second-place finish – with an easy-going attitude and a smile on her face.