My old partner in the business and I have a long history with Girona, THE cycling center in Europe these days. The first time we visited, back in 2014, La Fabrica – the place that kicked off the whole ‘cycling cafe’ movement there – was not even open. Now, every time I visit there’s a new cafe, bike shop, or kit store to greet me.

And pro cyclists. Lot’s of pro cyclists.

Below is a guy who blasted past us up the hill a few minutes before the pic was taken, doing an all-out effort before deciding the climb Els Angels with one leg. We barely passed him using all the legs we had. We were sure he was a pro, but were confounded by his lack of team kit. Sure enough, Viggo Moore is between teams at the moment (leaving IPT to Ineos). He was in the development team at Premier Tech and presumably training hard to make Ineos’ main team.

Apart from Viggo, we probably passed 10 other pros on that loop (a local favorite). The next day we saw at least that many, including fellow Canuck and World Champion Magdeleine Vallieres, out for a solo ‘Easy Spin‘. Keeping with the Canadian theme, that evening we stopped by a new bike shop selling gravel bikes (Guava) and the girl behind the counter was the partner of Canadian gravel champion Benjamin Perry.

Below is definitely not that little gravel bike shop, but a new cycling emporium (and amazing space) called Velodrom. The credit card was trying to jump out my wallet here, but I managed to leave unscathed.

And all this happened in around 24 hours. If Girona is close or easy enough for a quick getaway, do it.