Inaugural Girona Gran Fondo Cycling Festival a Success!
This past week the city of Girona welcomed the inaugural Girona Gran Fondo Cycling Festival, organized by the local Bike Breaks Cycle Centre. Over 200 cycling enthusiasts from fourteen different countries descended on the city to take part in three different riding events.
It was an incredible week of all things cycling in Girona, including riders participating in shop rides every day of the Festival week with our club members showing them around, as well as the pre-race party and other festival meals held at typical local restaurants throughout the week.
Tag Heuer Pere Quera Hill climb
The action started on a beautifully sunny Thursday morning with a timed hill climb up to Els Angels. Covering a distance of 11 km with a vertical ascent of 404m, the weather conditions were perfect as the combatants set off in two-minute intervals to race up the challenging climb.
In an astounding time of only 0:22:16 minutes, Raul Castello Garcia from Bike Esplugues team beat local favourite and team Bike Breaks rider Neil Martin by a mere 32 seconds and Bike Area Llagostera rider Eduard Figueres 50 seconds later, to take the podium number one spot and win the incredible prize of a TagHeuer watch donated by Pere Quera. In the women’s category, Katrina Grove won first place (and another TagHeuer watch valued at over €1200) with a time of 0:26:02, 57 seconds faster than Mule girl Adel Tyson-Bloor and with RCVC rider Nicole Millar in third place.
All participants and spectators were rewarded for a morning spent on a bike or cheering others on with the spectacular views from the Els Angels mountain top monastery and a pasta party provided by Santuari Angels.
The Bike Breaks Girona Nocturne
There were only a few hours rest before most of the riders climbed back onto their bikes to take part in the Nocturn event. Rescheduled from earlier in the week due to rain, this was perhaps the most unique event of the entire cycling festival and a race that could only happen in a town like Girona: racing through the medieval cobbled streets of the historic old town, with riders completing ten laps including the timed 300m section with an average grade of 7.4%. Prizes were awarded for the fastest lap and best average time of the ten laps of this amazing circuit.
The race began from the Race village at La Copa park, which hosted exhibitors and entertainment all week long. Isabel Muradàs, the local Minister for Sport (Regidora d’Educació i Esports) welcomed all the participants and started the race, and 55 cyclists disappeared into the labyrinth of the ancient streets.
Each lap was just less than 3 kilometers long, the timed section beginning at the foot of Girona’s 16th century cathedral steps up to past the University. The cobbled surface combined with the steep incline made this a challenging but rewarding experience for the riders. One competitor from the UK said “I’ve participated in many races but this was truly unique! The course was incredibly difficult but a superb experience riding through the old town and by the cathedral. Getting cheered on by hundreds of locals made it even better and I can’t wait to come back and do it again next year!”
The fastest lap time was posted by local Francesc de Bolos from Club Ciclista Bike Breaks Girona at only 37 seconds. The overall male winner was Eduard Figueres Agusti with a combined lap time of 6:42 minutes from team CC Bike Area Llagostera and the top woman with a combined lap time of 9:04 minutes was Carol Gimenez Sola from team Triatló Girona Costa Brava.
Cannondale Girona Gran Fondo
The week culminated with the main event: the 125km long Gran Fondo. The Girona area is a paradise for cycling of all descriptions surrounded by mountain ranges and halfway between the snow-capped Pyrenees and the beaches of the Costa Brava.
Building a route from Girona was an easy task, as we chose to send the race into the Garrotxa region famous for its prehistoric volcanic activity. The route then rolled through a variety of terrain from corn fields to shady woodland, making the course as beautiful as it was challenging.
A Gran Fondo is both a sporting event and a cultural experience. In Girona’s case, take a scenic and mountainous course, add enthusiastic cyclists ranging from former pros to sixty-year-old cycle tourists, mix in en-route mechanical and medical support, feed zones manned by cheerful volunteers and top it off with friends and family cheering everyone on with a promise of a great botifarrada bbq at the finish line.
The roll-out for Girona’s first Gran Fondo took place on a gloriously sunny Saturday morning. Almost two hundred riders assembled at the start line and waited for Isabel Muradàs to drop the Catalan flag for the race start.
The course took participants a distance of 125km with a climb of 2000m, exposing them to the stunning and varied terrain surrounding Girona. Some of the villages the cyclists passed through included Sant Esteve d’en Bas, Santa Pau and Banyoles, a true showcase of what Catalunya has to offer. A Canadian rider told us “I’ve travelled a lot and ridden all over the world, but this is my favourite place – the diversity of the terrain and the challenge it offers is fantastic.”
Most cyclists ride for the satisfaction and pride of just making it to the finish line. Others want to improve upon their previous times and to challenge themselves, their friends or their teammates. However, some do ride to win as friendly competitive spirit rises up at the front of the pack and on the day no one could hold off Neil Martin as he took the number one spot with a finishing time of 3:38:39. For the women, Carla Ryan took top honours with a time of 3:39:47. Special mention goes to Elvira Perez Custodio, a visually impaired rider who placed third in the women’s category with her co-pilot Iker Casas on a racing tandem. Congratulations to the whole field for completing such a great and challenging course – the finishing medals were well deserved!
Prize Draws
All our sponsors very generously donated an array of prizes for the Gran Fondo prize draw including boxes of energy bars from Mulebar, Haribo and Zeroflats goodies, signed jerseys from riders including David Miller, Andrew Talansky, Lucy Martin and Emilia Fahlin, and many more donated by local and international companies.
The highlight for many was seeing the joy on Josep Serrat Soler’s face as he won the main prize, a new 2014 Super 6 Evo Ultegra bike donated by Cannondale and Bike Breaks Girona Cycle Centre.
During the course of the entire week, a great time was had by all and can only be summed up by this: “Same time again next year?”
The week in numbers:
• 200 registered riders, representing 15 countries
• Girona Gran Fondo passed through 18 different ajuntaments
• Over 4000 meters of tape marked the course
• Riders consumed 600 litres of water and over 400 kg. of fruit at the feed zones
Special thanks goes to all our sponsors and supporters who have helped us to realize our dream of organizing a unique and different event so representative of Girona and what we do here; without their belief in us and our idea this would have never happened.
I would like to thank Mulebar, Cannondale, Pere Quera, Joieria Fortia, Summatory, Martin I Contesa, Haribo, Zeroflats, Isabel Muradàs and everyone at the Girona Ajuntament, all local police who gave up their free time to help us and the members of the CC Bike Breaks.
Race Results:
Tag Heuer Pere Quera Els Angels Hill Climb
Male category:
1. Raul Castello Garcia time: 0:22:16 from team Bike Esplugues
2. Neil Martin time: 0:22:48 from team CC Bike Breaks Girona
3. Eduard Figueres Agusti time: 0:23:38 from team Bike Area Llagostera
Female category:
1. Katrina Grove time: 0:26:02 from team CC Bike Breaks Girona
2. Adel Tyson-Bloor time: 0:26:59 from team Mule Bar
3. Nicole Millar time: 0:31:14 from team RCVC
The Bike Breaks Nocturne
Fastest lap:
Francesc de Bolos lap time: 0:00:37 from team CC Bike Breaks Girona
Male category:
1. Eduard Figueres Agusti combined lap time: 0:06:42 from team CC Bike Area Llagostera
2. Francesc de Bolos combined lap time: 0:07:10 from team CC Bike Breaks Girona
3. Marc Whitelaw Teixidor combined lap time: 0:07:17 from team CC Bike Breaks Girona
Female category:
1. Carol Gimenez Sola combined lap time: 0:09:04 from team Triatló Girona Costa Brava
2. Adel Tyson-Bloor combined lap time: 0:09:53 from team Mule Bar
3. Angie Spitznagel Bowen combined lap time: 0:12:14 from team CC Bike Breaks Girona
Cannondale Girona Gran Fondo
Male category:
1. Neil Martin time: 3:38:39
2. Francesc de Bolos time: 3:39:43
3. Ignasi de Bolos time: 3:39:44
Female category:
1. Carla Ryan time: 3:39:47
2. Carol Deavy time: 4:11:08
3. Elvira Perez Custodio time: 4:13:14
