“The great thing about cycling in Slovenia is that in less than one week you see a bit of everything,” says my guide Kristijan Koren as we descend the spectacular Vršič Pass and cross the first of many stone bridges over the impossibly emerald blue Soča River. 

“You start with the high mountains of the Julian Alps, pass alpine lakes, go up and over rolling green hills, come in and out of forests, pass vineyards, and finish on flat roads by the coast.”

This tiny country sandwiched between northern, southern, western and eastern Europe, the first to declare independence from Yugoslavia in late 1990, has become synonymous with cycling royalty in the past few years, with Tadej Pogačar and Primož Roglič winning nine of the last 16 Grand Tours between them. 

The country has one WorldTour rider (including male and female riders) for every 290,000 inhabitants – compared to one per 1.3 million people in Britain.

This article was published in Cycling Weekly in October 2024. You can read it here.