The Liv-Epic Endeavour

Britain's women are on the up and one club is making a big contribution to the future

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The sight of Lauren Dolan slumped over her handlebars after the junior women’s Worlds time trial in Bergen last September will live long in the memory. Once pristine white, her right sock had been turned deep red with blood, a crash halfway through the 16.1km test leaving her leg scarred with deep lacerations (pictured below). That she completed the race at all — let alone placed 27th of the 45 finishers — is testament to the Devon-based rider’s tenacity and courage, but is certainly not what she had hoped to be remembered for.

“I wanted to get a name from being good, earning it and being on the top step of the podium,” she tells us. “I was devastated that I couldn’t ride the road race because all year I had been aiming for that. Not even getting to the start line was soul destroying, and having to watch it from a hospital bed on my 18th birthday wasn’t great.” Headlines surrounding Dolan’s remarkable tenacity overwhelmed the story of Great Britain’s junior women’s team performance in Bergen. Few spoke of Pfeiffer Georgi, then only 16, who finished seventh and sixth in the time trial and road race respectively. And no one mentioned how she and Dolan were two of four riders on the team to have spent 2017 racing for the Liv-Epic club.

Run by Peter Georgi and Mark Dolan, the club takes its name from the latter’s coaching company and the former’s club, from which Liv-Epic developed to aid their daughters’ and their daughters’ friend’s transition from youth racing to elite level.