Pfeiffer Georgi (Picnic PostNL) is using the Tour of Britain Women as an opportunity to rediscover her aggressive racing style after a disappointing start to the 2026 season.
“We just finished the Tour last week and it’s luckily not as hot, which I’m really happy about. So yeah, I think I’m in good shape,” she told Velora.
“The spring was a bit underwhelming,” Georgi said. “I think now I'm feeling good still, so I'm just trying to get something out of the season. I think this is actually one of my highlights of the year, this race. I missed it last year, but I'm really happy to be back.”
Georgi will support her British teammate Josie Nelson in sprint finishes while looking for her own opportunities on harder days. “I think we’ve got Josie here for the sprint, so I think we’re mainly focusing on her, and then if there’s opportunities to attack, then I’m, yeah, really excited to get stuck in,” Georgi said.
That plan was visible during the 158.9km opening stage around Cockermouth. Georgi made several attempts to break up the race during an active final 40km, including an attack with 16.5km remaining, before helping Nelson in the sprint.
Nelson finished third behind Lorena Wiebes (SD Worx-Protime) and Chiara Consonni (Canyon//SRAM). Georgi crossed the line 16th in the lead group, receiving the same time as Wiebes and sits 10 seconds behind her overall after the opening day.
Georgi expects more openings across a 636.2km route that she believes will race harder than its profile suggests. The five-stage Women’s WorldTour event finishes in Royal Leamington Spa on Sunday, August 23.
“Always on British roads, the racing is actually harder even than it looks on the profile,” she said. “I think it is going to be five days of really challenging racing, and I hope there's opportunities for aggressive racing and attacking, which I'm looking forward to.”
Georgi's return from two serious neck injuries
The former British champion hasn’t quite found her form over the past couple of seasons after suffering a fractured neck and hand at the 2024 Tour de France Femmes. The crash ended a season in which she had finished third at Paris-Roubaix and fifth in the Olympic road race.
Georgi wore a neck brace for 10 weeks and spent three months off the road while the fracture healed completely. Her first outdoor ride after the crash came in November 2024, and she also worked on the psychological effects of returning to the peloton.
It was the second serious vertebral injury of her career. A crash at the 2020 Classic Brugge-De Panne left Georgi needing to learn to walk again, while doctors told her after both accidents that she was fortunate to retain full mobility.
Georgi, therefore, is keeping her objectives at the Tour of Britain Women open as she continues to search for the form that made her a key rider to watch in races such as Paris-Roubaix and other key Classics. Nelson takes the limelight for the team this week with a very strong start to the race while teammate Audrey De Keersmaeker took the Queen of the Mountains jersey on day one. Stages three and four give Georgi her best options with finishes on The Great Orme climb and Hay-on-Wye after a vicious day on a saw-tooth profile.
