Before the start of the elite men’s world championship road race in Brossard, Que., Michael Woods was a mix of emotions as he was about to roll out for his last race. “I’m feeling nervous, emotional, a bit melancholic as well. Yeah, feeling everything,” he said.
His confidence had taken a bit of a hit following his 18th-place finish at the Grand Prix Cycliste de Montréal two weeks earlier because he fell ill. Yet, he said he was better for the world championship road race. The result at the GP had actually shown him that even though he had retired from the pro peloton a year earlier, he was still able to ride with the best in the world. His 2026 season featured ski mountaineering, gravel events like Traka, and even Leadville. He joined Canada’s national team for the Quebec GPs as “rust busters” before the world championships.
The circumstances under which Woods retired were not what he wanted. In 2025, the plan was to race the Montreal GP to close out his career. But the year was a rough one. In March, he crashed at Milano-Torino, a race he won in 2019. Before the race in September in his home country, a stomach bug exacerbated a hernia he’d been dealing with. He needed an operation, so there’d be no career closer in Montreal. “It was totally lame. I had a funeral without a casket,” he said earlier this year on the Canadian Cycling Magazine Podcast.
Michael Leonard (left) and Michael Woods, elite men’s world championships road race, Montreal 2026. Image: Nick Iwanyshyn
It did seem an unsatisfying way to wrap things up. After all, Michael Woods has been Canada’s star rider of the men’s peloton for the past 10 years. Known as the middle-distance-runner-turned-rider, Woods’s true breakout year was 2018, in which he was second at Liège-Bastogne-Liège, won a stage of the Vuelta a España and came third at the world championships in Innsbruck, Austria. In 2023, his climbing prowess was on full display when he won a Tour de France stage up the Puy de Dôme.
“[That win was] satisfying. Actually, in many ways, big relief. When I first started cycling, I thought that [winning a Tour stage] was kind of an outlandish goal,” Woods said on a 2023 episode of the CCM pod. “I really didn’t think that was possible. Back in 2015, the goal was to be a good domestique at the WorldTour level, just because I didn’t know what I was capable of. Also I had a very limited runway and wasn’t sure if I would be able to explore my abilities to their fullest just because I was older. I was lucky to make it onto a team that did believe in me with EF. Then I was super lucky to find my way onto [Israel-Premier Tech], reunited with [principle team backer] Sylvan [Adams] and [coach] Paulo [Saldanha,] two people who were in my corner even back in 2015.
“Then early in my WorldTour career, I recalibrated those goals. One of those was to win a stage at the Tour. For years after, I was always talking about a stage win of the Tour. And every year that passed, not having accomplished that, I started to feel more pressure towards achieving that goal. To finally do it, in the latter stages of my career, was a moment of joy, but also of relief. I just felt relief when I finished that stage.”
As important as that Tour de France stage win was, Woods said after the elite men’s world championship road race in Montreal that his third-place at worlds in 2018 was possibly the best race of his career. He also mentioned that that day’s competition was much harder than the race in 2018.
Not long after the riders rolled out of Brossard, Woods’s teammate Guillaume Boivin, who is also retiring, got into the day’s breakaway. After more than 100 km south of the St. Lawrence River, the break and the bunch came into the city circuit, featuring classics such as the climbs up Camillien-Houde and Côte de la Polytechnique. Woods wasn’t with the front bunch as it came to the loop. That was a tactical error as he found it impossible to move up after that. He finished the race in 35th place.
Guillaume Boivin announces retirement
“Obviously, you dream or hope you can do a bit better. I was really hoping for the top 10 after [the GP] Montreal, but then getting sick kind of hit my confidence a bit,” he said. “I wanted to finish on a high, and I feel like I did.”
Woods was pressed about the “second” retirement that would follow the world championships. He was adamant that he was actually, in fact, retiring. No triathlons on the horizon. He and his family will remain in Europe for the time being. “We’re going to stay in Andorra for now,” he said. “But for sure, we’re going to return to Canada. Canada is my country. I’m proud to be from here.”
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