Alongside Olympic and world champion high jumper Hamish Kerr and former heptathlete Portia Bing, Walsh wanted to establish the Aotearoa Athletics Trust to help Kiwi athletes access opportunities often out of reach because of funding constraints.
“I said to him, ‘Wow, that sounds really cool. Let me know if you need a hand’,” Wood says.
Walsh took her up on that, and, today, Wood is the trust manager, drawing on more than two decades of experience across high-performance sport and a lifelong desire to help others.
The shot put legend says she was one of the first people he thought of when the trust began taking shape.
“I remember meeting her in Europe for the first time and sitting in the front seat of the van she was driving. She’s always been so easy to chat to and always warm,” Tom says.
“It’s not easy what we’re trying to do, so you’ve got to really believe in the cause, which she absolutely does. She’s been a really important part of the trust for us.”
Michelle and Warrick Wood with their children, Frankie and Scarlett.
The Aotearoa Athletics Trust exists to support athletes who are on the cusp of international success but may not yet qualify for targeted funding support. The grants help bridge the gap for athletes knocking on the door of Athletics New Zealand’s Targeted Athlete Programme, providing assistance to travel, compete and prepare for major championships.
In 2025, four grants were awarded, with three recipients going on to make the New Zealand team for the world athletics championships. This year, the trust doubled the number of grants available, helping six athletes to prepare for the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow.
Hammer thrower Anthony Barmes is a perfect example of an athlete who the trust aims to support. Having recently completed his collegiate career in the United States, Barmes required funding to continue competing between the NCAA season and his black singlet debut in Glasgow.
“Anthony isn’t a TAPS athlete yet, but this is exactly the type of athlete we want to support,” says Wood. “It’s about helping people take that next step.”
Other 2026 trust recipients included hammer throw silver medallist Lauren Bruce and the two Kiwi heptathletes, Briana Stephenson and Maddie Wilson.
Helping people take the next step has become something of a theme throughout Wood’s life.
Long before she was helping athletes chase their dreams on the world stage, she was pursuing her own.
Wood, nee Kiesanowski, grew up on a market garden on the outskirts of Christchurch alongside older sister Jo and younger brother Ryan, and sport was simply what the family did.
Michelle Wood (right) with her sister and pro-cycling teammate, Jo Kiesanowski.
“We were a busy family and sport was all we knew,” says Wood. Mum Heather was a runner and dad Phil was a former world champion jetboater.
When Wood was 8 years old, Heather took the three siblings to the Avon Athletics Club. Club nights became weekend ribbon days, which became national championships. Eventually Wood earned the title of New Zealand junior 400m hurdles champion.
But while she had the talent, her body struggled with the demands of the event, picking up ongoing injuries which put her at a crossroads.
Wood switched her focus to cycling, following a path already being forged by her sister, Jo Kiesanowski, who would go on to represent New Zealand at three Olympic Games and three Commonwealth Games.
The sisters raced together in the United States and spent time training and competing throughout Europe.
“Jo would always look after me in the peloton because she was a lot more experienced than me,” Wood remembers. “I was a better climber than her, and she was definitely a better sprinter than me.”
Wood harboured ambitions of reaching the highest levels of the sport herself, but a severe bout of food poisoning two years before her retirement triggered chronic fatigue-related issues and she never quite felt the same on the bike again.
Transitioning away from cycling was lonely and a difficult time for Wood, who eventually earned a scholarship to Indiana State University alongside her now-husband, Warrick. She completed a Masters in Physical Education.
On returning home, she went through another transition to working fulltime and sitting at a desk at Athletics New Zealand.
Over the next decade she became a familiar face in the athletics community, supporting athletes and teams around the world. As her role evolved, so did she as a person.
Michelle Wood talks with New Zealand athletics stalwarts Josh Komen (left) and Paul Coughlan.
It was a decade, she says, that never felt like too long but when an opportunity to join Snow Sports New Zealand through High Performance Sport New Zealand’s women in high performance sport residency programme came, Wood grabbed at the chance.
In December 2020 months into her new role, life changed dramatically for the Wood family.
Their son, Frankie, was 3 years old when he was diagnosed with a rare and aggressive brain tumour. Five months later, he passed away.
Through Frankie’s illness and the months that followed, Wood says the sporting community rallied around them.
Snow Sports New Zealand, Athletics New Zealand, High Performance Sport New Zealand and Massey University, where Warrick worked as a sports psychology lecturer, all provided support.
“I know high-performance sport gets a bad rap at times,” says Wood. “But there are some really good people in it. Those people helped us through that time and supported us.”
After Frankie’s death, Wood took time away. She gradually returned to work wanting to finish the Winter Olympic cycle and the next funding investment cycle pitch.
She then stepped away from sport for a period. She worked part-time in a restaurant kitchen doing food preparation, seeking space to think and breathe.
“I wasn’t sure what path I wanted to take or whether I wanted to work in sport again,” she says.
World champion athletes Tom Walsh (left) and Hamish Kerr (centre) have brought in Michelle Wood to run the new Aotearoa Athletics Trust.
But sport, and more importantly the people within it, continued to pull her back.
Wood and family are back in Christchurch surrounded by wider family and their 11-year-old daughter, Scarlett, is loving being part of her local athletics club, as well as playing basketball and netball.
Today, alongside her role with the Aotearoa Athletics Trust, Wood serves on the board of Brain Tumour Support New Zealand and remains heavily involved in Frankie to the Rescue, the charity established by her family to support others navigating the unimaginable journey they experienced.
For Wood, both roles are driven by the same motivation that first took her to athletics club as a child and later saw her put up her hand when Tom Walsh called.
Helping people.
Whether it’s a family facing the fight of their lives or an athlete chasing a black singlet, Wood has spent much of her life quietly making a difference behind the scenes.
“Not only do I love helping athletes achieve their dreams, I also recognise how important it is for children to have role models and be inspired by Kiwis doing incredible things,” she says. “Sport will always be so important to me.”
This story was originally published at Newsroom.co.nz and is republished with permission.