Canadian cycling ace Michael “Rusty” Woods announced in his blog on Monday that he will retire at the end of 2025 after 14 seasons of professional cycling. The 38 year old came to the sport late after a successful middle distance running career–he’s the first person to run a sub-four-minute mile and complete the Tour de France.
Rusty raced for several North American and European Continental Teams in the 2010’s before joining Cannondale-Drapac, an early incarnation of EF Education-Easypost, in 2016. It was with this squad that he achieved some of his greatest accomplishments: runner-up to Bob Jungels in the 2018 Liège-Bastogne-Liège, bronze in the 2018 World Championships, and two of three career stage victories in the Vuelta a España.
Woods transferred to Israel-Start Up Nation in 2021 to become one of four Canadians on the squad. Here, he took the La Route d’Occitanie-La Dépêche du Midi title two years in a row and won Stage 9 of the 2023 Tour de France, triumphant atop the mighty Puy de Dôme.
In Woods’ final season with IPT, he was one of six Canucks on the squad. He started 2025 with tenth in the Santos Tour Down Under. Breaking his collarbone in March’s Milano-Torino, a race his won in 2019, he came back in June’s Tour de Suisse but fell prey to illness. In his thirteenth and final Grand Tour, the Tour de France, he got in four breakaways and finished 52nd. His final WorldTour races with be September’s Grand Prix Cycliste de Québec and Grand Prix Cycliste de Montréal.
Woods’ palmares right now is 16 victories, his very first Stage 5 of the 2015 Larry H.Miller Tour of Utah. His legacy is one of the greatest Canadian road cyclists of all time.
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