Michael Woods is starting the Giro d’Italia with some of ‘the worst form ever,” but has plans for success
The Ottawa rider’s goals are driving him on as the end of this career is not so far away
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Sirotti
On the afternoon ahead of Stage 1 of the Giro d’Italia, Michael Woods finished a late lunch following the team’s training ride. He walked out of the Israel-Premier Tech meal bus into a parking lot by a hotel far from the heart of Giro activity in Turin. The start of the opening stage is in Venaria Reale just to the north of Turin proper. The first day of racing ends in the northern Italian city. Unlike some teams—Cofidis and Arkéa-B&B Hotels—that were given hotels in the city by race organizer RCS, IPT and another team had found themselves based 60 km to the northeast. But Woods and the squad would be in the thick of the action soon enough.
He sat down at a picnic table, commuter trains whizzing nearby, and reflected quite honestly on his condition ahead of 21 stages of racing. “I’ve had a very difficult start to the season,” Woods said. “Several viruses have really impacted my performances. My confidence is lower. Fitness isn’t great. It’s probably one of the worst forms I’ve ever entered a Grand Tour in, but I’m still excited to get into the race.”
Woods is planning to ride into shape and hopes to snag a Giro stage win. He has two Vuelta a España stages on his palmares, as well as the win on the Puy de Dôme at the 2023 Tour de France. Although he’s raced the Giro in 2017 and 2018, a stage victory has eluded him. He was close, however, in 2018. “I came second to Tim Wellens. I just left it a bit too late,” Woods said. “Not winning that stage has really almost haunted me a bit because I want stages from the three Grand Tours. I think there aren’t many opportunities for me to achieve some big goals left in cycling.” Woods’s contract with IPT runs until the end of 2025. At the moment, he’s pretty sure he won’t look to renew.
Riding into shape sounds like an old school strategy, one no longer used by riders with such precise training and nutrition plans. But illness and injuries happen. A rider has to work with them. And, Woods has come to a Grand Tour in rough shape before. “I crashed at the Tour of Utah in 2018. I flew back to Europe, in economy, with this terrible road rash,” he said. “Like, the leg was totally ripped apart. After the flight, I ended up getting a lot of swelling. It got infected, and it was brutal. When I touched it, it was like cheese pizza, like just cheese came out of the wound. I had to go to the hospital, get the skin peeled off and go on antibiotics. I didn’t ride for a week.
“Then, I called up my director at the time, Juanma Gárate, and told him that I didn’t think I’d be ready for the Vuelta. He said, ‘Mike, even if you start at 65 per cent, you’ll be good in the third week.’ I didn’t believe him, but he said just believe in me. And I won. I won stage 17.”
Woods expects the racing to be hard from the start of the Giro, just as it was at the beginning of the Tour last year. “It’s great because I think it will take some of the edge off,” he says. “For me, I’m not doing the GC, so I’ll lose time on the first few days and stay safe. Ideally, I’ll get a bit of an advantage on guys who have to take more risks and push themselves more.”
Since the rider will be taking it easy, or as easy as one can manage in a Grand Tour, he won’t be in contention on a stage that seems to suit him. The second day of racing ends up Santuario di Oropa—11.6 km, average 6.2 per cent, maximum 14 per cent. Marco Pantani won on this climb in the 1999 Giro, as well as Tom Dumoulin in 2017.
Before getting up from the side-of-the-parking-lot picnic table to head back into the hotel, Woods didn’t reveal what stages exactly he had circled in the race’s road book. If you try to draw any clues from the 2018 Vuelta, you’ll find this year’s Stage 17 looks good for the climber. The finish up Passo Brocon (11.8 km, average 6.6 per cent, maximum 13 per cent) could be just the thing, if the form comes around.
