Originally from Athlone, on the border of County Roscommon and County Westmeath, in central Ireland, Kielan Woods graduated from the Racing Academy & Centre of Education (RACE) in Kildare and rode his first winner under rules, Heroes Square, trained by Caroline Hutchinson, in a handicap hurdle at Thurles on November 27, 2009. He described Hutchinson as a ‘brilliant mentor’, but her retirement from the training ranks dictated a move to Paul Flynn, on whose suggestion he moved across the Irish Sea to join Oxfordshire trainer Charlie Longsdon a year or so later.
Woods rode his first winner for the yard, Be My Light, in a novices’ handicap hurdle at Huntingdon on January 26, 2011. Nowadays based in Bourton-on-the-Water, Gloucestershire, where he lives with his wife, Christy, he enjoyed his most successful season on British soil in 2022/23, when he rode 58 winners and amassed £662,185 in prize money. He had previously won the Grand Annual Chase at the Cheltenham Festival twice, on Croco Bay, trained by Ben Case, in 2019 and Global Citizen, trained by Ben Pauling, in 2022. He also rode his first Grade 1 winner, Millers Bank, trained by Alex Hales, in the Manifesto Novices’ Chase at Aintree in 2022.
In recent seasons, Woods have fallen foul of the British Horseracing Authority (BHA) more than once for repeated breaches of whip rules. He was suspended for 42 days in June 2023 and again, for a further 39 days, in January 2024. Nevertheless, he rode 40 winners in 2023/24 and, at the time of writing, has ridden 39 winners in 2024/25.
