Michael Leonard of Canada leads the pack during the UCI Montreal Grand Prix Cycling race in Montreal, Sunday, September 15, 2024. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Graham Hughes

Canadian time-trial champion Michael Leonard has joined the EF Education-EasyPost cycling team.

The 21-year-old from Oakville, Ont., who is now based in Andorra, made the move after three seasons with Britain's Ineos Grenadiers team.

Founded in 2003 by Jonathan Vaughters, EF Education-EasyPost has competed in the UCI World Tour since 2009.

“This team has a unique identity,” Leonard said in a statement. "Even growing up, watching the sport, it seemed like a team with an exciting culture. It is a team that you always see on the attack, being opportunistic, and giving riders the space to express themselves and race in ways that suit them, so they can take the best advantage of situations on the road.

"It's a team that definitely gets the best out of its riders. You see riders who might not fit in other places perform really strongly on this team.”

EF Education-EasyPost is also home to Canadians Clara Esmond, Alex Volstad, Alison Jackson and Magdeleine Vallieres.

Leonard won the Canadian National Time Trial Championships in June, covering the 34-kilometre course in Saint-Georges, Que., in 40 minutes 29 seconds. He finished 35 seconds ahead of Derek Gee of the Israel-Premier Tech team.

Leonard got the attention of Vaughters with a time-trial win at last year's Tour de l’Avenir, considered under-23 racing’s Tour de France.

"He is a time-trialist who can also climb and is quite handy in a breakaway," Vaughters said of Leonard. "He can get his body down really low and produce power on the road bike all day and he brings that double-trouble in that he can climb too, so he can actually finish the job on the final climbs once he gets in a breakaway."

Leonard got into racing at the Mattamy National Cycling Centre, the velodrome built for the 2015 Pan American Games.

'Leonard's pro career was interrupted by a broken hip at the start of his second season.

"I'd actually say that injury gave me an opportunity to re-evaluate my approach to the sport and different things I was doing in training," Leonard said. "It gave my body the opportunity to reset, to finish growing a bit, and to absorb the demands of the previous year. By the time I got back to racing that year, even considering how much I'd missed, I was almost immediately better than I had been the year before.

"Since then, it has been a continuous upward trajectory. I've managed to fit in well, supporting the team in some of the bigger races."

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This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 5, 2025.

News from © The Canadian Press, 2025