On September 26, she’ll defend her title in the 2026 women’s road cycling world championships. And she’ll do so close to home, in Montreal: the race will loop through the suburbs on the south shore of the St. Lawrence before sending riders up and around Mont-Royal for six grueling laps. Vallieres may have lost the element of surprise this time around, but the race is still the focus of her training for the year. “For sure, it’s a big target,” she says. “Coming with the [defending champion’s] #1 on the back, and at home, it’s unreal.”

As she prepared for the race, Vallieres spoke with Canadian Geographic about her path to the pinnacle of women’s cycling.

On getting started

My dad introduced me to the sport. He bought me a bike for Christmas one year, and he said, we’ll train a little bit and then next year we’ll go and meet where your mum lives, we’ll ride there. Which was one thousand kilometres away. So, I was nine years old and we left my hometown, Sherbrooke, and then we went to Carleton, in Gaspésie. We did it in nine days, so a bit over a hundred [kilometres], average, per day, with the luggage and everything. I could have either really hated it or really loved it, and I think I just fell in love with the sport then. 

When we came back, my dad put me in a club, Club Cycliste de Sherbrooke, and to be honest the first few years I was not that interested in racing. We just did these trips and that’s more what I liked. And then when I got into high school I went into a sport program, and then we did more mountain bike, cyclocross, a bit of BMX, a bit of road, and then I got more into competition. 

[Eventually] I went to the world championship in Austria, and that was my first experience in an international peloton. It was only one race, and it was my first race, and I thought, this is not for me. This is too scary in the big bunch like this. I also broke my thumb the day before, so I raced with a broken thumb, with a cast, so maybe that’s why it felt even extra scary. 

But yeah, it was a big jump. And then, the more you race, the more you get kind of used to it. The more you learn, I wouldn’t say it gets easier but you get a bit better and you’re able to race more.