The Scottish wheelchair racer, 31, has missed out on the podium at a string of recent events after a pair of sixth and eighth-place finishes at last year’s Paris Paralympics.
Two fourth-places at last year’s World Championships in Kobe, plus other near misses at the Tokyo Paralympics and Birmingham Commonwealth Games, means Woods remains without a major gong in a sport where Britain are one of the consistent heavyweights on the international stage.
Woods, a former PE teacher who was paralysed from the waist down after a motor accident back in 2018, will compete in the T54 400m, 800m and 1500m here in the baking hot Indian capital over the next week.
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And after a gruelling season of training, she believes she finally has what it takes to break free from the pack and propel herself onto the podium.
“After Paris, I came sixth and took some huge chunks off some of my times,” she said, speaking from the pre-event British holding camp in Dubai.
“I wanted to ride that wave and keep it going.
“I perform best at championships – it’s been a long season waiting for those to come around.
“We don’t have too many races, so keeping that momentum going has been hard. I started the season off really well, beat girls who came ahead of me in Paris, and that made me excited for these championships.
“This is the first championships I’ve gone into where I’ve thought a medal is an achievable target. Every other event I’ve got to, I just want to be in the mix, but this year I actually feel like I can do it.
“That gives me a real confidence about what I can achieve here, knowing that I can be not just in the mix but do something with that.
“It definitely feels like time – I’ve got experience, patience, and I’m ready to bring something home at the end of it.”
Woods gets her campaign underway in the 800m event on Monday, with action kicking off in Delhi on Saturday morning following the opening ceremony at the 60,000-seater Jawaharlal Nehri Stadium this evening (Friday).
And one of the first Brits in action is fellow Scot Finlay Menzies, who will be making his international debut as he competes in the T72 400m classification.
The Livingston athlete ran a new personal best at the England Athletics Para Championships in July in the T72 100m, an event that will make its Paralympic debut at Los Angeles 2028 and Menzies will compete in on Tuesday after his 400m tilt.
While later in the week from a Scottish perspective, Paralympic champion Ben Sandilands will be bidding to emulate those Parisian exploits when he competes in his T20 1500m.
The Kirkcaldy star, 22, shattered the world record in the French capital last summer to grab one of 49 brilliant British golds.
But he will have a long wait to compete here in the sweltering sub-continental conditions, with his race not until the penultimate day of the championships next Saturday.
Elsewhere, there are no shortage of big British Paralympic names in Delhi as Hannah Cockroft hopes to add to her remarkable haul of 27 major golds.
The nine-time Paralympic and 16-time world champion, 33, competes in all three of the T34 100m, 400m, and 800m over the course of a busy week.
Cockroft added two Paralympic golds to her collection in Paris last year before getting married to fellow wheelchair racer Nathan Maguire, 28.
This will be the first time Cockroft has competed in India, with the likely attendance at the imposing Jawaharlal Nehri Stadium – redeveloped for the 2010 Commonwealth Games – remaining unknown and the mercury rising to almost 40 degrees making for punishing conditions.
Throw into the mix the unpredictable nature of Cockroft’s opponents given the inexorable growth of the classification, and this represents a significant step into the unknown.
But ‘Hurricane Hannah’ insists she is embracing the challenge both on and off the track.
“Last year was manic and I never had a chance to come down from that chaos,” she said.
“I really built Paris up, so coming here to Delhi, it’s a completely different ball game.
“I’m not sure what we’re walking into and it looks like chaos, but I’m ready to throw myself in there and see what happens!
“I’m really intrigued as to who is going to line up on the start line – my class is getting stronger all the time.
“There were so many new girls in Paris, so I’m excited to see how they’ve progressed and if there are any new people!”
Elsewhere, Jonathan Broom-Edwards credits his gruelling stint on Celebrity SAS: Who Dares Wins for helping him battle through a year of illness and injury hell.
The Tokyo Paralympic high jump champion, 37, achieved a valiant fifth-place finish in Paris having only miraculously made it to the French capital after suffering an ankle injury.
In the 12 months that have followed, the three-time defending world champion has been blighted by a further Achilles injury while also losing 4kg through illness and suffering from the flu.
And after appearing on the Channel 4 show, Broom-Edwards said: “ Celebrity SAS definitely took me to another level. It puts you into a very dark hole that you have to climb out of.
“You figure out more about the limits of what your mind puts on you. Achieving gold in Tokyo taught me a lot when the chips were stacked against me – they’ve all added that extra element of showing things I can achieve.”
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