France 2030 - PARAPERF project

As part of the future 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games to be held in Paris, France aims to double the number of medals won at recent Olympiads. With this in mind, the Ministry of Higher Education, Research and Innovation and the Ministry of Sports have called on France 2030 (ex-PIA) funding to finance innovative projects via the call for projects Programme Prioritaire de Recherche " Sport de très haute performance ".

Among the 6 winners, the PARAPERF project project "Optimizing Paralympic performance: from identification to winning the medal" aims to understand the specific challenges of very high Paralympic performance in terms of trajectories, optimization of equipment and human environments, in order to better support athletes all the way to the podiums of the Olympic and Paralympic Games. Olympic and Paralympic Games in Paris 2024.

The project involves 13 sporting disciplines and 467 summer Paralympic events. Coordinated by INSEP (Institut National Sport et Performance), it is structured around three lines of research and development:

• Performance trajectories & potential estimation

• Couple Athlete - Wheelchair

• Athlete environment and career path

Aix Marseille Université/Institut des Sciences du Mouvement/Filière Fast Spor'In (AMU-CNRS) is involved in axis 2 "Couple Athlète/fauteuil" through the prevention and treatment of injury risk factors with the ballistic ergometer (Aix-Marseille University/CNRS innovation), the development of instrumented and connected wheels for wheelchairs with handrails, and the study of tire performance.

Last but not least, the University of Aix-Marseille will be one of 3 fixed national platforms hosting internships and multiple research projects within the Technosport platform. The project is led by Arnaud Hays, research engineer and top-level sports expert in the Fast Spor'In sector, and Denis Bertin, head of technological development.