After the 50 km walking event at the world championships, in Doha, September 29, 2019. MUSTAFA ABUMUNES / AFP
Head of the “environmental stress” cell at the Montpellier Sports Performance and Expertise Resource Center, Sébastien Racinais studies the relationship between sports performance and weather conditions. He is also the head of a group of experts from the International Olympic Committee (IOC) working on this subject.
What knowledge do we have about the potential links between heat waves and sports performance?
We often tend to consider it something new. But the fact of the human species exercising in the heat is not new. The first writings found on the subject date from 500 years before Christ, during the wars between the Persians and the Greeks, where the number of heat strokes among soldiers depended on the outfit they wore, their exercise intensity…
Today, it is more and more significant. First, with global warming and rising temperatures, but also because sports events are becoming global and are being organized in very hot areas. As in 2016 at the Rio de Janeiro Games, or in 2026, with the organization of the Youth Olympic Games which will take place for the first time on the African continent, in Dakar. The athlete is increasingly exposed to very hot environments in international competition.
The IOC created a research group on this subject in 2018, bringing together researchers, athletes and medical teams. What is his mission ?
The Tokyo Olympics [prévus en 2020, puis décalés en 2021 en raison de la pandémie Covid-19] promised to be very hot. The IOC wanted to set up a working group to propose solutions for protecting the health and performance of athletes.
The 2019 World Athletics Championships in Qatar attracted a lot of attention, but they also moved things forward a lot. They made it possible to set up a protocol with a section of the medical space dedicated to heat stroke, that is to say with cold baths, ice, water. This operational plan born in Doha has become the standard for all races.
Also read the editorial of “Le Monde” | At the World Athletics Championships in Doha, the disaster of sport
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An important part of your work is to inform athletes, even those playing on an international scale, who one might think are better prepared…
We conducted questionnaires. In 2015, for the World Athletics Championships in Beijing, in a hot and humid atmosphere, only 15% of the athletes had prepared for this heat. In 2016, we worked with the International Cycling Union to raise awareness of this issue and 38% of athletes said they had prepared for the heat for the road cycling world championship in Doha. In 2019, more than 60% of them had prepared for the world athletics championships. There is a greater number of dropouts for those who do not.
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