Created in 2019, it reopened in May after renovation, just in time for the training of Olympic and Paralympic athletes followed at the Creps (Centre for Resources, Expertise and Sports Performance) in Montpellier. With more than 2,400 athletes from 59 countries preparing in Occitanie for the Summer Olympics, the new “hot room” of the Montpellier city of sporting excellence was highly anticipated.
On 38 square meters and 3 meters high, it welcomes individual athletes and teams to simulate desert conditions (50 °C in a dry environment), tropical conditions (30 °C with 80% humidity), and in between in continuum. “It is also possible to create a thermal stress greater than that which will be experienced during a competition”, explains Sébastien Racinais, research director in exercise physiology and environmental physiology.
A performance loss of 10 to 15%
Heat affects the body’s proprioception and resistance capabilities, with a loss of performance estimated at between 10 and 15%. “When you know that medals are decided by a few seconds, it’s colossal,” notes the researcher. “An international level can fall back to a national level.”
We think of the 2021 Tokyo Games when Spanish tennis player Paula Badosa ended up in a wheelchair on the court, and Daniil Medvedev, a Russian tennis star who saw himself dying. In Tokyo (Olympics held without an audience during the Covid epidemic), temperatures reached 40°C with 70% humidity.
While it is too early for any prediction according to Météo-France, researchers from the University of Portsmouth in England, together with athletes, are warning of new heat records, even surpassing Tokyo. In this context, preparation for hot and humid conditions is essential for sports federations.
“Traditionally, we welcomed endurance disciplines, but today sailing sports or athletes subjected to short and intense events such as BMX freestyle are also concerned,” explains Sébastien Racinais.
Medical tent with cold bath
Our body is adaptable to heat. “We have the ability to dissipate heat by sweating more, which allows us to better thermoregulate our body,” explains the researcher. Two weeks of preparation with 1.5 hours of training per day in warm ambient air can be enough for an athlete. Sébastien Racinais points out that “Nordic athletes who prepare in advance are absolutely not penalized.”
As head of the IOC expert group dedicated to climate effects and athlete performance, he recalls the medical tent system, called “heat deck”, to treat heat stroke. It has been in place since the Doha athletics championship, allowing rapid diagnosis by rectal thermometer and cold bath, because “in heat stroke, every minute counts, it can lead to complications, or even death beyond two hours without treatment”.
This tent will be installed on each site considered “at risk”, in relation to their microenvironment or their very structure. These sites, identified by Paris 2024 in partnership with Météo-France, are part of the official campaign “Fighting the heat for athletes”. “It’s first about anticipating, then being able to react”, summarizes Lambis Konstantinidis, director of planning for Paris 2024.
Météo-France sensors on 5 sensitive sites
Since 2021, Météo-France services have been deploying weather stations at five main sites to collect temperature, precipitation and wind data, “to see how the sites behave in the face of meteorological events”, explains Alexis Decalonne, head of Météo-France Sports in charge of meteorological assistance for the Cojo.
To complement the existing sensors, five were installed at Roland-Garros to measure precipitation, at Vaires-sur-Marne for wind conditions (important for rowing events) and at Marseille for sailing events. With an innovation that Alexis Decalonne details: “The sensors placed on the buoys in the Bay of Marseille are smaller than those that are usually anchored off the French coast.”
Elsewhere, virtual observation points have been set up. “This tool, called data fusion, is based on radar and weather station observation models. It makes it possible to obtain hourly data with great precision, without having to equip each site with a view to reducing the carbon impact,” adds the Météo-France expert.
Two thousand people were mobilized each day by the weather forecasting institute. Around twenty forecasters were distributed to sites with specific needs, at Roland-Garros, Marseille, Vaires-sur-Marne, and in the center of Paris, allowing climate scenarios to be established during the Games.
Climate scenarios to anticipate the agenda
“A typical summer day is 27-28°C, over three or four consecutive days for a hot scenario, and a record episode of up to nine days at 35-36°C, with more sensitive sites, particularly within the city walls, linked to the heat island phenomenon.”
This will allow the Olympic Committee and the federations to set thresholds for changes to the competition calendar and to determine preventive measures, as was the case in Beijing in 2008 where the women’s football final was interrupted, or in Tokyo in 2021 for the walking event, brought forward by one hour the day before the event.
A forecaster will even be present from mid-July to September at the Main Operation Center of the Olympic Games. “For the safety of the athletes, a decision could be made at the last minute,” says Sébastien Racinais, researcher at the CREPS in Montpellier and advisor to the Olympic Committee. “The international federations remain the judges of the tolerance of athletes sport by sport and competition by competition,” adds Lambis Konstantinidis. Spectators will also be informed of the weather conditions and any changes to the schedule of the competitions.
Geothermal energy for the Olympic and Paralympic Village
In terms of infrastructure, the Olympic and Paralympic Village has been designed as a city capable of withstanding heat and adapting to climate change until 2050. “Designed by the company Solideo (the Olympic Village delivery company), the buildings, mainly made of wood, are equipped with a natural cooling system, allowing them to gain eight degrees compared to the outside, depending on whether the windows are opened or not,” explains Lambis Konstantinidis.
Learning from the past, the sustainable design of the village is a “showcase of innovation”, continues the director of planning for Paris 2024: geothermal energy, glazing and orientation of buildings so as not to absorb heat all day long, planting of 9,000 trees. However, some delegations did not want to take risks and decided to take charge of the air conditioning.
Water bottles allowed
If in Paris, the Arena and the POPB are air-conditioned, solutions had to be found for basketball and handball in Lille. On the public side, nothing is left to chance. Set up by the services of the city of Paris and the Île-de-France region, access to water for every 300 people is planned in the waiting areas, shaded as much as possible and with health personnel nearby. Caps, fans and misters will be available, and water bottles will even be allowed!
Faced with so much complexity, could the next summer games be postponed, like those of 1964 organized in Tokyo in October? “These are discussions that we are having,” concedes Lambis Konstantinidis. You also know that with the challenges of climate change, the committee is wondering about the Winter Olympics.”
