By James Crook

151280508May 3 - Keynote speeches from Motivation UK's Chris Rushman and Simone Oehler of prostheses company Ottobock touched on opposing ideas; the new technology in Paralympic equipment and the low-cost equipment available to disabled athletes with few resources.


Motivation UK are responsible for around 4,000 low-cost products across 50 countries, including a racing chair they developed in collaboration the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) prior to London 2012.

"For sports programmes to work in low-income countries, you need products that are affordable and suitable, but you also need the athletes, the coaches and the support," Rushman said.

"I think we really brought some healthy competition into the marketplace,"

Oehler focused on the process that must be undergone to produce high-quality state-of-the-art Paralympic sport equipment, and spoke of the influence that the athletes have in the production of these items.

"The athlete's voice matters just as much in the process as the engineers," she said

"The best engineer can't even come up with something good if they don't have feedback from the athlete."

VISTA2013 is duel conclude tomorrow with a speech by Ivo van Hilvoorde, an assistant professor at the Faculty of Human Movement Sciences at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam.

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