High Tech altitude room helps prepare Olympic athletes for Tokyo

The advancement in sports science and technology helps athletes around the world. Training at a simulated height or in a climate room was unthinkable 20 years ago. The ability to simulate altitude and / or climate in your own environment gives athletes a clear advantage over the competition.

When the US Olympic Committee asked in 2014 to install a world class elevation room, we knew exactly what they needed to train above the rest.

What does High-Tech mean?

The USOC wanted a High Tech training solution at their Flagship training center in Colorado Springs, CO, which was already at an altitude of 2000m. In 2014, the majority of athletes prepared for the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro.

How do you prepare for an Olympic game that is at sea level, warm temperatures and more humid than the Colorado climate?

COLORADO SPRINGS, CO - MAY 25: Marathon racer Desiree Linden runs on a treadmill at the High Altitude Training Center at the Olympic Training Center and simulates sea level at 90 degrees with 73% relative humidity on May 25, 2016. (Photo by Andy Cross / The Denver Post)

Case study: 2016 Olympics

You build a height and climate room. With this project, physiologists from Team USA were able to lower the room to a lower height and control the temperature and humidity. This gave the team incredible control over the training incentive for every athlete while preparing for the 2016 Olympics.

Given the tropical climate in Rio, it was necessary to give athletes a simulation of the high humidity in which they would perform. For example, a Team USA track coach can train a 10k runner in Rio's actual environmental conditions. They can then measure biological data, such as sweat and heart rate. This allows the physiologists to individually adjust the training and nutrition strategies of each athlete to be fully prepared for the elements of the environment.

Team USA would eventually take home 46 gold medals with a total of 121 medals, the highest score in the country classification.

What can we expect in 2020?

Given that the conditions in Tokyo 2020 must be very similar, we think the USOC will use the climate room in the same way for the next 12 months. The ability to isolate such circumstances gives Team USA a clear advantage in training.

Finbarr Kirwan, vice president of the US Olympic and Paralympic Committee (USOPC), spoke with a reporter during a conference call last week.

Kirwan spoke about the benefits of the High Tech altitude and climate room and told reporters: “It gives our team the opportunity to optimize fluid intake. We can also look at different nutritional strategies, there are many things that we can adjust individually for each athlete. ”

Keep your eyes open

It will be exciting to see how the athletes react to the conditions in Tokyo. We are extremely proud to be working with the USOC and the fantastic athletes that make up Team USA. Using technology products like ours and other companies, we expect another very successful Games in Tokyo, with an even more impressive medal tally for the US!

About Altitude Dream

Altitude Dream is the market leader in the Benelux in the field of altitude training. For more than 10 years we have been helping athletes realize their dreams and bringing people without altitude sickness to the mountain of their dreams. Altitude Dream is not a company. Altitude Dream is a dream. A dream that leads to the maximum use of our possibilities.