Strategies and performances of Functional Electrical Stimulation Cycling using the BerkelBike with Spinal Cord Injury in a competition context (CYBATHLON)

Submitted: 10 November 2017
Accepted: 16 November 2017
Published: 5 December 2017
Abstract Views: 1253
PDF: 734
HTML: 172
Publisher's note
All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

Authors

The functional electrical stimulation (FES) bicycle race was an event at the Cybathlon, held in Zurich October 2016. BerkelBike BV (The Netherlands) in collaboration with Imperial College London entered a spinal cord injury pilot who had tetraplegia to compete in this event. The BerkelBike Pro is a commercially available FES capable recumbent which is normally driven by the arm- and leg power. The arm cranking part was disabled. Now the tricycle must be driven using the pilots own lower limb muscles through stimulation in accordance with race rules. The bike used during the race was also adapted with a fixed gear for improved efficiency. The pilot who represented this team come second place overall in the event and attained the fastest race time of all pilots who utilised surface electrode FES. Steps can be taken to increase the race efficiency of the BerkelBikes and its FES capabilities even further.

Dimensions

Altmetric

PlumX Metrics

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

Citations

Supporting Agencies

BerkelBike BV, Active Linx, Imperial College London
Billy Woods, Active Linx, Allia Future Business Centre, Peterborough
National Manager, Active Linx

How to Cite

Berkelmans, R., & Woods, B. (2017). Strategies and performances of Functional Electrical Stimulation Cycling using the BerkelBike with Spinal Cord Injury in a competition context (CYBATHLON). European Journal of Translational Myology, 27(4). https://doi.org/10.4081/ejtm.2017.7189