The F1 Wheelchair 🧐 | How an F1 team helped Marcel Hug's Paralympic dreams

you might think it's just cars racing around a track every fortnite but Formula 1 will be represented at this year's par Olympic games let's take you to Switzerland and the story of the athlete they call the Silver Bullet so Marcel H who won the Boston Marathon for a seventh time and now the Silver Bullet comes across the line to win a SI London Marathon he's just Unstoppable [Music] I was born with an open spine it's called spinner bifida so that's why I'm in a wheelchair and I got a wheelchair with the age of eight and then I first I did some uh different kind of sports just for fun went to a sports club and then in the year 1996 I had the opportunity to try an old racing wheelchair was in the sports club I had really fun with it it was a junior race uh within a big International Marathon whe maritan and it was for me a great experience as a 10-year-old kid to see all these um great athletes from around the world uh it was so exciting to see The Spectators just the feeling of the movement in in a wheelchair race is so exciting sometimes it feel feels like flying just below on the ground it's an amazing feeling the Swiss paralympian Marcel hog won four gold medals at the Tokyo games and is going for four more in Paris but where does the F1 connection come in CEO from Autotech had the idea to develop a racing wheelchair in Switzerland with the SSS company and then he came to me and asked me if I want to be involved in this project as a as a pilot and for me of course it was a a great opportunity first of all I thought okay maybe it might be a dream it might be very difficult to realize it but then when I heard that also saber is involved and is interested to help develop us this racing wheelchair I thought okay maybe it can be possible because we have the best company in Switzerland involved you heard about it it was fascinating we were very interested um also yeah we like the the idea that's what we do daily for yeah other Industries um so the the project fitted very well to us many different uh people involved in in the team and that's also the great Advantage we have here because we we have the whole background of uh Formula 1 development and we have all the tools and machines in house so we we were able to take the best Technologies the best people and the best machines uh which we needed for the the project was very exciting to come here the first time to see everything of course I was also interested in Formula 1 to see a factory or like this uh and the team just see behind the scene is very interesting there are many similarities uh in terms of their materials uh development tools we use the Technologies we use you need to look at everything if you want to be the the best St if you want to build the the fastest wheelchair so we looked at the the whole system marel plus the the wheelchair we looked at aerodynamics lightweight design um optimize the structures to transfer the loads the seating position influences the aerodynamic track and it was a great moment when we had uh the first picture of of uh the racing wheelchair and then the next step of course was to see the first pieces in life in real for me it was really really a special moment I was so exciting it for me it was like uh Christmas birthday and and Easter all together was also very exciting to go on a track the first time to do the first Labs from the beginning I have to say it felt amazing we absolutely improved the sitting position we came a little bit lower from the sitting position which makes it a bit more Arrow of course but also gives me opportunity to have more power into the wheels we find out that the wheels which are open is better in aerodynamics because the air can flow through better we realized during AER development that it really brings an advantage um because the air can go through the wheels so there's less blage especially below the wheelchair and then really the first time he he used it was the Paralympics uh I think it's same in in Formula 1 which is not only the the competition on the very top level but it's also the automotive which uh has a benefit of the development in Formula 1 so for us in our project it was uh the same we not only wanted to develop a racing wheelchair for the uh top uh competition level but also we wanted to have a benefit for wheelchair users in general for me it means a lot that I have been involved in this project I had this opportunity it's a privilege uh and of course I'm also proud um what we achieved we put a lot of energy in it a lot of time to develop this racing wheelchair and I think what we achieved is is amazing it's amazing not only for me as an athlete it's amazing for for the sport in general I think we BR our sport a little bit on on a higher level because also other athletes now have the benefit of what we find out or can buy our racing wheelchair so that's important it was amazing to have this experience to work with a team a high professional team for me as a a single sport it it was a new experience to work together with the engineers and and mechanics and and so on so it was uh for me it was great to work together as a team to achieve one goal so that was was great so Formula 1 research and development bringing clear gains to wheelchair technology but what does Marcel make of the F1 circus hi R good to see you thank you for taking your time worries killing it on your competitions oh yeah it's it's good to yeah yeah we have the Paralympics in Paris in uh end of August how's the training going uh good good I think one of these uh very similar to this okay is also uh in my Fender yeah yeah it's very similar but you've been to a race before or uh yeah I was many years ago in henh yeah I've seen the the piece of Kit he's racing and it's impressive like uh obviously an F1 team team I think for many sports they can provide Solutions like that and that's that's really cool because I love all the tech stuff and all the especially things that improve performance like example in my on my cycling I'm always keen on the equipment so um it's it's pretty cool and how do you see the Formula 1 circus I think you've been to a couple of Grand Prix before when you come and see this weird world that we live in uh it's quite different yeah it's really different than to our world uh but it's really really exciting and and I'm so grateful to have this behind the scene access uh and so yeah it's really impressive to see this world so when you're watching the Paro Olympic Games next month keep an eye out for Marcel and you'll understand how Formula 1 technology and swiss engineering has helped shape the racing wheelchairs of the future