Font Romeu welcomes the European high-level training center of sports equipment supplier Asics

2023-04-29 02:00:21

After that of Iten in Kenya, the sports equipment manufacturer Asics is opening a second high-level training center in Font Romeu (Pyrénées-Orientales), as part of a partnership with the National Center for Altitude Training (CNEA). The CNEA was created in 1967 to prepare the teams for the Olympic Games in Mexico in 1968, the Japanese brand’s Chojo Camp Europe is aiming for the World Championships in Athletics scheduled for this summer in Budapest and, in the process, the Paris 2024 Olympic Games.

Chojo means “aim for the top” in Japanese. This is what the sponsor brand intends to do by planning to welcome a total of around one hundred athletes under contract with it. Among the desired benefits of training at altitude: an increase in the production of red blood cells which has the effect of improving endurance at the time of competition thanks to a greater quantity of oxygen transported in the blood. In particular, cross-country skiers and half-cross-country skiers are announced Eilish McColgan et Mekdes Woldu but also Yohan Durand, first Frenchman in the 2021 Paris marathon as well as Aurélien Quinion, French record holder for the 35 km walk.

Sports infrastructure and medical follow-up

“We take care of accommodating them and facilitating their arrival,” explains Eddy Ferhi, marketing director of Asics France, who indicates that this will also be an opportunity to have some of the brand’s innovations tested. Open-air athletics track, hypoxia chambers… athletes will be able to use all of the sports facilities and benefit from medical supervision. For now, this Chojo Camp from Asics is planned until the Olympics. “We will then take stock to find out if it should be maintained”.

This time for reflection should coincide with the delivery, still in Font Romeu, of sports equipment this time financed by the Occitanie Region: the High Performance Preparation Center. This complex attached to the CNEA, which will have required 45 million euros of investment, is expected for July 2024. It will include an Olympic outdoor swimming pool, a sports performance support unit, a sports complex with fencing halls , wrestling and trampoline as well as a gymnasium.