With sensors on the body and a virtual reality headset on the head, the boxer is immersed in a virtual ring. An opponent appears before him, a 3D avatar created using virtual reality. The virtual boxer will perform a series of attacks and you must try to dodge the blows and counterattacks.“Explains Hugo, one of the students from the University of Rennes who took part in this high-level PPR project, ‘Revea’.

National Research Institute for Digital Sciences and Technologies of the University of Rennes Developed a virtual reality headset to help boxers improve their training. “The goal is to enable the boxer to basically train his defense, to be able to anticipate and avoid blows, without getting hit during training. During training they often get injured more than during the match.”Richard Kolpa, professor at the University of Rennes 2. The helmet is financed by France 2030 and the National Agency for Research (ANR).

Each session lasts 3 minutes and feels like a real boxing match. The helmets have been used by Olympic-qualified boxers for months, with training sessions that are as close to reality as possible. “We use motion capture systems, like in animated films, to capture the real movements of the professionals, so we have a realistic opponent who can really use this headset for high-level training.”“It’s a very good idea,” explains Richard Kolpa.

Virtual Reality Headset to Enhance Motorcyclist Attacks

Racing researchers are also working on another AI, this time to improve cyclists’ performance during attacks. “The goal is to learn how to counter a platoon attack in virtual reality.”Wearing virtual reality glasses, the cyclist rides an exercise bike, sees other cyclists in front of him and has to overtake them as quickly as possible, explains Frank Moulton, research director at INRIA in Rennes and head of the MimeTIC team, which studies and analyses human movement. “We will be able to generate a lot of different attacks that are more or less easy to detect, and so cyclists in virtual reality will learn to detect these weak signals, anticipate the attack, and be able to start at exactly the same time as the attacker and the force.”

A technology developed by collecting information in the field with an analysis of the movements of real cyclists. It is currently in the planning phase and will soon be used by professional cyclists. The Horizon Europe project “ShareSpace” is led by the DFKI in Germany. The work is carried out by the MimeTIC team, a joint project of Iniria, the University of Rennes 2, the University of Rennes, the School of Environmental Sciences of Rennes and the National Centre for Scientific Research.

All these innovations can be tested for free by the general public at the French club during the Olympic Games.