On the eve of Weltklasse Z\u00fcrich pole vault show at Zurich Main Station and two days prior to the Weltklasse Z\u00fcrich meeting at Letzigrund Stadium, people with disabilities and the world of science took centre stage at the station\u2019s ticket hall. Competitors \u2013 or pilots \u2013 lined up for competitions in which they had to master tasks relevant to everyday life with the help of assistive technology.
The competition consisted of various disciplines. Pilots were equipped with prosthetic arms, prosthetic legs, motor-operated wheelchairs, or robotic exoskeletons (devices that help paraplegic pilots walk). Tasks included putting on a jumper and hanging out laundry with a prosthetic arm, climbing stairs with a prosthetic leg while carrying removal crates, park a wheelchair at table without touching the table top, as well as sitting down and getting up with the support of an exoskeleton. All pilots were accompanied by members of the ETHZ team of developers and by \u201cspotters\u201d who made sure that the pilots were safe at all times. These volunteers were not allowed to assist them with the tasks, however. <\/p>\n
Long jumper Benjamin Gf\u00f6hler was among those cheering the Cybathlon pilots. He was impressed by the performance of both the competing pilots and assistive technology. Gf\u00f6hler had to end his own season early because of an injury. He will therefore not be able to compete at Weltklasse Z\u00fcrich. Instead he took out time to attend the Cybathlon show. \u201cIt is incredible how the pilots handle their disabilities,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd how their teams support them. My own team is considerably smaller.\u201c
Athletics was represented at the Cybathlon by a para-athlete: Sofia Gonzalez, who will compete in the 100m at the 2019 World Para Athletics Championships in November, was one of the pilots navigating the Cybathlon course with her prosthetic leg.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Zurich is a Mecca for world-class athletics \u2013 and world-class science. The Cybathlon...","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":1161,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"city":[],"class_list":["post-1750","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-zurich"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zurich.diamondleague.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1750","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zurich.diamondleague.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zurich.diamondleague.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zurich.diamondleague.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1750"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/zurich.diamondleague.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1750\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zurich.diamondleague.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1161"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zurich.diamondleague.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1750"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zurich.diamondleague.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1750"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zurich.diamondleague.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1750"},{"taxonomy":"city","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zurich.diamondleague.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/city?post=1750"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}