Invictus Games or reconstruction through sport for war wounded

After London in 2014, Orlando in 2016, Toronto in 2017 and Sydney in 2018, the Invictus Games are back. This year, around twenty athletes will wear the colors of France among the 19 nations represented. This gathering was scheduled for 2020 and was postponed due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Modeled after the Paralympic Games

The first edition was launched in the United Kingdom in 2014 by Prince Harry, grandson of Queen Elizabeth II, when he returned from Afghanistan after serving in the ranks of the British army. Prince Harry was inspired in particular by Warrior Gamesa competition held annually in California by the US Army for its wounded soldiers.

It can be said that the Invictus Games are akin to the Paralympic Games, which ignited the United Kingdom with London 2012. Of the 4,400 athletes who were at Tokyo in 2021a dozen of them were veterans of Afghanistan, wounded in operation.

From volleyball to athletics, via archery, golf, wheelchair rugby or even swimming, everyone will come to measure up to the other, to continue to grow and make their handicap a strength. .

Invictus (“undefeated” in Latin) is a short poem written in 1875 by the English poet William Ernest Henley who, suffering from tuberculosis, had to have his leg amputated. This poem was also one of Nelson Mandela’s favorites. The poem ends with two iconic lines: I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul » (« I am the master of my destiny, I am the captain of my soul “).

“I only had the idea of ​​resorting in my head”

Victim of a stroke in exercise in 2001, fell into a coma, Sébastien was at the time of the tragedy a skilled runner, who achieved more than respectable times, before ending up in a wheelchair. For two long years, he had to learn to walk again, before considering going back to athletics to rebuild himself physically and especially psychologically. In The Hague, he will take part in two athletics events: the 1500m and the 400m. From his stroke, he kept hemiplegic sequelae on the left side.

” A few months after my stroke, all I had in mind was the idea of ​​having recourse. It saved me. At the beginning, I ran slowly, and as I am a very proud person, a quality, I had to progress quickly. I went back to the club, I trained a lot, and I started to make podiums at the French championships in disabled athletics. “, confides Sébastien to RFI.

One day, an executive from the National Center for Defense Sports (CNDS) in Fontainebleau offered him to participate in the Invictus games in Orlando in 2016. “ Sport gave me steely morale and great willpower. Thanks to sport, I became almost able-bodied again. Today, people look at me more as an able-bodied person than as a disabled person. With sport, I felt valued he says. Able to run the 10 km in 38 minutes (33 minutes before his stroke) with his disability, he even participated in the semi-finals of the French cross-country championships with the able-bodied.

The forgotten history of conflicts across the planet

Those Invictus Games also tell the story of conflicts across the planet. Most of the time distant wars, with wounded soldiers, amputated, that we do not see. In Afghanistan, 89 French soldiers were killed and there are around 700 wounded. In less than a decade, 58 French army soldiers have lost their lives in the Sahel as part of the Serval then Barkhane operations.

” In Orlando, I was impressed to see Americans and Iraqis rub shoulders in the same hotelrecalls Sébastien. When you know what happened between these two nations, it was moving to see them look at each other without malice, only sportingly “. In his closing speech in 2014, Prince Harry indicated that the Invictus Games were also a competition” where two competitors have chosen to cross the line hand in hand, where the winners, having just arrived, turn to applaud and encourage those behind “.