BU design new prosthetic limb for Irish Paralympian

22 March 2012

Colin Lynch using prosthetic limb at UCI Para-cycling Championships, copyright Colin Lynch

BU’s Bryce Dyer helps create prosthetic limb for Paralympic Cyclist Colin Lynch to use at the London 2012 Paralympics.

Bournemouth University’s Bryce Dyer helped create the prosthetic limb Irish Paralympic Cyclist Colin Lynch will use at the London 2012 Paralympics.

After a chance meeting with Pace Rehabilitation Ltd in November last year Bryce Dyer, Senior Lecturer in Product Design at Bournemouth University (BU) was asked to help design the prosthetic limb, with the world Para-cycling Championships in February in mind to test it. Working closely with Colin Lynch and Pace Rehabilitation Limited, using Bryce’s expertise in science and technology and also as a competitive cyclist himself the design was completed in about five weeks.

Bryce said: “The margins in para-cycling are small, tenths of seconds, so any advantage he can get is better than nothing. I just wanted to do something that hadn’t been done before, something you never see. There are other athletes that use cycling prosthesis, but I just wanted to give him something that was a little bit mind-blowing.”

Lynch won gold when he trialled the bespoke prosthetic leg at the 2012 Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) Para-Cycling Track World Championships in Los Angeles in February, the first competitive test for the para-cyclist this year.

Colin Lynch said: “It was a privilege to work with Pace Rehabilitation and to have the expertise of Bryce Dyer in the design and production of this cycling leg. It was a massive leap forward from the first leg that Pace made for me last year. Using Bryce’s expertise in aerodynamics, we were able to make a leg that both increased my power output and reduced wind resistance. The folks at Pace made sure it was as light as possible.

“The final product shaved precious seconds off my previous personal best times and helped power me to my World Championship win. I’m looking forward to much more success with it over the coming months and in the Paralympics in London. Thanks to both Bryce and Pace for their help and dedication to making it the best it could be.”

The device aims to give Lynch a competitive edge, but like any sport, there are rules and regulations that the design has to adhere to so was created with those in mind.

Bryce said: “I don’t want Colin going to London and being overly stressed because they say he has something that is advantageous or just raising the question because Colin is going to want to have his head in the game not on the prosthetics.

“The limb is shaped differently. It uses a different method of manufacture, and it’s very very aerodynamic compared to conventional prosthesis. It’s designed to give him maximum speed and maximum power transfer, he relies on a combination of speed and power and aerodynamic efficiency and it was just to try and give him something that would ultimately help and not hinder him in races.”

You can listen below to Bryce discussing his work with Colin Lynch on TalkSPORT.