Why do many rope access technicians consider themselves “top athletes”?

If you walk around this Thursday and Friday in the Confluence district of Lyon, don’t be surprised to discover athletes lifting buckets of 12 liters of water, all hanging in the void about twenty meters from the floor. Welcome to the 10th edition of the French rope access championship, which takes place at La Sucrière (Lyon 2nd). “We are always entitled to a dozen different challenges that we discover on D-Day and which combine the speed with the precision of our profession, explains Antoine Quidoz, rope access technician since 2008 around Chambéry. Only this test where you have to climb a bucket on ropes by dropping as little water as possible is unavoidable. »

And she succeeds very well in Antoine Quidoz, who is simply the seven-time reigning French champion, and undefeated since the launch of this meeting, in 2011 in Crolles (Isère). “The competition is a good showcase for highlighting this little-known profession”, also called “difficult access worker”, appreciates this 37-year-old caving enthusiast. And thanks in particular to the Petzl brand as a historic partner, the French championship allows prize money of up to 1,000 euros for the final winner.

Three times more rope access technicians in France than ten years ago

Antoine Quidoz’s main opponent, Ivan Muscat, sums up the course of this French championship like no other: “It’s never very different from our daily lives. We have to do bits of work, like taking something apart and putting it back on another part of the structure, without dropping anything.” Because everything is not just a question of speed, as can be the case for the speed climbing event, which the general public discovered at the Tokyo Olympics last year. Delicate technical manipulations in the air “can lead to penalty points in the event of errors in safety, which remains the basis of our profession”, recalls Antoine Quidoz.

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How did this profession, which appeared in the 1990s in France, and which has tripled its workforce over the past ten years (from approximately 5,000 to 15,600 professionals today), launch a championship involving a hundred top athletes level ? The Union of Professionals France Works on Cords would like to promote “the great diversity of activities” of rope workers, from work on structures to protection against natural risks and rockslides, including renovation of buildings and the restoration of historical monuments. The images of the colossal construction site of Notre-Dame de Paris, where several dozen rope technicians have intervened since 2019, have highlighted this “shadow profession”, with an obvious sporting dimension.

“Some rope workers are completely washed out at 40”

For Ivan Muscat, runner-up to Antoine Quidoz during the two previous editions of the French championship, “we consider ourselves high-level athletes even if we don’t have the status”. This former welder in Brest, who has become a rope access technician for 20 years in Millau (Aveyron), is very careful about his lifestyle, his diet and his recovery, while he also often tackles dreadful ways of climbing to 8b+ rating. “The cordists are often a little broken, with recurring back and shoulder injuries,” says the 42-year-old Aveyronnais. When you have recurrent tendinitis, it’s unfortunately impossible to stay on the ropes, so you have to either become a trainer or change direction. »

“Some are completely washed out at 40, but others are still there at 60, nuance Antoine Quidoz. In any case, we are necessarily sharp when we do this job. This observation has become a little less true in recent years, due to the evolution of the public interested in this profession intended to carry out work at height, with difficult access, and of course without the use of scaffolding.

“The fantasy of freedom that our profession suggests titillates”

“The profession is intrinsically sporting but the training has become more democratic, in particular from Pôle Emploi, specifies Alexandre de Loynes, vice-president of France Works on ropes. We therefore see the arrival in the world of rope access technicians of profiles of roofers, masons or painters, and no longer only people from the mountains and disciplines outdoors. It gives a changing profession, with an average age between 25 and 35, and which has gained legitimacy. »

“We feel that the fantasy of freedom that our profession suggests titillates more and more people”, observes Ivan Muscat. Add to that, for the most competitive, the prospect of traveling around the world and aiming for a world title. All this with sometimes really unusual challenges. World team champion in 2016 in Salt Lake City (United States) alongside Ivan Muscat, Antoine Quidoz says: “Once, we were given a picnic table in kit form and we were entitled to 10 minutes to assemble it in the air, with three rope access technicians, before sitting down around it”. You can feel it coming, the box office hit of a potential film Rope access workers ?

Free admission. From 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. this Thursday and from 8:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Friday, at La Sucrière (Lyon 2nd). More information here.