Scientific Symposium Québec

Frédéric Grappe

Frederic Grappe is Director of Innovations and Performance for the GROUPAMA-FDJ United professional cycling team and a distinguished sports science researcher with over two decades of experience in the cycling industry and sports science. He holds a PhD and HDR, working as a university lecturer-researcher on secondment. Frédéric has authored 5 university textbooks, published 75 articles in international scientific journals, and supervised 10 PhD theses. He bridges academic rigor with practical sports performance, combining deep scientific knowledge with cutting-edge technology to advance professional cycling performance.

Topic covered:
From the neural adjustments in the brain to the muscles to produce efficient power output.

Richard Ferguson

Richard is a Reader in Human and Exercise Physiology. He has broad research interests, with a particular focus on human performance and developing a greater understanding of the underpinning mechanisms of training adaptation. Richard has a specific interest in the effects of blood flow restricted (BFR) exercise on skeletal muscle adaptations and performance. Current work is also investigating the physiological and skeletal muscle morphological determinants of the power-duration relationship and how it relates to cycling performance.

Sujet couvert :
Blood flow restriction for recovery in high performance endurance cycling.

Rob Lamberts

Rob Lamberts is a professor in the Department of Human Movement Sciences at the University of Groningen and the University Medical Center Groningen in the Netherlands. With over 20 years of experience in applied exercise physiology, his primary research focuses on cycling and other endurance sports, including road and trail running. In recent years, his work has concentrated on exploring physiological resilience and durability in professional cyclists, alongside investigating the impact of the menstrual cycle on athletic performance.

Rob has extensive experience in training and testing elite cyclists competing at the highest level. He has provided practical support and expert advice to top athletes and teams. Rob also contributes to the development of coaching expertise through his role in the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) coaching course. He serves as an advisory panel expert at the International Testing Agency and is an associate editor for the International Journal of Sports Physiology and Performance. Additionally, he is a member of the scientific board of the European College of Sport Science.

Topic covered:
Resilience and Durability in High-Endurance Cycling: Exploring Key Factors for Peak Performance

Vanessa Zoras

Vanessa Zoras, RD, MSc, is Head of Nutrition for the UCI WorldTour team NSN Cycling, where she leads high-performance nutrition strategy and athlete support. She has nearly a decade of experience working across para and able-bodied high-performance programs in multiple sport disciplines. Vanessa earned her MSc from the University of Victoria in 2025, focusing on Relative Energy Deficiency in Sport (REDs), and is currently pursuing a PhD investigating carbohydrate fueling strategies to optimize elite endurance performance. In 2025, she supported athletes at the UCI Road World Championships in Rwanda.

Topic covered:
Case Study of a World Champion: Aligning Health and Fueling to Optimize Performance Across an Elite Cycling Career.

Chris Rozdilsky

Chris Rozdilsky is an elite endurance coach and exercise physiologist with more than 20 years of experience working with professional and Olympic-level athletes. He currently supports high-performance cycling programs including the UCI WorldTour team NSN Cycling. Chris holds a Master’s degree in Exercise Physiology and Human Performance and specializes in long-term athlete development for elite endurance performance. He has coached Magdeleine Vallieres, the current Elite Women’s Road Race World Champion, since she was a first-year junior.

Topic covered:
Case Study of a World Champion: Aligning Health and Fueling to Optimize Performance Across an Elite Cycling Career.

Myriam Paquette

Myriam Paquette holds a doctorate in exercise physiology. Myriam has been a sports physiologist at INS Québec since 2015, where she has worked primarily with the para-swimming, para-cycling, and canoe-kayak teams. Since 2017, she has been the physiologist and lead of the integrated support team for the national para-cycling team. Her research focuses on interval training, muscle oxygenation, and the specific physiological characteristics of Paralympic athletes. She is constantly seeking to deepen her understanding of athletes’ physiological profiles and to better document their responses to various training stimuli.

Topic covered:
The gold is in the process: the Canadian Paracycling Team approach. Training plans designed from the gap analysis to the choice of the intervention or tool, and the tracking of its effects.

François Raymond

François Raymond, who holds a master’s degree in kinesiology, has been a strength and conditioning coach at INS Québec since 2014. In addition to his work in physical conditioning, he also undertakes training and knowledge dissemination mandates related to the science of training. Currently responsible for supporting the Canadian para-cycling and boxing teams, François has lent his expertise to a wide range of sports over the past decade: mountain and road cycling, para-swimming, canoe-kayak, judo, and goalball. Throughout these roles, he has distinguished himself through his focus on individualized training, the importance he places on interpersonal relationships, and the cohesion of the multidisciplinary teams he works with. Competition and performance remain part of his daily life in sports, though he can’t imagine competing with the athletes he has the pleasure of coaching!

Topic covered:
The gold is in the process: the Canadian Paracycling Team approach. Training plans designed from the gap analysis to the choice of the intervention or tool, and the tracking of its effects.

Robert Moskovitch

Robert Moskovitch is a faculty member of Computer and Information Science at Ben Gurion University of the Negev (BGU), Israel, where he directs the Complex Data Analytics Lab and serves as the Vice Dean for Industry and International Relations. He is also an adjunct faculty member at the Department of Population Health Science and Policy at Ichan Medical School at Mount Sinai, NYC, USA. Before his postdoc fellowship at the Department of Biomedical Informatics at Columbia University in NYC, he headed several R&D projects in Information Security at the Deutsche Telekom Innovation Laboratories.

He is an Associate Editor at the ACM Transactions on Knowledge Discovery from Data (TKDD) journal, Big Data journal, and was Academic Editor at PLOS ONE. He is also on the editorial board of the Journal of Biomedical
Informatics (JBI) and is the elected Vice Chair of the Board of the Artificial Intelligence in Medicine (AIME) Society. His lab focuses mainly on temporal data analytics and generally data mining and machine learning, as well as their use and applications in biomedical, cybersecurity, sports, and other domains.

Topic covered:
Modelling Team Skills and Roster Selection to Predict Cycling Race Outcomes

Jonathan Tremblay

Jonathan Tremblay, Ph.D., is a full professor at the School of Kinesiology and Exercise Science (EKSAP) at the University of Montreal and an affiliated researcher at the Laboratory of Exercise Physiology and Applied Bioenergetics (LPEBA) at the Montreal Heart Institute. His work focuses on exercise bioenergetics, the oxidation of energy substrates, and the modeling of endurance performance, particularly using indirect calorimetry and ¹³C isotope tracing. He collaborates with several high-performance sports groups in various disciplines and was the first scientific director of the National Institute of Sport of Quebec (INS Québec).

Topic covered:
From the molecule to the road: bioenergetic approaches and modeling to push the limits of cycling.

Jérémy Briand

Jérémy Briand, a sports and science enthusiast, is a former member of the national triathlon team. After obtaining his bachelor’s degree in physics from McGill University in 2019, he applied his skills in data analysis and modeling to research projects at the Institut National du Sport du Québec. These experiences sparked a genuine passion for research and led him to pursue a master’s and PhD in exercise science at the Université de Montréal. His current work focuses on modeling locomotion performance, with the goal of better understanding and identifying its bioenergetic determinants. By pinpointing these key factors, performance can be optimized through targeted interventions, such as training programs. In his free time, Jérémy remains an avid cyclist, runner, and outdoor enthusiast.

Topic covered:
From the molecule to the road: bioenergetic approaches and modeling to push the limits of cycling.

Erick Auger

With 36 years in the cycling industry, Erick Auger has been a central contributor to the technological evolution that shapes modern performance cycling. For the past 15 years at Faction Bike Studio, he has partnered with leading brands—ranging from emerging innovators to global OEMs—to advance product development and elevate real-world rider performance. His expertise extends to high-performance sport, having collaborated with Olympic federations on track bikes engineered purely to win, pushing beyond commercial constraints to expand the limits of what is possible. Combining deep technical knowledge with practical experience across multiple cycling disciplines, including a second-place finish at the 2009 24-Hour World Championships, he brings a rare, dual perspective to the future of cycling technology and human performance.

Topic covered:
A case study in track cycling design : performance Engineering Through Data-Driven Product Optimization.

Stephen Cheung

Dr. Stephen Cheung is a Distinguished Professor and Senior Research Fellow in the Department of Kinesiology and directs the Environmental Ergonomics Lab. His research ranges from the effects of heat stress on the brain’s ability to recruit muscles through to the blood flow of fingers in the cold and its effect on frostbite risk and marine survival. He has partnered with the Toronto Fire Service to improve heat exposure guidelines and recovery protocols, the Search & Rescue Secretariat to improve survival models in the North Atlantic and the Arctic, various occupational and athletic clothing manufacturers on developing more thermally efficient and comfortable clothing, and Olympic teams and World Champion athletes to optimize performance. Cheung authored Advanced Environmental Exercise Physiology, the primary graduate text in the field, along with two books on the science of cycling. Dr. Cheung obtained his M.Sc. from Simon Fraser University, his Ph.D. from the University of Toronto, and an Honours diploma from the International Space University. Cheung has a deep love for cycling, rockclimbing, snowboarding, Nordic skiing, and pretty much all forms of physical activity.

Topic covered:
Optimizing cycling performance in hot environments.

Benjamin Pageaux

Benjamin Pageaux is an Associate Professor at the School of Kinesiology and Physical Activity Sciences (EKSAP) at the University of Montreal. He is also a researcher at the Research Centre of the Montreal Geriatric Institute (CRIUGM).
Benjamin’s research aims to understand the neurophysiological mechanisms that influence the perception of effort, with the goal of improving health and performance. He is particularly interested in the interaction between effort, pain, and fatigue. He uses a multidisciplinary approach that integrates knowledge from physiology, psychology, and neuroscience. His work contributes to a better understanding of how the brain regulates performance, with a particular focus on endurance performance.

Topic covered:
Dissociation between perceptions of effort, pain and fatigue: why does it matter for endurance performance?

James Sadauckas

James Sadauckas, PhD, is Principal Engineer of Vehicle Dynamics in the Trek Performance Research (TPR) group for Trek Bicycle Corporation. A lifelong bicyclist across multiple disciplines with twenty years in motorcycle development and over five studying bicycle dynamics, he has authored one engineering book and numerous scientific papers. His primary research is in vehicle handling and stability with a focus on tire characterization and modelling as well as suspension dynamics related to vehicle ride quality and performance. James studied mechanical engineering at Marquette University and earned his PhD from the University of Padua, Italy. He works remotely to support Trek product research & development as well as collaborating with Lidl-Trek and Trek-Unbroken professional racing teams. James is proud to work alongside his esteemed TPR colleagues, experts in biomechanical, experimentation, structural, aerodynamics, and ride test, to bring a foundational, science-based approach to Trek and the broader bicycle industry. TPR’s goal is to provide a conduit of knowledge between stakeholders, academic partners, and the cycling public to get more people on bikes.

Topic covered:
Predicting Virtual Mountain Bike Tire Force & Moment Data for a New Combination of Tire Diameter and Width

Hilkka Kontro

Hilkka Kontro completed a PhD in Exercise Physiology in 2024 at the University of Calgary, where she currently works as a post-doctoral associate in Dr. Martin MacInnis’s lab. She also holds MSc degrees in Biochemistry from University of Helsinki and Exercise Physiology from University of Jyväskylä (Finland), and has also published research from her work at the University of Limerick (Ireland). Her research spans both basic and applied exercise physiology, with a particular focus on the determinants of endurance performance. Her PhD research focused on how changes in oxygen delivery affects the maximal metabolic steady state and durability. More recently, her work has centered on modeling acute cycling performance and training adaptations, including power-duration relationships, critical power, and fatigue modeling in cyclists.

Topic covered:
Modeling fatigue during severe-intensity exercise by maximum power available.

Delphine Périé-Curnier

Delphine Perie-Curnier is a full Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Biomedical Engineering at Polytechnique Montreal since 2008. Her main research area involves understanding and quantifying the cardiac behavior under stress conditions through new imaging protocols and modeling technologies. Her most important contributions vary from image analysis, mechanical testing, and numerical modeling to clinical applications in cardiomyopathy, knee arthroplasty and scoliosis. She even took her triathlon passion, having completed thirteen Ironman races, including the Ironman World Championships in Kailua-Kona twice, and more than forty Ironman 70.3 races all around the world, so far as to incorporate it into one of her research projects on cycling positioning for highest performance. Her expertise allows her to optimize the cyclist position from both a parameterized finite element model of the cyclist for computer fluid dynamics simulation to electromyographic, biomechanical and metabolic measurements.

Topic covered :
Aero handlebar positions effects on muscle activity, kinematics of the lower limb, oxygen uptake and aerodynamics.