CHENNAI: Kamal Kanta Nayak, a youth from Odisha who is paralysed from the waist down, successfully attempted an entry in the Guinness Book of World Records for covering the longest distance on a manual wheelchair by breaking the previous record of 182 km in 24 hours.
He completed a 213-km run on his manual wheelchair at Bhubaneswar by using NeoFly wheelchair, which was designed and developed by the TTK Center for Rehabilitation Research and Device Development (R2D2) of IIT-Madras and NeoMotion, a start-up from IIT-Madras.
Sujatha Srinivasan, Head of R2D2 said, "The wheelchair was designed for Kamal’s body to provide him the correct ergonomics and comfort. Selection of appropriate wheel size and centre of gravity location was done to ensure Kamal's energy was used efficiently during the long run."
Kamal trained on NeoFly for this record attempt for over four years, with product refinements based on his feedback. A team from IIT-M and NeoMotion, was present at the event venue for with technical support.