Over the weekend, a Monegasque team of firefighters took part in the Trail Trophée de Biot, which saw them race along forest trails with a disabled team member as they sought to win a prize for the Monaco Liver Disorder Association. 

When a person is sick or disabled, they can miss out on things that the rest of us take for granted. Simple acts can become monumental tasks and often they don’t get to experience things the way they should or could.  

This is where the Trail Pour Tous comes in. The association takes those who cannot go out on their own on nature trails in the comfort of a joëlette, a wheelchair-type construction that is specially made for trails and features sturdy wheels and handles to make pushing and pulling the chair on uneven terrain easier. 

“It all started with the motorcycle accident of a friend, in Èze, who became a paraplegic,” explains Jérôme Fouffé, the president and founder of the Trail Pour Tous. “It was when I learned that he regularly looked at the photos of trail [events] organised in the region that we wanted to find a way to take him to them with a small group on a joëlette. That was in 2009, then we founded our association in 2014 to buy other joëlettes and help families in the Alpes-Maritimes and the Var.”  

This year’s winning team were a group of firefighters from Cagnes-sur-Mer, who were followed by a Nice police team and firefighters from Menton. The Monegasque firefighters racing for the Monaco Liver Disorder Association came in sixth.    

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Photo source: Monaco Liver Disorder