INSEP is the National Institute of Sport, Expertise, and Performance (Institut National du Sport, de l’Expertise et de la Performance). It is a French training institute and centre for excellence in sport that trains elite athletes.

INSEP is France’s flagship institution for sporting excellence. The institute has unique and high quality infrastructure, including specific sports equipment, medical and recovery facilities, scientific research, accommodation and food services. The institute prepares over 700 athletes from 22 sports for future international events;

INSEP also offers individual athlete’s personalised support for training and professional conversion, supporting athletes in their “dual career” projects.

INSEP and ESC2 project

The vocational courses offered at INSEP aim at enhancing the competences of professionals working in the field of elite sport. They cover several intervention fields: sport training, sport management and coaching (mentoring).

INSEP drives a multi-disciplinary research laboratory working on several research areas: stress, recovery and movement. These includes research topics such as workload monitoring, performance analysis, recovery, injury prevention and innovative training that will be crucial in the implementation of the project of a European Strength and Conditioning training course.

INSEP can also lean on the expertise and competences of a national network called “Grand INSEP” built up with the regional centres of performance (CREPS). The “Grand INSEP” network gather experts in sports, research, vocational training, etc.

INSEP, as the French National Elite Sport Institute, it is the only centre gathering such a wide range of resources: technicians, researchers, teachers-trainers, medical staff, etc. Each vocational training program is coordinated by an expert working with a network of teachers/trainers (around 30 INSEP teacher-trainers + outside INSEP teacher-trainers), scientists (INSEP owns a laboratory in the field of Sport Performance: biomechanics, physiology, psychology), elite sport coaches, elites sport managers, (mentoring) coaches.

INSEP key figures:

  • 800 top-level athletes
  • 150 national coaches
  • 18 sports & 24 Olympic disciplines
  • 50% medallists in Rio 2016 trained at INSEP
  • 300 INSEP collaborators
  • 52 teachers/trainers
  • 500 vocational trainees per year
  • 20 researchers
  • 80 medical & paramedical staff