Abstract
On 1st December 2006, Olivier Girard presented his Ph.D. thesis titled ‘Neuromuscular fatigue and mechanical alterations in intermittent activities: applications to racket sports’, concluding five intensive years (including a master’s degree on the same topic) of study on the analysis of racket sport determinants at the Faculty of Sports Science in Montpellier in the South of France. The jury included Jean-François Kahn (reviewer), Jean-Paul Micallef (co-supervisor), Grégoire Millet (supervisor), Alain Martin (reviewer), as well as Adrian Lees (examiner) and Robin Candau (examiner). The Ph.D. thesis comprised 480 pages and 570 references, including an extensive review of the physiological and biomechanical determinants of racket sports, with ten studies either published or pending publication. After a three-hour presentation, followed by questions from the jury, Olivier received the rank of Ph.D. in Human Movement Sciences with the highest grade available in France.