O'Hanlon will take to the start line for a special, invitation-only 100m race in Rio de Janeiro on Monday to celebrate it being one year from next year's Paralympic Games.

The race will involve para-athletes from a variety of classifications.

O'Hanlon is the world record holder in the T38 cerebral palsy class with a time of 10.79 seconds. He is the most decorated athlete in the field with five Paralympic gold medals and seven world titles, having cleaned up at the 2008 Beijing Games and in London in 2012.

O'Hanlon is using the trip to Rio as the perfect preparation ahead of next year's Paralympic Games.

"It's an absolute honour to be invited, not only to race for the title of fastest Paralympian in the world, but also to race in Brazil one year before the Games," O'Hanlon said.

"I feel travelling to Brazil and racing will put me in a better position to defend my unbeaten run at the Paralympics next year in Brazil.

"Getting to experience the actual journey to Brazil, which is quite long from Australia and then racing once there is a huge advantage. The experience will also give us all a good understanding of what Rio 2016 will be like."

The man to catch is Ireland's four-time Paralympic gold medallist Jason Smyth.

The visually-impaired sprinter's world record in para-athletics competition is 10.46 seconds, however he has a personal best of 10.22 seconds at an able-bodied meet.

"In terms of the race itself, I'm looking forward to racing the best the IPC has to offer," O'Hanlon said.

"I'm particularly looking forward to sharing an office with Jason Smyth, the fastest Paralympian ever. He is like the Roger Federer of our sport and the opportunity to race alongside him will be an experience in itself."

O'Hanlon is no stranger to testing himself outside of his classification.

He officially became the fastest man in the ACT - including able-bodied 100m sprinters - this year at the Athletics ACT championships in February.

O'Hanlon was seventh in a time of 11.10 seconds, but was the first Canberra athlete to cross the line.

He sat out the 2013-14 season recovering from meningitis before returning to the track in November last year to start his preparations for next year's Paralympics.