My Dad boxes three times a week with Rock Steady Boxing at the Border City Boxing Club in Windsor. When I was down for a visit a few weeks back I attended his Saturday class and captured some moments. This amazing program gives people with Parkinson’s disease hope by improving their quality of life through a boxing-focused fitness curriculum.
Parkinson’s disease is a degenerative movement disorder which causes deterioration of motor skills, balance, speech and sensory function. Watching my Dad experience the symptoms of this terrible disease has been difficult — especially the lack of energy — but I was amazed at his (and everyone else’s) motivation through the workout! I got tired just watching them. I feel incredibly grateful to the coaches of this amazing program.
Rock Steady Boxing initially began through the friendship of two men, Scott Newman and Vince Perez, after Scott had been diagnosed with early-onset Parkinson’s at the age of 40. Refusing to let his friend go down without a fight, Vince turned to his experience as a Golden Gloves boxer to design a program that attacks Parkinson’s at its vulnerable neurological points. His intuitive insight is now proven to have merit through an increasing body of medical research.