Parkinson's diagnosis now drives American Ninja Warrior

A scratch golfer and former high school athlete, Jimmy Choi of Bolingbrook was just 27 when he was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease in the spring of 2003.

“I was shocked. I was so mad. I thought my doctors were wrong because Parkinson's was a disease for old people,” Choi remembers thinking. “All I knew was that there was no cure. I thought my life was over. I gave up.”

By 2011, his 250 pounds of muscle had turned into “250 pounds of not doing anything,” Choi says. He wallowed in denial and depression, and he needed a cane to walk short distances. Now 43, he is waiting to hear if he'll be selected for the third straight year to be a contestant in TV's “American Ninja Warrior,” the grueling obstacle-course competition where Choi has collected fans from everywhere and inspired countless people.

Running the obstacle course twice a week at Ultimate Ninjas in Naperville, where he also does strength training every other day, Choi runs up the 14-foot curved wall on Wednesday with ease. Competing against athletes half his age, Choi was praised for his effort during the 2017 “American Ninja Warrior” qualifiers in Kansas City, but he fell, as did half the competitors, on an obstacle requiring them to run across two spinning logs. In 2018 in Indianapolis, he fell on the fourth obstacle known as the “wheel flip,” where athletes need to propel themselves from one wheel to another.

“That was Parkinson's,” Choi says, his hands shaking slightly as he rocks back and forth while explaining how balance issues dropped him off the spinning logs and kept his right side from swinging in rhythm to generate momentum on the wheels. If chosen as a competitor this year, Choi vows to make it through that first stage.

A baseball player, wrestler and captain of the football team as a member of Bolingbrook High School's Class of 1994, Choi regressed after his Parkinson's diagnosis until a turning point in 2011 involving his baby son, Mason.

“I carried him down the stair, and we both fell,” says Choi, who suffered bruises but saved his son from injury. Choi's wife, Cherryl, and their daughter, Karina, witnessed the fall.

“When I saw the look on their faces, I knew something had to change,” says Choi, a Purdue University graduate and computer programmer. “I started educating myself about Parkinson's. Everywhere I looked, exercise was a constant key word.”

Using a cane for balance, Choi and his family started walking around the block every night. Then he started walking around the block a couple of times. Then he ditched the cane.

In April 2012, he finished a 5K race, In May, he ran a 10K. June saw him complete a 15K. He completed his first half-marathon in September. In October, Choi completed the Chicago Marathon in 4 hours 26 minutes.

“Jimmy took a single step, and that turned into a walk and that turned into a run and a jog, and next thing you knew he was racing,” actor and Parkinson's advocate Michael J. Fox says in a video about Choi. “It gives people a chance to engage, and engagement is empowerment.”

Now Choi has run 15 marathons, 104 half-marathons and one 50-mile ultramarathon, and he has ridden his bike in many 100-mile events. He once ran a half-marathon and a marathon on consecutive days, and his fastest marathon time is 3 hours 40 minutes. His daughter never knew him as someone without Parkinson's, and she kept pressing him to try out for “American Ninja Warrior.”

“I can't,” Choi would explain. “I have Parkinson's.”

In 2017, he gave it a try and made the qualifiers. The actor Fox sent a video message to Choi, who was competing for Team Fox, which raises money for Parkinson's research. This past Saturday, the Chois hosted their fifth annual “Shake It Off” to raise money for Fox Foundation, with Mason, 9, playing the national anthem on his violin. The first year, the race attracted 300 runners, including eight with Parkinson's. This year, it drew more than 1,000 runners, 74 with Parkinson's. Their efforts have raised $390,000 for Parkinson's research.

This will be Choi's last attempt at “American Ninja Warrior,” but he will teach others how to compete. His daughter, 11, recently finished second in the nation in her age group for “American Ninja Warrior Junior.” He also gives more than a dozen inspirational speeches each year and will be featured at the Parkinson's Patient and Family Spring Symposium from 8:30 a.m. until 12:30 p.m. Sunday, April 28, at Northwestern Medicine Lake Forest Hospital, 1000 N. Westmoreland Road in Lake Forest. To register for that free event, phone (847) 535-8244. Fans can follow Choi at thefoxninja.com, on Facebook, and on Instagram, where he is @jcfoxninja.

The way medications are delivered, the advance of deep brain stimulation and the recent studies showing the value of exercise are helping patients live better with Parkinson's disease, says Dr. Avram Fraint, who specializes in neurology at Northwestern Medicine Lake Forest Hospital and is aware of Choi's accomplishments.

“Assuming they are safe to do it, exercise is nonnegotiable,” Fraint tells his patients. “Exercise is the best chance they have of slowing the disease down.”

Choi still falls sometimes, and he has days when he can't get out of bed. But he finds strength is his accomplishments.

“I relate that back to how I live my life,” Choi says. “Exercise and nutrition is not a hobby. It has to be a lifestyle change.”