AdaptX Podcast #41- Preparing for the Paris Paralympics with Chuck Aoki

Introduction and Chuck Aoki's Role at the University of Michigan okay welcome to the adap ex podcast where we have conversations with individuals who are building accessible businesses advocating for inclusion or excelling in adaptive Sports Our intention is never to speak on behalf of those with disabilities but give them a platform to share their stories so we can make a more accessible world today we're joined by Chuck Aoki a three-time US par Olympic medalist four-time World Championship medalist and three-time parapan American medalist in the sport of wheelchair rugby he is currently training for the Paris 2024 par Olympic games where he will Captain the US team now residing in Arbor Michigan he also works for the University of Michigan in their adaptive Sports and Fitness Department Chuck thank you for joining me today yeah my pleasure Bron thanks for having me uh we're big fans of um Mish um we worked with their Fitness and Recreation Department uh a bunch of their trainers took our adaptic course uh and we've been following the work of Dr o Eric yourself pretty closely our creative director for the nonprofit as a student at uh University of Michigan and undergrad uh majoring in ux design so Mich is uh big fans exciting football season as well um so what is your what is your role at the University yeah so my role at University of Michigan is actually a pretty unique one and pretty cool so we have a a position called the Community Access Navigator and that's a a role that we designed via the um via the Craig H nelon Foundation Grant we received to essentially you know very broadly speaking get folks with spinal core injuries more active Sports and Fitness competitive Sports Recreation sports fitness opportun doesn't really matter just how can we get more active and then on the second hand a little more unique to us is we also really are trying to get the medical community more engaged whether that's doctors pts residents OTS uh really seeing that as the pipeline and way to get people involved in adaptive Sports um you know anyone who's been in adaptive sports for a while knows that there really is no systematic way you get involved in it it's not like a kid who grows up you know F five hits oh what's your kid going to play it's Sports oh baseball soccer whatever uh there really isn't that for disability because it strikes it so many different times and so so one of the goals of our The Community Access Navigator Role and Engaging the Medical Community program along with our program director Dr F Mami is to to let's systematize let's find ways to build consistent pipelines and Pathways into adapted Sports and the way we said is everybody goes to the doctor so why wouldn't we um reach out to that so I do a lot of work um educating like I said educating medical providers medical students as well kind of trying to get them on the front end saying hey you're in school let's get you some experiences with this so that you know as they become future clinicians they're like oh that's right I remember adaptive Sports and they'll seek that out you know what ever they end up across the country you know that some will hopefully stay here in an AR but inevitably a lot will travel elsewhere so it's been a really really rewarding program to get to be a part of um and a really cool thing we're doing here at Michigan yeah that was a a conversation that we had with a guest um 10 episodes or so ago Sarah skills about medical professionals uh maybe not being well equipped to work with disabilities or maybe not being well versed in the etiquette and the communication did you have any experiences growing up up that kind of were negative or maybe on the contrary positive yeah you know like a lot of kids who grew up with disability I grew up with mine um rare congenital genetic disorder uh certainly had a mix you know certainly had a mix of of interactions I think we I think what I would say is I had a lot of sort of neutral to bad ones until we sort of found the good doctors who we really liked a lot my mom you know is very persistent we're going to Experiences with Medical Professionals and Disability Etiquette find you the best possible care she said I don't care if we wait in the waiting room for an hour to see them as long as when we get in there they spend whatever time is necessary with us and so we went through some iterations of you know some doctors who would kind of look at me and say oh okay not really sure what's going on there like I guess we could try something until and so we'd say okay great kind of on to the next one let's find someone who's really going to sit down and and and deal with it so I think I've been lucky in my life to have doctors who were who are really uh open to learning you know what I have is fairly rare um and so it's not the kind of thing where even something like spinabifida or spinal core injury doctors at least have heard of that and know like okay I know generally how to treat this even if there are idiosyncrasies to every single person um what I had was fairly rare and so I was like okay how can we really treat that you know some doctors were very curious some weren't and so it was it was a process definitely of getting through the system and finding it but you know you talk to anyone with disability they inevitably have a story of you know they weren't believed someone said oh I don't think it's that bad or well have you just tried this it's like yes I've tried that that's why I'm here so yeah it's a really important thing to to work with doctors on disability kind of how do you interact with a patient with disability who may present with something that normally you would say okay I'm going to I'm going to quote unquote fix this person that's my job it's like well no some of this thing is just static this is how I am I need help with this other thing that any is so I think that's that's one of the biggest challenges and one of the things we worked over come and I know it's a it's a challenge as well that you know quite frankly they're just not taught it you know medical school is already busy and packed as it is it's kind of gets left by the wayside so that's also something we're working here at Michigan to try and change is how can we get involved with the medical school and their curriculum as well but uh but yeah overall I would say you know my my interactions with doctors now are pretty pretty positive but I think that's through you know sort of painstaking effort to really spend the time to find that person who's really going to spend that good time with you and and get to know you and understand you which you know quite Frank I think you'd want from a doctor able-bodied or disabled yeah what was the diagnostic process like I was reading some various things about how you broke a leg and continued to uh to play sports because um your condition you uh don't have necessarily feeling in your extremities so yeah so I have a a very rare genetic condition briefly it's called hereditary Diagnostic Process and Rare Genetic Condition sensory autonomic neuropathy type 2 um very fancy word essentially I have no sensation elbows down and knees down um nothing pain hot cold vibration uh and so the diagnostic process for me was actually quite interesting you know as a as a very young child like infant to toddler presented fairly normally uh maybe it was a little KY but nothing that nothing that seemed out of the ordinary until I learned how to walk on my knees which my parents like that's kind of odd like I don't know why he's doing that and then as a toddler when I was teething I would literally chew my fingers like not like sucking like actually chew and my mom would see the little bite marks I was leaving and she took me to the doctor here we go with the doctor's and said hey like this seems unusual right and the do oh he'll grow out of it she was like well shouldn't this hurt and he's like oh no he'll grow out of it and you know a new mom does not expect her child to have a rare genetic disorder so she kind of said okay I'm sure the doctor's right and seen it before for and so uh but so there was sort of ongoing things like that that would happen the next couple years that was probably when I was two or three a lot of ongoing different things where I would like I said I would one day I think I was curious so I ripped a bunch of my nail off as a little kid cuz I wanted to see it was under it and this led to a discovery of a bedroom wall covered in blood in the morning and my mom terrified and there was me smiling say hey good morning mom um and so that led to um ging Nerf biopsy done and eventually going down to the male clinic when I was 10 years old to sort of get the official diagnosis of the hereditary sensory autopathy type 2 which again fairly rare there's five different types what I have I have I actually have one of the least severe um it goes all the way up to folks who have no sensation on their entire body I have Navigating Disability and Social Dynamics in Childhood um significantly more than that and yeah so that's pretty much what happened is we went to the maale clinic we did some tests we learned about the autonomic component I also don't sweat on parts of my body uh so really you know from a scientific perspective a very interesting process um and luckily we were but but we figured it out fairly early as you mentioned I when I was six I think I broke my leg um and walked on it and no one really realized cuz it didn't hurt um and so that is what led me to start using a wheelchair part-time um and then finally switched using it full-time at age 10 so I could preserve what Mobility I have in my legs which is not a lot but I've still got a little bit so it uh it was an interesting process to say the least I know I'm certainly caused a lot of stress on my my parents at the time but all all in all it's landed you know in a good place I've got a good good kind of understanding what I've got going on and sort of know how to know how to handle myself why was there a seven or eighty year period perod between the initial uh concern and like the Mayo Clinic uh a couple reasons I think one was just uncertainty kind of generally from my parents like well maybe this you know we don't actually know again this this this the thing I have is quite rare so it was like the the nerve biopsy we Connecting with Others with the Same Diagnosis did in Minneapolis where I'm from was sort of like oh it's probably this um but I think it never really presented as as a big problem uh until I broke my leg and that was probably was about seven and at that point it's like okay let's really kind of settle down actually drilled out and kind of figured out and I think another reason there was it took some time is because while going to M Clinic is you know very interesting very cool place the reality is that going there was really just to confirm what we had kind of already figured was happening you know the doctor the neurologist ahead in Minnesota had research and yeah I'm pretty sure this is it kind of done some good digging on that so it was really just a case of let's go here to kind of double check confirm make sure we're not missing anything we discovered that I didn't sweat um on parts of my body but uh but yeah yeah so it's really just more just sort of a it it was no rush to go down there because we' gotten a pretty good sense of what was going on it's like let's just sort of you know check the box and make sure yep we're right this is what's happening and again if there's any little things you could do cuz I actually have not been back to the male clinic as a patient since because it was sort of like all right this is what you got calls if you need anything so how was your childhood like uh navigating like disability and social dynamics yeah it's interesting um I think my childhood was was was was all in all pretty good you know my parents were very supportive of me um but they were also very sort of uh driving of me you know what I I said I grew up playing sports uh loved Sports you know played baseball played soccer able-bodied and you know eventually was like okay can't play these anymore and I was obviously very upset very distraught as a little kid as any young kid would be being told hey you're not going to play sports anymore um but you know my parents allowed me to be upset they didn't try to say hey don't be mad don't be sad they were like you know they got it but they also said at the end of the day okay I know you're mad but we're going to going to find something for you to do we're going to find some way for you to be active like you're not you're certainly not just going to sit at home all day and so they enrolled me in swimming lessons and through that is how I uh then also found wheelchair basketball and so that really gave me a nice a nice pathway into being active and being around other folks with disabilities uh there were certainly a lot of times especially as a younger kid where I really felt isolated um in that like I'm the only one in a wheelchair why is this happening to me this doesn't seem fair you know nobody else has to deal with it why do I have to deal with it did I do something wrong um a lot of frustration around that but you know again I give a lot of credit to my to my parents who said like hey you're just we're going to figure this out you know yeah it sucks but we're going to figure it out we don't have much choice in life um and then you know socially I think I was really lucky I went to a school where the teachers in the building and the students were actually quite supportive um I you know encountered a little bit of bullying as a kid but not a lot honestly I considered myself really lucky had a good group of friends who were kind of like hey yeah you use a wheelchair okay like we're just going to figure it out you know and inevitably I'm sure I missed out out on some social opportunities but didn't really know about it this is of course before social media dating myself a little so it's not like I was watching on Facebook or Instagram or something people doing stuff that I wasn't at um but you know I I think I ultimately was able to find a good group of friends and again really finding Sports and having a team in that aspect of other kids also going through those challenges really is a was a robust support system that I think helped me a lot and you know some of those people are still my very close friends to this day awesome yeah I think I'm sure we'll talk about representation a bit as we kind of transition into the paralympic uh discussion did you were you able to connect with anyone that had the same diagnosis as you did that matter to you um yeah so I I I have never met anyone actually with type two I I I can't I really can't stress how how rare this is I think when I was officially being diagnosed in the male clinic the doctor said yeah well we know the family of five in Canada with this and that's all the other people we actually know with your type so it's very very rare there's proba there's there's certainly more um but you know in a country that maybe doesn't have quite as advanced medicine it might present very differently or confusingly um and so my mom actually you know early on this is of course early days of the internet was all forums trying to find she she connected actually with a mom in Sweden whose son had type three so fairly similar to mine and I know they chatted and talked and kind of interacted we've never actually met unfortunately but they they chatted and engaged but no i' I've never met anyone else uh really with my diagnosis I you know I think what's what I always found with my uh disabilities I find people who have bits and pieces kind of like me you know someone who's walking oh yeah I get that someone who has hand impairment oh yeah I kind of get that you know I kind of bring all these different things together and really just find community and you know just moving through life differently or or you know opening plastic bags differently or whatever like that so it's never been something for me that I just felt like this desire oh I've got to meet someone else who's who's just like me I think just the community as a whole has been has been really helpful you have a very prolific academic background Masters in uh public policy from U Minnesota and a PhD uh from University of Denver still work the PHD is not there not there Sor in in process yeah yeah permanent Hiatus we'll call her but um what were you initially Academic Background and Pursuit of Public Policy interested in pursuing and has that uh evolved over the last few years yeah it it has you know I think uh my dad's a professor so I've academics has always been a big part of my life and something I've always been important on and you know I think my career has been in sport of course and that's what I've spent a lot of my time doing but I've always been the kind of person who couldn't just do one thing you know I couldn't just train and then come home and kind of sit on the couch like all right well that was a good day it's like I've got to have something else push me forward and for a long time academics was that thing uh whether it was my undergraduate degree and then you know saying finished my undergrad okay you know what am I going to do now because my degree was in teaching which I love to teach I would I would happily be a teacher but it just that was not very conducive with the athlete lifestyle unfortunately of traveling and being all over the country and all over the world so I said all right well what can I do instead and so I was looking at different you know sort of next level higher education programs and I landed on public policy because you know a big part of my life and a big part of how I've always wanted to be is what can I give back to society right how can I like build the next generation of of whatever whether it's disabled athletes whether it's you know Advocates on whatever issue how can I build that and so I think public policy where I landed on this is a way to kind of learn how to uh navigate and Advocate within the systems and structures that exist you know like within governments within nonprofits kind of an understanding of how to do it so I think you know I entered into it with a with a global public policy Focus we call I was very interested in you know sort of how do we how do we manage Global issues and how do we kind of work together to solve these really challenging Global problems like climate change or you know just the rights of person with disabilities globally like how do we kind of handle those things um so I was very interested in that um and then I was doing that for a while and graduate and then kind of was in the same situation I said okay what am I going to do now I'm probably not going to go work full-time this was two years before what was supposed to be the 2020 uh Tokyo Paralympics and I said well I guess I could someone start of said why don't you see if you could do a PhD I like okay I guess I'll apply for it um and so I got in at the University of Denver um and I was really interested in studying the effects of big data and Technology sort of on Democracy like how we view democracy how it's affecting democracy I was affecting the world around us uh really enjoyed my research there uh really was having a good time had a group of people was allowing me the flexibility to travel and compete but also sort of scratching my my nerd side as I like to call it um but uh but then the uh obviously the covid-19 pandemic happened as we all recall um it went remote and I kind of lost Steam on it had some health issues that was kind of battling through and you know it's something that I always have in my back pocket I can always go back to certainly or lean into but i' I've really been like if we discussed earlier lucky to this opportunity University of Michigan um had some other interests come up some you know as paralympic sport is growing there's more commercial opportunities there coming along and so you know it's something that I'm I'm always a learner I've always been a learner I always have to be learning the next thing if I'm driving my wife nuts I read books dense history textbooks she's like why are you reading that why don't you read something fun I like Well I this is fun she's like okay 800 pages on the the medes is fun for you and it's like it is so um so yeah no academics and learning has always been a big part of my life and you know it's it's like I said currently it's on Hiatus for a bit but it's something I know I can always kind of go back to and lean on that background yeah absolutely maybe in some way you can find a way to um maneuver it Transition from Wheelchair Basketball to Wheelchair Rugby into your time at Michigan find a find a way to incorporate it there you're a first competitive sport was wheelchair basketball uh but now obviously competing in wheelchair rugby what influenced that transition from basketball to rugby yeah so yeah so grew up playing wheelchair basketball absolutely loved it had a blast um and yeah really made some great friends with it and it was it was a great sport but what it happened when I when I way I found wheelchair rugby I I'd heard of it a little bit growing up but never really considered it much um but in 2005 the movie murderball came out which folks may not be familiar with um you know documentary about 2004 excuse me US paralympic team and you know I was a 15-year-old boy at the time so I saw people smashing at each other and talking trash and crashing and partying and swearing and I was like that looks awesome and so my mom was like well I don't know like I don't have to look into it and so you know we did a little looking and I discovered that I would be eligible for it you know because as as folks may not realize wheelchair basketball is very open to you know essentially anyone with a lower limb impairment of some kind it's quite it's quite open whereas Wich rugby you have to have an impairment in at least three and typically uh four Limbs and because of my hand impairments that I have that are pretty significant I was like oh I think I'd actually be eligible for this I think I could play it uh so I was like well let's find out and so you know after some back and forth they finally relented okay you can go to practice so I went to a practice in Minnesota I showed up you know I probably weighed 120 lbs and at the time there was you know guys who were former D2 football players guys who' played for like 15 years and they kind of looked at you know scrawny little me's like you want to you want to play the sport I was like yeah I want to play there like okay sounds good um so I hopped in a chair and as I like to say I got beat up and sent flying and tipped over and crashed into the walls and just you know UT utterly destroyed for about two hours straight uh but I fell in love with it that night you know I I really did the the competitiveness the the intensity the phys ality of it you know it really just it it spoke to me in a way that you know again I love basketball but never never had played anything like rugby and just just instantly fell in love with the sport so that set me off on the path I am today um to be here and so yeah I was like I said it was it was love at first site and the other other joke I'd like to make is that in basketball I was I was pretty fast I was good at uh chair positioning kind of playing defense ceiling picking all those things I was terrible at shooting really really terrible at shooting so then Along Comes the sport where you had to push really fast be good at your chair be evasive evasive good at defense but you don't have to shoot the basketball and I was like this is perfect so it really it really aligned in a lot of ways for me to um to have success uh pretty quickly in that as well yeah I don't think people realize how uh physically demanding how fast how like aggressive the sport is I think there's always a tendency to just assume that these are lower level sports but like one if people have watch wheelchair rugby definitely suggest you should and maybe can you provide for people who haven't Overview of Wheelchair Rugby and Gameplay seen it or heard it maybe just like a gross overview of what gaml is like maybe how many athletes on each side rules um Etc yeah absolutely so wheel TR rugby is the only full con fully full contact Paralympics sport I like to say uh it's played on a basketball court uh four on four four players on each team and we each have little chairs that they're like little battams they're like little tanks quite frankly if you can imagine your average wheelchair I would add about 30 lbs to that thing and armor it up put big old metal guards on it and put the wheels are covered in Spoke guards and they just they really are built for combat I like to say and so then the game proceeds we have a tip off and we've got sort of two two try lines either end of the court and to score a point all you have to do is go across that line with the ball in your possession you know sounds very simple um then there are some rules sort of around how the game it's really a mix of rugby wheelchair basketball there's a little bit of hockey into it it's kind of a mix of sports actually and so it's really unique um each play starts with an inbound you know you inbound the ball you've got 10 seconds to do that you've got 12 seconds to advance across half court you got 40 seconds to score the ball entirely so we've got a score clock uh very similar to a shot clock that kind of keeps the um keeps the game flowing you know they did not used to have that uh and so You' have situations where teams would stall and hold the ball for a minute or two and it honestly was just not very good for spectators uh but now it's very fastpaced very hard-hitting as I said it's completely full contact the only contact that's not allowed is you can't physically like hit other players now they let a lot of that go to be honest with you um incidental contact is kind of like ah it's okay um and you're not allowed to hit players behind the axle is what we like to say which is which essentially is a situation where you know if you can imagine if a person is pushing a wheelchair and you hit the very back of their wheel you'll send them into a tail spit and that could be quite dangerous a lot of players don't have trunk function they won't be able to catch themselves as they fall so those hits are illegal but other than that it's pretty much all all fair game um when you're out in the court and so it I tell people it's it's very loud it's one of the loudest Sports you're going to hear two metal 50 45lb chairs just crashing into each other there's nothing quite like it uh but there's also a lot of tactics to it you know when you first watch it you think oh my God they're just running into each other and crashing and flying uh but the deeper you get into it you realize there's lots of strategies lots of logic um like most ppic sports we have a classification system which I'm happy to to get into it if we'd like to as well obviously there's a lot of strategy that goes into lineups who's on the court what they're doing at a time and so I like to say it's it's it's chess but in in bumper cars so it's uh it's it's a it's a lot of fun I you know as you said I encourage folks to check it out on YouTube or you know obviously upcoming Summer and the par Olympics on on NBC and peacock you'll be able to see see lots of it so it's a it's a very very exciting uh spectator friendly sport we can touch on those classifications real quick if you want sure yeah you know I think it's it's an important aspect of of Paris sport you know every you know a lot of people watch paralympic sport for the first time and they're like well why is that person against that person this doesn't make any sense and you know the idea is that we're always trying to be as balanced as we can based on a function level so what that is to say is that ideally someone who is missing an Classification System in Wheelchair Rugby entire leg is not running against a person with s ball policy for example that the the the impairments are not similar there uh but so for wheelchair rugby specifically I'll overview this quickly and briefly is we every player has assigned a score or classification score value and those values range from 0.5 all the way up to 3.5 in Half Point increments so 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 Etc and so as I said before there's four players on the court the four players total point value cannot be more than eight so if you can imagine you know if 3.5 is the highest functioning player you cannot have more than two of those players on the court at any time you can't have more than two 3.0 players which is my classification you if you're going to have a player of a higher value you're going to have to balance it out with lower players or lower value players I should say and so I like to say it's the meritocracy of paralympic sport and it's it's a little a little unusual I think for folks for fans of of of Able by sport because it's I I describe it as it's it's if in the NBA they said okay you can have a guy who's seven feet tall no problem but you got to have a guy who's under 5'8 and they'd be like people like oh that'd be weird but that's the best way I've always found to describe is the idea is like because disability is spread all across different function levels and it's all place you know you we we have to kind of find a way to balance otherwise the folks at the lower end of the spectrum would just have a harder time keeping up and it wouldn't be their fault they can be the best athlete work as hard as they can but if they're paralyzed from you know the chest down and have limited arm function they're simply not going to be able to do the same things and the quadruple MPT you know who is missing their hands and their feet but otherwise is fairly Able by isn't going to be able to do so it's a it's a really unique system I think it's something that when people watch it for the first time paralympic Sport and wheelchair rugby for the first time they'll say well why is that person going slower like is there someone faster it's like well maybe but it's I say within that person's classification they're actually incredibly fast they are the fastest in the world at their classification relative to the other players maybe they look a bit slower but they're out there again to kind of balance that people get that oh that makes sense and then like I said there's a lot of depth and understanding kind of what's going on with those classifications I think is very interesting yeah you referred to it as chess is anecdotally is there any is it better to have like four 2.0's or two 3.5s and two halves like have you guys kind of played around obviously I'm sure you have and figured out kind of what the best orientation is yeah so it's a great question um so it depends on depends on the country and it also kind of depends on your pool of athletes the Australians for example who are one of our top Rivals they have leaned pretty heavily into the what we call a high low lineup so 235 players 20.5 players they're really big on on running that kind of lineup uh we in the US tend to Training and Physical Traits in Wheelchair Rugby run more what we call balanced lineups so that would be like myself with a 2.5 player and a 2.0 player and a a 0.5 player or myself with a 2.5 player a 1.5 player and a 1.0 player we kind of we we tend to run more in the balance side um of the of the game the way we like to play it but it really depends you know a lot of it also ends up being uh what sort of talent you have if you have really talented 2.0's you're going to want to find a way to get them on the court you know if you have really talented 1.0 you're going to want to find a way to get them on the court you know and so there's a lot of Strat think goes involved in kind of figuring out what are we going to do and it's one of the biggest challenges the coach have at the beginning of the Season When selecting the roster is okay what are we going to balance this with you might have six really good let's say 1.5 players but you're not going to be able to play six of them so what do you how do you balance that with people on the higher end it's it's a really interesting um sort of issue that they have to deal with for lack of a better term has has there been any like unified um wheelchair rugby where maybe you have quote unquote an able-bodied athlete playing alongside other with disability and is they're kind of a it seems like that would be an easy way or this classification system seems like it would be an easy way to kind of level that playing field to a degree um yeah so there there have not been yet um wheelchair basketball I know has done that in Canada for example a able-bodied players play in their leagues um we've had conversations about it you know a big belief we have here at Michigan actually is that adaptive sports are for everyone especially since to your point you sit in a chair yes you're going to have more function in some ways but you're also you're still sitting you know you're not running around and so we have a lot of conversations about what that could look like you know certainly in our practices uh here at Michigan for example we have volunteers student volunteers who come and they'll hop in the chair and play and some of them get pretty good over time and so we have we have never put together kind of a full true league but it's something that I I have a lot of interest in you know I think it's a great way to grow paralympic sporters to basically say look this is for everybody you know and to your point classification is a way to kind of balance it out um I know they The Clash Fighters get a little not annoyed but they work meticulously to have this nice balanced system and so you then add a let's call it a 4.0 class for able players it's like oh what do we do now now all the Math's on off but we could figure that out yeah and also just like just because I don't have a diagnosed disability doesn't mean I'm obviously not going to be better at wheelchair rugby than you so I shouldn't just be uh automatically 4.0 uh just because I don't have a diagnosis so uh what physical traits are most important for wheelchair rugby yeah so wheelchair rugby I think there's there's there's two or three physical traits that are really important especially you know particularly to P at high levels you've got to be very fast you know the game moves extremely fast even if you're a 0.5 you've got to be incredibly fast as a 0.5 you know uh obviously you're not going to be expected to chase down 3.0 but you've got to be able to be extremely fast within your classification um so speed is one um endurance is another it's a very physical sport you know getting hit then having to start up again is is just tiring you know and doing that over the course of 48 minute quarters with a stopped clock you end up you're on the court for hour and a half two hour you're on the court for a very very long time and so you have to have really strong um really strong endurance to be able to do that successfully uh that's that's a big one is really having that that sort of strength endurance and then the the third thing that I'll say is and this is this is not quite physical but I think it is in some ways is you know I you have to be tough you have to be really okay with getting hit it's the best way to put it you know I when the way I describe this is um when players first show up typically we see them and you know get them in the chair and they're pushing around they like oh this is good cool and the first time they get hit for real not like a little love tap but someone really comes and hits them you pretty much know if that person is going to be a whech rugby player or if they're going to be something else because they get hit and half the time their eyes light up and they're like oh oh okay they hit you back or they it and other times they get hit and they kind of kind of shrink down oh like what was that like not so sure about that and this is not to denigrate anyone you know not it's not for everybody and that's okay you know it's not for not everybody likes to get hit not everybody plays hockey not everybody plays you know American football so I don't I certainly don't um I don't I don't I don't talk bad about anyone who does that but you do have to have this sort of slight slight sort of craziness about you where you say yeah getting hit yeah sign me up for that like let me get let me get knocked around and dipped over and sent flying and you know I think that's one of the cool things about our sport is you find that all the athletes involved we we had that missing in our lives you know whether they people were injured midlife and we're kind of missing that thing that made them feel alive or someone like myself who's never played you know ice hockey or or like I said football and I was like where is that where's that real feeling of it I think that's a that's a really important one I played golf so I can't even begin to uh relate it anyway oh you'd be surprised you'd be surprised uh how do you train outside of specific sport practice do you guys supplement with strength and conditioning and yeah yeah I think one of the great things about paralympic sport in the last you know I would say it's like 10 years maybe even longer maybe 12 years is that it's really become more professionalized in terms of training in terms of there's a lot more sort of trainers who are willing and interested to learn about training adaptive athletes and there's really been a a broad movement across the board for par athletes saying no we're going to take this seriously we're not just going to show up and get bu our function no we're going to be serious athletes um and so strength conditioning is a huge part of what we do um for myself personally it's uh usually lifting weights three to four times a week and then I'm in my chair doing a lot of Sprint work uh I would say also three to four times a week although I know those that numberers weird I not I don't go eight days a week or anything like that um but you know it's a balance of both you know I think for my sport you know the longest I'm ever going to Sprint full speed is 94 feet so I'm not like a you know a marathoner who they've got to go do miles and miles and miles and miles I'm only going a short distance so most of my work is really burst intervals a lot of power being able to kind of work really hard that's really what I do um on on in my training is just sort of grind really hard at that um that sort of explosive work let go really fast for short distances and then do it again and then do it again and do it again and do it again do it again so it's uh it's uh it's you know I say to people it's you have to love to do that if you want to be successful at it because that's that's the unfund part right go to the Paralympics that's the easy part in a lot of ways the hard part is getting up and putting yourself to the gym even when you don't want to yeah even those interval Sports it it's definitely essential to have a a good cardiovascular base as well even the even the short Sprints whether it's hockey or basketball or yeah really any of those so they're definitely training a variety uh you were named as one of the two flag Bears uh with Melissa Stockwell for the uh previous par Olympic Games what did that honor mean to you yeah I mean that's uh that was truly one of the best honors of my life uh I think it's what I people may or not realize is the flag bearers for countries are voted on by the athletes of that country and so that really what that meant was that I was nominated by my team the wheelchair rugby team but then all of Team USA paralympians voted for me Melissa to to represent them and Flag Bearer Honor and Overcoming Health Conditions to lead the flag out it was it was really special you know it was a really really incredible thing to to to have that sort of honor and for them to say like we want you to lead us out at the biggest event of our of some people's careers it was it was really cool it was really special for me it was really impactful for a couple reasons too is one you know it was in Japan and my Heritage is Japanese um but what's really interesting is that my grandparents on my dad's side and my aunts and uncles everyone on that side kind of that older generation was actually interned in the interment camps dur World War II you know they were essentially put in prison by their by the United States and for you know uh two generations later you know the the grandson of someone who had been sort of quote unquote locked up by their own country was then leading their country out it was just this really kind of incredible full circle moment um you know where you know things can change and obviously what happened during World War II is terrible but you know we're able to progress and move forward in our world so that that I was able to do that so it it was really really special honor something I'll I'll really treasure forever yeah that's a really cool parallel um prior to that competition though you faced some health conditions that kind of put it in Jeopardy right yeah yeah it was uh it was a tough it was a tough uh beginning of 2021 for me certainly I um we had went to our first training camp of the year uh first one back from Co was there was training everything seemed fine obviously kind of tired um first after three days of training I was woke up and ah I'm just I don't feel well I don't feel I'm tired okay well let's just give myself a break you know haven't TR I haven't done this in months and months and months maybe I'm just a little worn down um so stayed in bed end up staying in bed all week um never felt bad but never felt never felt really bad but never felt good just kind of was in this weird Middle Ground um and so I and so you know I was doing that and finally decided okay you know what let's just send you home let's get you home let's not wor let's stop having you here so the night before I was supposed to go home woke up horribly sick just horrendously sick at 3:00 a.m. said okay something's WR on here we got to take you to the hospital so went to the hospital Birmingham I ended up having to stay there for a month actually um because I had a incredibly bad infection in my leg had just gotten completely out of control um was septic really really sick for a long time um and yeah it was just it was tough you know it was really really hard hard but uh eventually managed to have a surgery they quite literally took my knee out and put a you know cement spacers and stuff back in was on IV meds for um eight weeks up until at this point we're running up into about April um and it was sort like you said it was I don't know are we going to be able to do the games it's going to happen um and so but was able to get healthy in time and our snc coach the time put me on a an aggressive training plan to say the least to see how we could do and you know I was I was able to get back there I was able to to do it it was it took it took a lot of effort my time girlfriend now wife was instrumental and kind of basically being with me every day she came down to Alabama and were with me and you know help me do my meds get trained I really owe a lot to her that I that I was able to get back at all um and it and her family as well who were living with at the time so it was uh it was definitely a touch and go thing there for a minute but you know I made it through on the other side and uh you know just now it's something that just just sort of happened to me you know and it was it was was unfortunate yeah but I the one the one kind of kind of cool takeaway is the in the leadup in that window I had I had about two and a half months to train before the games I worked as hard as i' ever worked and I really discovered that holy cow I could push myself really hard I didn't realize how hard I could push myself hopefully I'll never have to push myself quite that hard again because we were trying to make up for five months of lost time but it was kind of cool to see wow there's there's something there's another gear in me that I can do if if I need to yeah that's awesome uh those 2021 games where they if I remember correct the first ones that were televised nationally you know I I I I couldn't remember for sure what exactly they were at Rio I know London we didn't have much coverage at all Rio there was a bit of coverage but yeah Tokyo I know there was really Rob some of the most robust coverage we've had so far and you know obviously the time change was tricky and being co was tough but yeah it was it was it was great you know we we had coverage people able to watch us on TV I Television Coverage of the Paralympic Games got posts from oh watching you seen this it was really really cool um and the coverage is only getting better you know we're really only seeing more and more commitment from NBC you know as the rights holder to lean into paralympic cage and saying this is this is the next thing this is going to be big and you know we're going to have really amazing coverage I know in Paris and then you know honestly not not not looking forward or not saying but La is going to be even even more amazing I know but we Paris first Paris first how has that landscape uh of par Olympic sport kind of changed because of this exposure can you kind of identify any um like quantitative yeah yeah for sure you know I think that when I when I first started you know and I've been on I've been on the national team since 2009 2012 with my first paralympic games we've really seen a recognition and understanding awareness particularly from brands that parp par Olympians are athletes they can leverage they've got great stories to Impact of Exposure on Paralympic Sport tell they're great speakers they're great athletes um and they're people they can partner with to to be successful you know and I think that when we first started there was sort of like it was the Olympics oh yeah and there was this Paro Olympic thing like I'm not I don't really I know what that is but that thing is there too I andan now it's really Olympics and Paralympics or in some cases it's paral Olympics you know period they just say Paralympics and or they say you know so I think it it's really Advanced a lot we've seen so much growth on on social we've seen athletes with absolutely massive followings um who are paralympic Growth and Recognition of Paralympic Athletes athletes who are you know that's what they're known for and but they also have the personalities do things so we've really we've really seen tremendous tremendous growth and sort of understanding awareness and and people saying this isn't just some sort of thing they do for fun it's like these are competitive highlevel athletes who bring a lot to the table and and Brands want to partner with them they want to have them on board you know I'm I'm lucky to partner with quite a few uh Brands who are really you know highend sponsors and are like yeah we want to support the parp movement we believe in this just as strong as the Olympic movement we believe in paralympians we believe in in helping you tell your story and we believe in in sort of what you bring to the table so it's it's been a sea change you know honestly even just in the last honestly even in the last six years really it's it's been an incredible change and I think we're only we're only going to see even more more um as we move forward yeah absolutely for those who don't know uh and correct me if I if I say incorrectly but the Paralympics started about two to three weeks after the Olympics wrap up um and I wonder why there has to be that Gap and whether like it kind of loses a little bit of its luster because of that Hiatus and I can't pretend to know the first thing Logistics and Gap between Olympics and Paralympics about the logistics of organizing an event on that scale but I wonder why it can't just all at the same time so it's a great question um I think there's a couple a couple things I can say one the same time would be very challenging logistically because we stay where the Olympians stay so the housing would essentially it wouldn't have to quite double but it would have to increase significantly um and then it would also require and we also use the same venues and so the logistics and challenge you you would essentially have a much much longer event which is kind of of what you're getting at is why is there a Gap you essentially the the Olympics would go to like instead of being like what is it like two and a half weeks it would go to being like a month or maybe a month and a few weeks it would just have to be so much longer uh for the sake of of it working and so you know you raise a good question though there is this Gap you know there is this kind of unfortunate and there there there are logistic reasons for it you know one is that all The Branding changes they go from having the Rings everywhere to having the aitos which is the paralympic symbol um and so there's uh so there's that there's some practical things like that I know one thing is that you know the Olympics are apparent Olympics are staffed by volunteers um and so they give the volunteers essentially a break rather than sort of throwing them back to work um immediately following it and and the other part is that you know it's it's worth remembering we you know will our first game will be the day after opening ceremony so right away and so we'll actually get in country anywhere from 7 to 10 days prior to it and so kind of that same point were they to back up just against the Olympics we would be arriving sort of in that last week at the Olympics which would be very cool I would love to go to the Olympics don't get me wrong but it would sort of get in that logistic challenge but no you you know you raise a good point it's like having that separation uh can sometimes lead to sort of a a gap and lead to a sort of a loss of energy and so I think that's something I know I think about a lot and I know a lot of the media folks think of a lot too is how can we keep how can we either keep that energy going or how can we really just say Okay Olympics great awesome here we go here comes the Paralympics kind of give people a reset and I know there's a lot of really smart people um in marketing working on this really thinking about how can we leverage these things and you know I'm I'm I I think it's one of those two for me it's said if you build it they will come Americans love sports right we love to watch sports and if you if you provide the coverage if you give it the treatment it deserves which I think we're going to see people will watch it people love s people love track and field they hopefully love wheelchair rugby you know they want to see these Sports and so you know I I I think all your points are fair uh I think it's something that it would be amazing to have this one massive monthlong event but uh for right now I I think we can really I think we can make them each into their amazing unique opportunities and you could really look as the the Olympics is just sort of onramp into the par Olympic games that we can we can leverage all those eyeballs to say hey in two and a half weeks come right back here you're going to get to see Team USA's best getting after it and so I think there's I think there's a lot of cool things that can be done with that yeah I really look forward to the start of that um you were on the cover of Sports Illustrated with the um with the title achieve and Inspire um what are your thoughts on being considered an inspiration it's something that we've had or it's a conversation that we've had with some guests kind of that inspiration narrative that uh perpetuates disability The Inspiration Narrative and Achievements do you have any commentary on kind of that topic yeah you know I think it's a it's an interesting conversation I think to you know I think you'd ask 10 10 people disabilities about it you'd get 10 answers so this is only my perspective I think for me what I always say is that you know inspiring someone is really about that person right something that they feel inside them and so you know a big part of highle Athletics is I'm going to control what I can control my training my fueling my whatever I'm going to control that I can't control necessarily how someone else is going to react to something and so part of me always is like if someone's going to feel way there's only I can't stop them from feeling that you know so I think there's that but I think the other part is that you know I I what I think is important is that people with disabilities are not seen as inspiring literally just for existing going to the grocery store driving their these are these are just things you do to live your life you wouldn't be inspired by seeing someone just sort of doing it but you know when I look back at what I've been able to achieve in my life which is you know at this point you know significant and if someone wants to look at that and say wow that's really amazing you've done that that's going to motivate me and inspire me to to do whatever you know who am I to take that away from the person why would I take that away if I can Inspire the Next Generation particularly of par Olympic athletes why wouldn't I want to do that you know why wouldn't I want to be someone they could look up to you know if if they do so I think it it's a nuanced conversation for sure you know I think again that some folks would probably say well it's not good to feel that way and they're only feeling that way because you have a disability and that might be true you know don't get me wrong um but I I think it's a it's a it's an interesting conversation one will continue to have but I think the only thing that I really do feel you know really strongly about is this idea that you know someone should you really should avoid just feeling quote unquote inspired by someone just because they're they're out there just living a normal life right that's not that's nothing to be that's just that's just an that's just someone doing their their daily tasks you know that doesn't need to inspire you but you know if someone has achieved a lot and you're that that can be something that inspires you you know so I think it's a like I said it's a Nuance conversation people have different opinions um but I like I said I always come back to as well with me is I can't control how someone else is going to feel or react to something I can have a conversation but I think if someone feels a way and you tell them hey you shouldn't feel that way that often can be you know taken taken poorly as well so it's it's something I try to be careful with yeah I think if you removed a lot of the context of this conversation if we didn't talk about your diagnosis if we just talked about you being a national level USA athlete then it would sound basically the same you very accomplished in the classroom very accomplished on the court like it would just sound like a professional athlete and I think a lot of people are inspired by professional athletes so um Representation and Competitors at the Paralympics whether you look up to someone in the par Olympics or the Olympics um the representation we kind of mentioned it really briefly at the beginning uh I'm sure is really important for a lot of wheelchair users that want to see people like themselves competing in the highest level and seeing themselves on TV um I think that representation is Big um who's going to be your biggest competition at the par Olympics yeah uh it's it's going to be a lot actually uh wheelchair rugby is lucky that we're growing with depth of talent it makes my job harder um but what I've been saying to people is that I think you know there will be eight teams there alt together seven can win a medal and that's no no slou to the eighth team the eighth team whoever it is is going to be just AIT probably a step below um but seven teams can win a medal um and so it's going to be the deepest Paralympics ever it's going to be incredibly talented uh I think that our our top competition at the moment Australia is the raing world champions um they're incredibly good they're very hard to beat I think the Japanese are very very strong as well France has recently come on as a very talented Squad and they'll have that sort of home home atmosphere behind them we were in Paris late last year for a competition that was truly deafening in the arena when we played the French team so they're they're very they're very talented U they've got some really good players and so they're good and the classic classic Canadians we just recently beat them on Chile to qualify but they're always a dangerous team and uh you know H I'm just listing all these squads but the reality is they're all good you know they're all really good but you know Australia remains one of our sort of perennial Rivals again they're a rating world champions they beat us in the world championship final in 20122 and so that's a team that you know I think I think whoever wins will have to go through them uh to do it what will the next six months look like for you do you guys meet training camps do you train individually yeah so training on our own of course you know kind of doing that grind that's where the I like to say the quote unquote real work is done um lots of that and then we will we do training camps once a month as well and we'll have some competition so off training camp we go to Denmark in late uh late March we'll go to Wales in mid April for competitions and then we'll have just like I said training camps kind of Preparations for the Paralympics working on some things figure out what lineups we want to run kind of fine-tuning stuff all the way up until our final Camp before the par Olympic Games and then it's then it's showtime it's awesome uh it's a question that we've asked all the guests in the episode uh since our stuff is kind of uh centered around Fitness um what do you think needs to be done to make Fitness environments more accessible for individuals with disabilities yeah it's a great question um I think Fitness I to me the biggest thing that I think would be helpful for Fitness to make it more accessible is if commercial gyms in particular I would say really and this is my main focus commercial gyms your planet fitnesses Making Fitness Environments More Accessible your lifetime fitnesses were were went beyond just oh well you know we have no steps to get in we've got this we got this but really had an active goal of being AA being a place where people with disabilities can train and can be adapted and we can figure things out for them whether that's hiring more trainers whether that's really be you know in marketing saying we want to do this I think that is really to me where what can be most helpful is really saying out loud hey we're here for you you can do it because you know specialized centers are great but don't get me wrong the place we train lakar Foundation um in Birmingham Alabama is fully accessible amazing there's a mar freebed YMCA up in Grand Rapids uh here in Michigan that is fully accessible phenomenal you know but the reality is we're not going to have those every single place in the country and so it's like how can we make these widely available commercial gyms as welcoming and accessible to people as possible you know and how can how can a person disability enter that space and if either a feel feel welcomed and have someone who said if they're not sure how to do something someone will step in and be able to kind of work with them and figure out and they don't even have to be in my opinion they don't have to be an expert in disability necessarily but what they do have to be is is compassionate and adaptable and willing to say Hey you know I'm not quite sure but let's work on this let's talk together and figure this out you know I think to me that is the biggest thing it's just a sort of an overall attitude shift of we're going to be an open welcoming place for folks disabilities and we're going to have staff that is sort of prepared to assist them in any way shape or form I think to me that's that's a really really big and important thing because you know let's let's be honest some people also can't afford to go to these bigger places they can only afford to go to the place right down the street and you know I think you and you can get a great workout in at any G any of these gyms you know I I go to Planet Fitness you can get a great workout there you know and so I think it's really helping people get get the feel feel comfortable do they get in there and then having the tools themselves and then go out and say okay I got this I can just show up and go go to work so to speak yeah absolutely I like that yeah the the barometer that I use when hiring coaches at my gym is is more so empathy communication how they treat people um it's easy enough to teach them the modifications and the uh adaptations that you can make to equipment and exercises I think one of the tough things about commercial gyms is they try to pack a lot of equipment and into their floor space and then also the also the price point being so low it's sometimes hard to Leverage The individualized like personal training sort of thing that some people with disabilities might benefit from um but it's definitely something that I'm interested in tackling we've been working with some YMCAs that seem to be committed and they have a really good model to be accessible price point wise uh environment wise so um yeah I'm hoping it's definitely adaptive Fitness is definitely becoming more common uh hopefully becomes the norm rather than the exception over the next five or 10 years for sure well I I I could I couldn't agree more and it's great to hear great to hear all that and I think it's it's so important because you know I tell people this especially disabilties it's like you don't have to be a paralympic athlete you don't have to play a sport but it really is important you find a way to be active whether it Le through Fitness whether it's weightlifting cardio whatever it may be I agree it's I think it is getting better I think you're seeing more sort of awareness and recognition this is something we need to sort of be able to provide um but yeah it just it just takes time right well Chuck it was an honor to talk to you um for people who are interested in following along both with the paral Olympics or with yourself individually um we can include it in the show notes but where would you suggest that people go yeah uh awesome no I've really had a good time talking um I think the best uh to really follow all all the all the stuff I'm up to was on social media um Chuck Aoki on pretty much every platform Importance of Being Active and Following Chuck Aoki you can find me also USA wheelchair rugby uh we're on pretty much all the platform so yeah go ahead and hit follow come along it's a lot of a lot of good stuff and then of course this and that's where we post usually the links to watch games and YouTube and stuff like that and then of course this summer uh NBC and peacock are going to be your home for all par Olympic sport and so we hope to have hope to have lots and lots of folks watching on there so we can really show the the quote unquote powers that be that hey this is awesome people want to see this there's a demand for it um and so there'll only be more and more going forward