FORT WORTH, Texas _ When all of the gyms closed, the people who worried the most were not restricted to meatheads, yogis and weekend basketball junkies.
Those with Parkinson's disease need the gym more than any of the above.
They feared the coronavirus as much as returning to _ and forever remaining on _ the couch.
"It is so hard for people with the Parkinson's, the apathy," said Dan Novak, who has lived with Parkinson's for seven years. He is 63 and lives in Fort Worth, and he's one of the millions who fight the disease by boxing.
Novak is part of a group of approximately 80 people who regularly train at ex-bantamweight champion Paulie Ayala's boxing gym in West Fort Worth. For nearly 20 years Ayala has run a "Punching Out Parkinson's" program.
For Novak, and millions of other Americans, especially those who live in retirement communities, life in the age of the coronavirus is isolating, not crippling. As much as anybody, those patients need to get out and move, but right now their radius is a glorified closet.
"When this outbreak started they were one of my main concerns," Ayala said. "That's why we shut it down right off the bat. I didn't want to risk anything with them. But we want to take care of them and be sure they can maintain their workouts."
