Health

Paralympic runners left with questions about qualifier after Boston Marathon canceled

BOSTON — This year’s Boston Marathon was supposed to serve as a qualifier for the 2020 Paralympics in Tokyo. Now many athletes are left wondering if they’ll be able to compete for the chance to represent the United States.

Most Paralympic athletes have overcome unimaginable hardships throughout their lives and one local runner who Boston 25 spoke to says he’s using his past experience to work through the devastating news that this year’s marathon is canceled.

“I woke up and rubbed one of my eyes and when I was looking out of the other eye it was just all blurry,” Chaz Davis said.

Davis is from Grafton. He had perfect vision his entire life until one morning when he was a freshman in college he couldn’t see out of one eye.

“For me it was devastating and I didn’t know that it would lead to permanent blindness,” Davis said.

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The star Division 1 track and cross country runner was diagnosed with Leber’s Hereditary Optic Neuropathy and gradually lost vision in both eyes.

“I started to fall into a deep dark depression where a lot of substance abuse, drugs and alcohol really came into play,” Davis said.

Davis knew running again could quite possibly save his life so with the help of guide runners he gave it a shot.

“When I first started out I fell off the treadmill, I tripped, I ran into poles and really banged myself up quite a bit but mentally I was just really happy to start running,” Davis said.

Davis made it all the way to the 2016 Paralympics in Rio where he finished 8th in the 5,000-meter race.

“Getting to run in front of 80,000 people in a stadium and finish in the top 8 in the world was something I think I’ll always hold on to,” Davis said.

The 2020 Boston Marathon was to serve as a qualifier for the 2020 Paralympics in Tokyo marking a historic moment for parathletes.

“This would have been the first time in its history and really in the history of any marathon where we would really get to see elite parathletes that are ambulatory runners who would really get to compete and compete against the best runners in the world,” Davis said.

But Davis is not stopping his training. He’s been using the app Charge Running during the quarantine.

“The Charge App allows people to run in a live setting with people from all corners of the world,” Davis said.

The app provides something similar to what the BAA is hoping to do by holding the Boston Marathon virtually.

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“Just getting that social part of it and seeing their leader boards and their run times, it’s really cool to see especially during this time,” Davis added.

The Paralympic is determined to get back on Team U.S.A. no matter what other obstacles come his way.

“I’ve really had to adapt to a lot of situations and this is really no different to that,” Davis said.

Boston 25 reached out to the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee for more information on a new qualifier and are waiting to hear back for comment.

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