Adaptive Boxing Rolls into the Ring

Some people start celebrating the weekend early, while others lay low, trying to muster enough motivation to make it through Friday, but for Joanna Bonilla and a group of wheelchair-using athletes in Northern Virginia, Thursday nights are time to lace up the gloves and study the sweet science of adaptive boxing. For a few hours, Bonilla sets aside her day job and responsibilities and rolls into the ring as “The Real Deal.” 

“Life gets busy, having a full-time job, being the president of a growing nonprofit and having to do many other things,” says Bonilla, a paraplegic. “Now, I look forward to Thursdays and seeing our core group. I put in some work hours and then disconnect as soon as I can, so I can learn more about adaptive boxing.” 

Adaptive boxing — or paraboxing or wheelchair boxing, depending on whom you talk to — is so new that it doesn’t even have an official Wikipedia entry. If you Google “adaptive boxing,” the third entry that pops up directs you to the website for DPI Adaptive Fitness, the gym Bonilla and her cohort call home. 

Located about 20 miles outside Washington, D.C., in a nondescript office park, you’d never guess that DPI Adaptive Fitness doubles as one of the international hubs of the nascent adaptive boxing community. 

Developing a New Sport 

Boxing has been an integral part of DPI founder Devon Palermo’s life since he learned to box for self-defense growing up in New York City. He started teaching adaptive boxing classes while working as a physical therapist in an assisted living facility, combining his professional expertise with his love of boxing. He focused on devising safe adaptive solutions for people of different levels of functional ability. 

Palermo, who is nondisabled, continued to offer adaptive boxing fitness programming when he opened DPI Adaptive Fitness. He convinced a reluctant Bonilla to give boxing a shot. “After attending my first class, I wasn’t sure, but I knew there was so much to learn,” she says. “The more Coach Devon adapted the sport to everyone, the more we wanted to see the development of the sport. Glad he noticed the spark in our eyes.” Growing interest led Palermo to start the DPI Adaptive Boxing Club in 2022. 

Over the past three years, DPI has hosted two of the first adaptive boxing exhibitions in the U.S., and Palermo has been a key voice in shaping rules and regulations to grow and codify the sport. Palermo says that wasn’t his original intent. “When I started with this idea, my thought was for me to train some of my female fitness clients so they could just jump into a fight,” he says. “I didn’t realize that there was nothing going on in the U.S.” 

Palermo found small, passionate groups across Europe, but each seemed to have differing approaches. In addition to using different scoring and safety rules, some advocated for boxers to remain stationary while others preferred differing degrees of movement. “There was no unison when it comes to how adaptive boxing is done,” he says. “That’s why I got so interested in it. It seems like it’s at a real point of uncertainty, but exciting uncertainty, where it could go a lot of different directions.” 

Palermo’s main innovation which all the DPI fighters use is a stabilizer board that allows boxers to lock their wheelchairs into a set position. He was inspired to build the board because of his experiences working with people with differing levels of stability due to spinal cord injuries and related disabilities. 

“If I’m locking in your chair and I give you some support, you can do a lot, and you’re not going to feel like you’re going to fall at all,” he says. “I feel like every [adaptive] boxer that I’ve talked to, once they experience our locked-in board, they’re like, I want one. I want to do it like that.” 

With the stabilizer, there is no movement in the ring. Adaptive boxers rely on their timing, speed and coordination to avoid and land shots. Palermo has heard first-time viewers describe it as “rock and sock ‘em robots” but says they quickly see it is much more strategic. “It’s like chess … see someone moving and trying to set something up so that they can counter,” he says. 

Bonilla uses the term “locked in” to describe her physical situation but says it also applies to her mentality when she is in the ring. “Not a lot goes through your head because you’ve been training so long that it’s almost like your body knows what it needs to do,” she says. “It feels like everything’s in slow motion — like it’s The Matrix. You’re two, three steps ahead, and your body is just literally doing what it has been doing during boot camp.” 

Safety First 

Bonilla is one of two women to take part in the two exhibitions DPI has hosted. In September 2023, the club held the country’s first Adaptive Boxing Club exhibition, with two fights and 150 people in attendance. A year later, the second exhibition had five matchups featuring boxers from around the country. 

Bonilla fought as part of a decisionless exhibition in the 2023 event, and earned her first official win in the 2024 edition. Having Palermo in her corner made it extra meaningful. 

“He’s the one that introduced me to the sport,” she says. “All this trust that we build between a boxer and a coach … it’s unique. So being able to have him on my corner this year was extremely special, and to get a W made it even better.” 

Thanks in part to the success of the two exhibitions, Palermo and DPI are building momentum for the sport. The club now has relationships with boxing gyms across the U.S., and adaptive boxers have joined its events from Maryland, Florida and Utah. 

Internationally, the club works with Dragon Krakow Para Boxing in Poland, which holds matches across Europe. Additionally, adaptive boxing is on the map in Italy, Ghana, Nigeria and the United Kingdom. 

In April 2024, USA Boxing, the national governing body for amateur boxing in the U.S., announced it is launching a new Adaptive Boxing program focused on athletes with disabilities, but has provided few details since. Palermo says he and other adaptive boxing leaders have offered to collaborate with USA Boxing, but in the interim they have founded the United Adaptive Boxing Council to serve as a governing body.  

“Our focus is to make sure that there are standards and safety in place,” he says. “We need to have one body, and I wanted that to be USA Boxing, but if it’s not going to be them, then we’ve started that process.” 

At DPI, boxers must wear full headgear, a mouthpiece and any other protective gear or stabilization straps the coaching staff requires for the safety of fighters. Fighters participate in three two-minute rounds and up to three three-minute rounds for competitive bouts, following strict safety rules and regulations to reduce the risk of injury. 

“The first conversation you should have with a coach is how they make it safe for you and your disability,” says Bonilla. “I’ve never been part of a team that expresses safety so much, and it’s inspiring. I am not worried about my safety when I get in a ring. I know my coaches have thought of every way to ensure I will be safe.” 

Thanks to the growing interest, Palermo has expanded the boxing offerings beyond just Thursday night, with beginner Wednesdays, Saturdays with the captain, and occasional pop-ups on Sundays. Bonilla is excited to be a part of the sport’s growth and eager to get back in the ring, but says the real draw is the feeling she gets after a good session.  

“I feel good when I sit in my car and I’m letting it warm up. I’m like, that was a great workout,” she says. “I’m tired, but at the same time I think I can go for another hour.”