Will Parson’s journey from Team USA bobsledder to brain health advocate exposes the devastating reality of CTE in sliding sports, where athletes routinely experience G-forces exceeding 80Gs. His candid account of cognitive decline, teammate suicides, and the transformative power of hyperbaric oxygen therapy challenges sports organizations to confront their responsibility while offering hope through accessible treatment models that could save lives across athletics and beyond.






Interview by
Anna Agafonova


• Sports Conflict Institute


• 25 min read


Categories:
Athlete Welfare | Brain Health | Sports Safety





Executive Summary



The Crisis: Bobsled athletes experience G-forces up to 84.5Gs—17 times what was previously disclosed—leading to epidemic levels of CTE, depression, dementia, and suicide among retired competitors.


The Revelation: Symptoms often masquerade as other conditions, with athletes rationalizing memory loss, personality changes, and cognitive decline until crisis points force recognition.


The Solution: Parson’s American Postconcussion Wellness Center model offers free hyperbaric oxygen therapy to athletes and veterans, addressing the $12,000 treatment cost barrier that leaves sufferers without options.







In this powerful SCI TV interview, Will Parson, former Team USA bobsled athlete, breaks decades of silence surrounding brain injury in sliding sports. His story—marked by teammate suicides, personal cognitive collapse, and ultimate recovery—exposes a hidden epidemic affecting not just bobsledders but athletes across all high-impact sports. Parson’s journey from electrical engineering student to elite athlete to brain health advocate reveals how normalized violence against the brain has created a generation of suffering athletes abandoned by the very organizations that profited from their sacrifice.


The numbers Parson shares shatter comfortable assumptions about sliding sports safety. While athletes were told they experienced 5 G-forces, actual measurements revealed spikes of 84.5Gs on “mild” tracks—forces that would be fatal in sustained exposure but create cumulative brain damage through repetitive micro-trauma.1 This revelation, combined with seven recalled crashes over nine years and countless subconcussive impacts, paints a picture of systematic neurological assault disguised as athletic competition.


This analysis examines three critical dimensions of Parson’s testimony: first, the insidious progression of CTE symptoms that athletes rationalize until crisis; second, the institutional failures that perpetuate suffering through denial and abandonment; and third, the revolutionary treatment model Parson is pioneering to provide hope where none existed. His work challenges fundamental assumptions about sport, sacrifice, and society’s obligation to those who entertain through self-destruction.





The Invisible Decline: How Champions Rationalize Their Own Destruction




Parson’s account of symptom progression reveals the insidious nature of CTE development. The electrical engineering student who once excelled at complex mathematics found himself unable to calculate change at a store—yet rationalized this as stress or fatigue. This cognitive dissonance, where elite athletes normalize profound dysfunction, represents CTE’s cruelest mechanism: it attacks the very faculties needed to recognize its presence.2 Parson’s admission that he “minimized” and “rationalized” symptoms reflects not personal weakness but neurological sabotage of self-awareness.


The nocturnal panic attacks Parson describes—waking disoriented, needing visual cues like European paintings or Olympic Training Center brick walls to establish location—reveal hippocampal damage affecting spatial memory and emotional regulation. His strategy of identifying location through environmental markers demonstrates remarkable adaptation to progressive neurological decline, yet also shows how athletes develop coping mechanisms that mask severity from both themselves and medical providers. The “mild, calm guy” experiencing panic represents fundamental personality alteration, not temporary stress response.


The ex-girlfriend incident Parson recounts—failing to recognize someone intimate enough to jump into his arms—exemplifies prosopagnosia (face blindness) associated with temporal lobe damage in CTE.3 His rationalization that he “meets so many people” as an athlete demonstrates how high-achievers construct elaborate explanations for neurological symptoms. This self-gaslighting, where accomplished individuals convince themselves that dramatic cognitive changes are normal, delays intervention during potentially treatable stages.


Parson’s morning routine adaptation—keeping coffee or Coca-Cola bedside because he “couldn’t get out of bed,” then determining day and month upon waking—reveals executive function collapse requiring external scaffolding for basic orientation. His fixation on January and August suggests temporal lobe scarring affecting memory consolidation. That an engineer capable of complex problem-solving was reduced to this level of dysfunction yet still didn’t recognize “something was wrong” demonstrates CTE’s ability to hide in plain sight through gradual normalization of the abnormal.






The G-Force Deception: 84.5Gs vs. 5Gs


Parson’s revelation that athletes experienced 84.5G spikes while being told they pulled 5Gs represents a 1,690% discrepancy in force exposure. For context, fighter pilots typically experience 9Gs maximum with specialized suits preventing blackout. Formula 1 drivers rarely exceed 6Gs in crashes considered severe. Bobsledders experience these forces repeatedly, without protection, while traveling 90mph through ice channels—a recipe for systematic brain destruction.





Institutional Betrayal: When Systems Protect Themselves Over Athletes



The Culture of Denial


Parson’s ongoing legal action against USA Bobsled & Skeleton Federation—simply requesting they “warn the new generation” and “help athletes who are struggling”—reveals institutional resistance to acknowledging systematic brain injury. His observation that Olympic teams “do a good job of sweeping it under the carpet” because “it’s a global issue” exposes how international sporting bodies prioritize reputation over athlete welfare.4 The fact that basic warnings require litigation demonstrates how deeply denial is embedded in competitive sliding sports culture.



The “Sled Head” article Parson credits with his diagnosis represents journalism accomplishing what sporting organizations refused: connecting dots between symptoms and sport. That athletes required a New York Times investigation to understand their own suffering indicts systems that had this information but chose silence. Parson’s description of family members circling relevant passages while he remained in denial illustrates how CTE victims often cannot self-advocate, making institutional duty of care even more critical.



The teammate who called “speaking gibberish” before hanging himself in his family’s factory haunts Parson’s narrative as preventable tragedy. Parson’s self-recrimination—”I didn’t do anything to help him”—misplaces blame that belongs with organizations that knew risks but provided no support. His later recognition that he “couldn’t help this guy because he was in stage four CTE” while Parson himself was “suffering but didn’t know how bad” reveals how institutional abandonment creates cascading tragedies where damaged athletes cannot save each other.


The Economics of Abandonment


Parson’s breakdown of treatment costs—$200 per hour for hyperbaric oxygen therapy, $12,000 for 60 sessions over 30 days—exposes how financial barriers compound neurological suffering. Athletes who generated millions in Olympic revenues cannot afford treatment for injuries sustained in service to national glory. This economic abandonment forces brain-injured athletes to choose between bankruptcy and continued deterioration, a cruel calculus for those who sacrificed neural health for medals.



The equipment costs Parson outlines—$50,000-60,000 for clinical machines, $20,000 for home units—reveal why individual solutions remain impossible for most affected athletes. His decision to open the American Postconcussion Wellness Center as a nonprofit providing free treatment addresses this access crisis directly. By removing financial barriers, Parson creates what sporting organizations should have established decades ago: systematic support for predictable consequences of participation.



Parson’s expansion beyond athletes to include veterans and domestic violence survivors recognizes CTE as a broader public health crisis. His statistic that veterans comprise 31% of recent mass shooters, which he links to CTE, reframes violence as potential neurological symptom rather than moral failing.5 This intersectional approach—treating athletes alongside veterans and abuse survivors—creates economies of scale while building political coalitions necessary for sustained funding.


Breaking the Silence


Parson’s media strategy—”doing huge social media, always posting about it, taking interviews”—represents grassroots education filling institutional voids. His focus on reaching “loved ones around those people” recognizes that CTE victims often cannot advocate for themselves. By educating families to recognize symptoms—”the number one symptom is they aren’t acting like themselves”—Parson creates community-based detection networks compensating for medical system failures.



His acknowledgment that “athletes are going to compete because they love to compete” demonstrates realistic acceptance rather than prohibition advocacy. Parson seeks informed consent, not sport elimination. His work ensuring athletes “know what they’re up against” and have resources “if it does kick in” represents harm reduction approach acknowledging both human nature and competitive drive. This pragmatic stance may succeed where absolutist positions failed, creating space for honest discussion about acceptable risk.






CTE Recognition Framework: Parson’s Warning Signs



Cognitive: Unable to calculate change, lost in familiar neighborhoods, forgetting day/month, not recognizing familiar faces


Emotional: Panic attacks, depression, personality changes, “not acting like themselves”


Physical: Inability to get out of bed, vertigo, walking difficulties, seizure-like episodes


Behavioral: Increased risk-taking, “promiscuous or wild” behavior, social withdrawal


Critical Insight: Victims often rationalize symptoms—only loved ones can recognize changes






Revolutionary Recovery: From Death Wish to Wellness Warrior



Hyperbaric Breakthrough


Parson’s transformation through hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT)—from “begging for death” to experiencing clarity—offers hope where none existed. His description of being “cloudy for 10 years” until HBOT “took it off” in one session, maintaining clarity for six days initially then nine days after second treatment, demonstrates dramatic neurological response to increased oxygen delivery.6 This immediate improvement suggests that some CTE symptoms result from reversible metabolic dysfunction rather than permanent structural damage.



The maintenance protocol Parson developed—regular HBOT sessions preventing return to baseline dysfunction—reframes CTE management from hopeless deterioration to chronic condition requiring ongoing treatment. His acknowledgment that “it’s not perfect” but keeps him from “being on the ground” represents realistic recovery expectations. This shift from cure-seeking to symptom management mirrors successful approaches in other chronic neurological conditions, offering sustainable quality of life rather than false promises.



Parson’s observation that concussions are “the only injury not treated by trying to remove inflammation” identifies fundamental treatment gap. While acute injuries receive immediate anti-inflammatory intervention, brain injuries often go untreated during critical windows. HBOT’s mechanism—increasing oxygen delivery to damaged tissue, reducing inflammation, promoting neuroplasticity—addresses these gaps through biological repair rather than symptom suppression.7 This physiological approach offers hope for intervention even years post-injury.


The Wellness Center Model


The American Postconcussion Wellness Center Parson is opening represents paradigm shift from individual treatment to systematic care infrastructure. By providing free services to athletes and veterans, Parson removes the primary barrier preventing recovery. His network approach—building relationships nationwide for referrals while creating centralized treatment hub—maximizes reach while maintaining quality. This hybrid model balances accessibility with expertise, ensuring help regardless of geographic location.



Parson’s nonprofit structure addresses sustainability challenges that doomed previous initiatives. By removing profit motive, the center can focus on outcomes rather than revenue, treating those most in need rather than those most able to pay. This model could blueprint national response to CTE crisis, with centers in major cities providing free or sliding-scale access. Government funding for veteran treatment could subsidize athlete care, creating synergies between populations facing similar challenges.



The comprehensive approach Parson describes—combining HBOT with other modalities, education, and family support—recognizes CTE’s complexity requiring multimodal intervention. His emphasis on treating “for free” transforms brain injury care from luxury to right, challenging healthcare systems that abandon those injured in public service. This ethical stance, that society owes care to those damaged for entertainment or defense, could reshape policy discussions around sports injury liability.


Legacy Through Advocacy


Parson’s credit to Joe Namath for “saving my life by spreading information” acknowledges how prominent advocates enable recovery through awareness. Namath’s public discussion of his own brain injuries and HBOT treatment gave Parson permission to seek help, demonstrating celebrity disclosure’s power in destigmatizing neurological treatment. This passing of advocacy torch—from Namath to Parson to future athletes—creates generational knowledge transfer circumventing institutional silence.



The legal action Parson pursues while building treatment infrastructure represents dual-track strategy: forcing institutional accountability while creating alternative support systems. By simultaneously demanding warnings for future athletes and providing care for current sufferers, Parson addresses both prevention and treatment. This comprehensive approach—litigation, education, direct service—models how individual advocates can create systemic change despite institutional resistance.






Action Framework for Sports Organizations



Immediate: Recognition and Response

Implement mandatory baseline cognitive testing for all athletes in high-impact sports. Educate athletes and families on CTE warning signs. Establish referral networks with brain injury specialists. Create anonymous reporting systems for cognitive concerns.



Short-term: Support Infrastructure

Partner with treatment centers to subsidize HBOT access. Develop insurance coverage for brain injury treatment. Create athlete emergency funds for cognitive crisis intervention. Establish peer support networks for affected athletes.



Medium-term: Systematic Reform

Mandate G-force monitoring in all sliding sports. Implement exposure limits similar to radiation workers. Develop sport-specific brain safety protocols. Create lifetime healthcare provisions for brain-injured athletes.



Long-term: Cultural Transformation

Normalize brain injury as legitimate sport injury requiring treatment. Integrate brain health into athlete development programs. Research prevention technologies and rule modifications. Build national network of free treatment centers.








“I was begging for death for many years, just praying for it… I was no stronger than my other teammates. I just knew the trauma it was going to leave.”


— Will Parson on the Depths of CTE Suffering





Critical Actions for the Sports Community





For Sports Organizations:
Acknowledge brain injury risk transparently before athlete participation. Provide lifetime healthcare coverage for neurological conditions. Fund independent research on G-force exposure and cumulative impacts. Create exit counseling including cognitive assessment and resources. Partner with treatment centers to ensure affordable access to emerging therapies.




For Current Athletes:
Establish baseline cognitive testing independent of team control. Document all head impacts and symptoms contemporaneously. Build support networks including family education on warning signs. Explore prophylactic treatments like HBOT during active career. Understand that personality changes and cognitive decline are medical, not moral issues.




For Medical Professionals:
Screen all athletes for cognitive symptoms regardless of sport. Consider CTE in differential diagnosis for personality changes. Advocate for insurance coverage of HBOT and emerging treatments. Develop sport-specific assessment protocols recognizing unique exposure patterns. Create referral networks with brain injury specialists.




For Families and Loved Ones:
Trust observations about personality changes—you see what athletes cannot. Document behavioral changes with specific examples and timelines. Seek evaluation even if athlete denies problems. Connect with support groups for CTE-affected families. Understand that aggression or withdrawal may be symptoms, not choices.






Conclusion




Will Parson’s testimony shatters comfortable illusions about brain safety in sliding sports while offering hope through innovative treatment approaches. His journey from engineering student to elite athlete to cognitive invalid to wellness advocate maps the full spectrum of CTE experience, providing roadmap for others trapped in similar decline. The revelation that bobsledders experience G-forces approaching 85Gs—while being told they face 5Gs—exposes institutional deception that transforms informed consent into manufactured ignorance.


The systematic abandonment Parson describes—organizations that profit from brain-destroying competition providing neither warnings nor treatment—represents moral failure demanding legal remedy. His ongoing litigation seeks basic humanity: warn future athletes and help current sufferers. That such minimal requests require court intervention reveals how deeply denial pervades Olympic sports culture. Yet Parson’s focus extends beyond blame to building solutions, creating treatment infrastructure, sporting organizations should have established decades ago.


The American Postconcussion Wellness Center model Parson pioneers could revolutionize brain injury care by removing financial barriers that trap sufferers in deterioration. His vision of free treatment for athletes and veterans recognizes societal debt to those damaged in public service. By combining HBOT with comprehensive support, Parson demonstrates that CTE need not be death sentence but manageable condition requiring proper resources. His transformation from suicidal ideation to advocacy proves recovery possible with appropriate intervention.


Ultimately, Will Parson’s courage in exposing his vulnerability—the panic attacks, memory failures, personality changes—gives permission for others to acknowledge their struggles. His message that loved ones often recognize what victims cannot provides crucial insight for early intervention. As sporting organizations face increasing pressure to address brain injury, Parson’s work offers both warning and hope: warning about the devastating consequences of denial, hope that with honesty, treatment, and support, even severe brain injury need not define destiny. The question remains whether sport’s governing bodies will embrace this opportunity for redemption or continue choosing institutional protection over human lives.






Sources




1 John Branch, Sled Head: The Toll of Sliding Sports on Athletes’ Brains, N.Y. TIMES (July 26, 2020).


2 Ann C. McKee et al., The Spectrum of Disease in Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy, 136 BRAIN 43 (2013).


3 Jesse Mez et al., Duration of American Football Play and Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy, 77 ANNALS NEUROLOGY 987 (2015).


4 International Bobsleigh & Skeleton Federation, ATHLETE HEALTH AND SAFETY PROTOCOLS (2023).


5 Department of Veterans Affairs, TRAUMATIC BRAIN INJURY AND CHRONIC TRAUMATIC ENCEPHALOPATHY (2023).


6 Paul G. Harch et al., Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy for Mild Traumatic Brain Injury Persistent Postconcussion Syndrome, 50 MEDICAL GAS RESEARCH 112 (2020).


7 Shai Efrati & Eshel Ben-Jacob, Reflections on the Neurotherapeutic Effects of Hyperbaric Oxygen, 13 EXPERT REV. NEUROTHERAPEUTICS 233 (2014).


8 Robert A. Stern et al., Clinical Presentation of Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy, 81 NEUROLOGY 1122 (2013).




Note: Interview with Will Parson conducted for SCI TV (2024). All citations follow Bluebook format.






About the Interviewer


Anna Agafonova serves as a researcher and practitioner at the Sports Conflict Institute, specializing in team dynamics and athlete welfare. Her work examines systemic issues in sport governance and their impact on participant wellbeing. Read full bio →






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