NY City Bar Leader Prepares for Race of a Lifetime (New York Law Journal)
New York Law Journal, October 13, 2017
NY City Bar Leader Prepares for Race of a Lifetime
“Bret Parker, executive director of the New York City Bar Association, is preparing for a competition unlike any other: running seven marathons on seven continents in seven days. It’s called the World Marathon Challenge. While Parker, 49, will be joined by up to 60 other participants in the race, he said he is the only participant who has Parkinson’s disease. His goal is to increase awareness about the affliction and raise money for research. Parker, who was an associate general counsel at cosmetics and fragrance company Elizabeth Arden Inc. before moving to the City Bar in 2013, sits on the Patient Council of The Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research. ‘Many people don’t understand that Parkinson’s is not just a disease for older people. Many people can get Parkinson’s when they’re still trying to work and raise families,’ said Parker, a father to two teenage boys who is married to Katharine Parker, a former Proskauer Rose partner who left the firm a year ago to become a federal magistrate judge in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.”
