When Daniel Cho crosses the finish line of this year’s New York City Marathon, he’ll join more than 18,000 first-time runners to do so.
But this time last year, he was part of a very different statistic.
Cho was standing on the platform of the Bowery J/Z train station at around 4 p.m. on Oct. 29, 2025. He was on his way to collect a racing t-shirt for his first-ever marathon from a non-profit group he was helping to raise money for low-income Asian youths.
A stranger approached him on the platform and punched him in the face, shouting a racist slur. Cho ended up on the train tracks.
“I turned around to look if there was a train coming. [The tunnel] was pitch black, and so I said, ‘OK, get it together, and you’re gonna be able to figure it out,’” Cho said.
He climbed back onto the platform, called 911, and gave the police a detailed description that helped them quickly catch his assailant. But in an instant, Cho, 46, became one of more than 29,800 people who would experience a serious physical assault somewhere in the city in 2025.
The arrest of his perpetrator was only the beginning of Cho’s mental and physical journey toward recovery. With multiple fractures to his right cheekbone, nerve damage along his eye socket and only four days to go before the race, doctors told him to cancel his marathon bid.
In the months that followed, he’d endure surgery to install a titanium plate in his face, log hours of work with a therapist to overcome lingering post-traumatic stress disorder, and shuttle to acupuncture treatments to tackle persistent numbness.
In early spring, Cho decided he was ready to run again — and hoped to take another shot at New York City’s iconic race.
“ Both marathon training and recovery from violence, or just a crime, ask for the same things: resilience, motivation, mental fortitude,” he said. “So I’ve been able to redefine that strength.”
While many of the city’s major violent crimes have declined significantly this year, felony assaults — the kind of attacks that leave people with serious injuries — have remained confoundingly high. According to the most recent NYPD data, there have been 165 more felony assaults reported citywide this year than the same time period last year, bucking the decreases in other kinds of offenses.
The same man who punched Cho was allegedly involved in four other anti-Asian attacks that same day, according to Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg. So far this year there have been 548 felony assaults in transit, up from 490 at this time last year; an 11% increase.
The MTA declined to comment on Cho’s attack or on the spike in assaults on its system.
Cho, who works for the New York City Campaign Finance Board, was originally running the marathon to raise money for Apex for Youth: a nonprofit headquartered in Manhattan’s Chinatown that provides resources and mentorship to young Asian Americans from low-income backgrounds. Now, he said, he is also running to raise awareness about the prevalence of similar attacks, to spread hope to other survivors, and to reclaim his sense of safety and community in the city he loves.
“I was running for kids who are learning to trust this city to nurture and protect their futures. And then I had to learn to trust the city again myself with every commute, with every subway ride,” he said.
Cho’s message to other survivors is to treat recovery like marathon training: a long process with ups and downs, twists and turns, progress and setbacks.
“Find your own healing journey,” he said. “Don’t be afraid to tell your story…and my last thing is, create space for that intentional rest.”
On marathon day, Cho said he is most looking forward to “taking it all in,” “finding joy in the struggle,” and seeing his wife and two kids at mile 14. He said the race provides a unique opportunity for people from all walks of life to find common ground with strangers.
“ New York is a place for everyone, like nowhere else in the world, and the city belongs to all of us,” he said. “Hopefully we can lift each other up.”
This story has been updated to clarify the item Cho was collecting and the nature of his attack.
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