Welcome, I’m Jonny Landis and this is a blog where once a month I will cover and bring light and honor to those people who are struggling with something and are working to overcome. This is where the saying and my life mantra came about, “Never Stop the Fight.”
The first post will be about me and some of the challenges I have had to overcome, which began on March 9th of 2019. This is when my life changed forever when I suffered a severe traumatic brain injury (TBI) from a 40 feet fall onto pavement that resulted in 162 skull fractures. The first night was touch and go as I endured over 100 frontal lobe strokes and honestly the medical staff didn’t think I’d make it through the night, but God had other plans.
From there I spent 60 days in a coma and was given less than a .1% chance of survival. After defying the odds I spent the next two years doing in and outpatient therapy and living at home with my family. However in the fall of 2021 I returned back to school in Boulder where I lived with a friend from high school and became a part time student taking one or two courses a semester. I actually ended up graduating from CU Boulder on May 2nd of this year with a degree in Strategic communication and a minor in Leadership in the spring of 2026, Sko Buffs!
From there I now have become an intern at Dawg Nation working for the Dawg Father and helping him grow the business and sharing my story and helping inspire others to Never Stop the Fight! This has been a great experience as he is super forgiving and understanding of my limitations and makes it great for me to succeed to my fullest potential. My role includes making calls, helping with sponsorships, sharing stories and skating with the Hockey Heals community and everything else that comes along with Dawg Nation.
Along the way I accomplished another dream of mine which was returning to playing ice hockey. I could not have done this if it wasn’t for such an amazing group of people called Hockey Heals. That has allowed me to meet some really close friends such as Marty Richardson and Dave Carr. I see Dave along with Marty every week at Hockey Heals and they are both great guys. We have fun together and can just be hockey guys. Competing and talking a little trash to each other but it’s always filled with love and it’s always fun to compete with and against each other.
Another one of best friends is Paul Zancanelli and I have become extremely close and actually best friends after we met at the 2025 Survivor Game. Paul also suffered a TBI and we can be truly our authentic selves around each other without any judgment. We truly enjoy spending time around each other where it doesn’t feel like either of us has an injury or any adversity that we deal with when we are around each other. I love to spend time with Paul because he’s so authentically himself around me, and I feel like I can be the same way around him.
For this reason and so many others I have found it easier to “Never Stop the Fight” for the others around me and myself. Because ultimately I love to live life and so does everyone who comes and joins me in the Dawg Nation community, collectively we all know what it truly means to Never Stop the Fight!
