A cooking throwdown with race car driver Johnny Sauter and students at KCKCC-TEC was held on Thursday. (Photo from Kansas Speedway)
If anyone needed any proof that race car drivers are competitive off the track, they need look no further than today’s “Cooking Throwdown’ at KCKCC-TEC’s Culinary Arts Program.
NASCAR Camping World Truck Series driver Johnny Sauter made a guest appearance at the program and teamed with one of the students to come up with a tailgating theme menu in 30 minutes. Sauter, an admitted novice in cooking, started the event by telling everyone, “I have no idea what I’m doing. I’m looking around for Ratatouille!”
The three teams had to 10 minutes to decide on their menu for the event and then the cooking began. In addition to cooking, each team had to name their plate.
Sauter embraced the challenge with his culinary student and came up with a plate they called “The Victory Lane,” which consisted of sausage meatballs and chicken wings with a specialty sauce. The nerves definitely kicked in for all of the students participating with all of the TV cameras filming their every move.
In the end, Sauter’s team was deemed the winners.
Sauter is hoping his win today is a little foreshadowing Friday and he’ll be visiting Gatorade Victory Lane at Kansas Speedway once again.
Kansas Speedway, a premier motorsports facility in the Midwest, hosts two NASCAR race weekends a year, in addition to hosting approximately 200 other events throughout the year. Kansas Speedway’s first race weekend of the season is May 11-12 with the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series and Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series under the lights.
In the fall, the NASCAR playoffs return Oct. 20-21 with the NASCAR XFINITY Series and Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series. Also in the fall is the ARCA Racing Series presented by Menards series finale. To purchase season or single-day tickets, call 866-460-RACE (7223) or log onto www.kansaspeedway.com.
General parking is free at Kansas Speedway and fans can bring in one 14x14x14-inch soft-sided cooler with their favorite food and beverages.
Fans can follow Kansas Speedway on Facebook at www.facebook.com/kansasspeedway, Twitter (@kansasspeedway), Instagram (kansasspeedway) and Snapchat (kansasspeedway).
– Story and photos from Kansas Speedway
A cooking throwdown with race car driver Johnny Sauter and students at KCKCC-TEC was held on Thursday. (Photo from Kansas Speedway)
KCK native Jennifer Jo Cobb’s truck, the No. 10 Silverado, will have a new design when it races Friday, May 11, at the Kansas Speedway. (Submitted photo)
by Mary Rupert
A glance at the Monster Energy Cup series and NASCAR Camping World truck race entry lists for this weekend at Kansas Speedway shows only one woman entered so far – Jennifer Jo Cobb, a native of Kansas City, Kansas.
Cobb returns to her hometown track on Friday, May 11, to race in the Camping World truck series. She drives the No. 10 Silverado that will have a new design for this race.
For some years Danica Patrick and Jennifer Jo Cobb were the main full-time female drivers in NASCAR’s top tier. Now, with Patrick’s exit from the Cup series – she will drive an Indy car in late May – Cobb is the only full-time woman driver left in the top NASCAR competitions.
Cobb has been racing consistently at the top level for eight years. The daughter of Joe Cobb, who raced cars at Lakewide Speedway in Kansas City, Kansas, Jennifer started racing consistently in 1991.
“My very first race at Kansas Speedway was 2002,” she recalled.
It is unusual to still be racing after all these years, she agreed. “What makes it more unusual is I also own the team,” she said. She is the only female driver-owner in the top tiers of NASCAR racing.
That’s very difficult, because as someone who grew up in Kansas City, Kansas, graduated from Schlagle High School and never had a lot of money, Cobb was able to become a team owner and NASCAR driver out of very little.
She added she had some good support, and she is proud and grateful to have made it this far in the sport.
She said that 90 percent of the support she received has been from Kansas City, Kansas.
Jennifer Jo Cobb (Photo by Rhonda Pridgeon for Indigo Imagery)
A year to remember
Although she has finished in the top 10 only a few times, nevertheless, Cobb persists and is finding that this year is turning out to be memorable. Her past accomplishments include highest finishing female driver (sixth at Daytona), highest female points finisher (17th in 2010 and 16th in 2014), as well as the woman with the most starts in the truck series (114).
In addition to full-time truck racing, earlier this year, Cobb went to Valencia, Spain, for the NASCAR Whelen Euro Series for a German racing team, Racing-Total.
“It was amazing,” Cobb said. She was in 17th place overall, and when competing in a sub-category, the “legends” group, she was third.
“I literally cried when they played the national anthem,” she said. It was a moment that made her wonder if it was real, she said, and it will be something she thinks about as one of her higher accomplishments.
Also this year, she raced in the NASCAR Xfinity Series at Talladega for the first time. While it didn’t end as well as she had hoped, her car reached almost 195 mph, she said, making it one of the faster cars on the track for a moment.
Continuing her feeling that it can’t be real, Cobb has been tapped to speak abroad to women about entrepreneurship. The U.S. Embassy has asked her to speak in the countries of Georgia and Azerbaijan, presenting information about entrepreneurship and STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) topics to women military members. Besides owning her own racing team, and doing public speaking, Cobb also has her own line of clothing.
They’ve also asked to her participate in a rally race while she is there, she said.
Women Build Week and sponsors
While in Kansas City, Cobb went to the kickoff for a Women Build Week for Habitat for Humanity on Tuesday. Women in Construction Owners and Executives are participating this week to build a house for a recipient.
She attended on behalf of her sponsors, four of whom are women-owned construction companies, she said.
Supporting Cobb’s efforts by sponsoring her Silverado No. 10 truck are Mark One Electric, Rose B. Privitera; International Builders in Construction, Brandy McCombs; Cornell Roofing, Mary McNamara; and Osage Construction, Ruthann Griggs.
Her primary sponsor this year is Think Realty, also a Kansas City area company. IBC and CommunityAmerica Credit Union are other sponsors. Pizza Shoppe is another sponsor, and Cobb will be signing autographs from 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. Thursday, May 10, at the Platte Woods, Mo., Pizza Shoppe.
Besides helping her sponsors with their charitable event, Cobb also started her own not-for-profit, Driven2honor.org, to honor female military members. She said she wanted to bring attention to women military members, and also to let young women know that if they are growing up without funds to attend college, the military is a viable option for career skills and education.
Women military members are honored at each of Cobb’s races with a VIP experience, she said.
No plans to quit
Persistence over the years has worked for Cobb, and she has no plans to quit racing.
“There’s no intention to stop at any point, it’s something that I still enjoy doing and I’m still capable of doing,” said Cobb, who is in her 40s.
“I look to Morgan Shepherd, a NASCAR driver still racing in his 70s, as a really good inspiration,” she said.
Daniel Salloi and Gerso Fernandes struck in the second half as Sporting Kansas City (7-2-2, 23 points) earned a 2-0 victory over Atlanta United FC (7-2-1, 22 points) on Wednesday at Mercedes-Benz Stadium to leapfrog their opponents for first place in the MLS Supporters’ Shield standings.
Salloi opened the scoring with a curling effort in the 67th minute, tallying his second goal in as many games, before Fernandes came off the bench to seal the result against an Atlanta side that was reduced to 10 men following a first-half red card to goalkeeper Brad Guzan.
Sporting KC goalkeeper Tim Melia delivered a sterling performance between the posts, finishing with eight saves as his team became the first in MLS history to shut out Atlanta United FC in a regular season match at Mercedes-Benz Stadium.
The Five Stripes had scored at least twice in each of their first 13 home matches at the venue, but a resolute defensive display gave Sporting KC its fifth clean sheet in seven games and its third road triumph of the season.
Manager Peter Vermes, who on Monday signed a contract extension with Sporting KC through 2023, made one change to his starting lineup from Saturday’s 1-0 win over the Colorado Rapids.
Midfielder Yohan Croizet entered the fray in place of left back Cristian Lobato, with the versatile Jimmy Medranda dropping into defense for his seventh straight start.
Two players reached notable milestones, as midfielder Ilie – who assisted both goals Wednesday night – played his 50th match for the club in all competitions and Melia logged his 100th career MLS appearance (including playoffs).
The visitors weathered a turbulent storm in the early stages as Atlanta nearly took the lead on multiple occasions.
Josef Martinez entered the night as the league’s top scorer with seven goals, and the forward thought he had bagged his eighth after slotting low into the corner past Melia in the sixth minute. Referee Mark Geiger initially awarded the goal, but a review of the play prompted by Video Assistant Referee Edvin Jurisevic showed Martinez to be in an offside position when he received Ezequiel Barco’s deflected through ball.
Melia was then forced to make three saves in as many minutes, first sprawling low to smother a Leandro Gonzalez Pirez header off Miguel Almiron’s corner kick.
Former Sporting KC defender Sal Zizzo created Atlanta’s next chance with a pinpoint cross to the near post, but Melia corralled Martinez’s close-range flick-on effort. The keeper’s best stop during the frantic interval came in the 15th minute when he fisted Hector Villalba’s volley over the bar.
Sporting KC gradually gained a foothold before the raucous crowd of 44,696 at Mercedes-Benz Stadium – the fourth-largest crowd for a regular season match in Kansas City history.
A defensive header from Gonzalez Pirez steered Graham Zusi’s free kick marginally wide of goal, then Ilie was afforded space to send a long-range blast a yard over the crossbar. Sporting KC threatened again in the 33rd minute as Roger Espinoza’s cross from the right wing was nodded off target by Khiry Shelton.
The game’s complexion changed drastically in the 34th minute when Atlanta’s keeper was sent off.
Yohan Croizet slipped a through ball in behind the Five Stripes backline to Shelton, who was chopped to the turf by Guzan just outside the penalty area. Geiger showed no hesitation in brandishing a red card for the denial of an obvious goal scoring opportunity, giving Sporting KC a numerical advantage for the rest of the night.
Guzan was replaced by rookie and League Pool goalkeeper Paul Christensen, who was rooted to the spot when Zusi smacked the ensuing free kick inches wide of the post.
The second stanza unfolded in equally compelling fashion, bursting to life in the 50th minute when Christensen raced off his line to thwart Johnny Russell after the Scot had run onto a diagonal pass from Medranda. Ten minutes later, Espinoza cut the ball onto his left boot at the top of the box and flashed a shot less than a yard wide of frame.
Sporting KC’s 21-year-old homegrown forward provided the match-winner halfway through the second period. Settling a pass from Ilie, Salloi dribbled centrally from the left edge of the box and curled a strike just inside the far corner for his third goal of the season and the sixth of his MLS career.
The hosts were stretched thin in their search for an equalizer, allowing Sporting KC to break on the counter in the 75th minute. Salloi skipped down the left flank and whipped a low cross into the penalty area for Espinoza, who hammered high from seven yards.
Melia was heroic in the dying embers of the match, producing near-identical saves to deny free kick specialist Kevin Kratz in the 83rd and 86th minutes. Kratz bent a pair of free kick attempts over the Sporting KC wall, but Melia dove right on both occasions to parry the ball away and keep Atlanta off the scoresheet.
Sporting KC effectively sealed all three points with three minutes left. Ilie floated a long ball over the top to Fernandes, who had entered the fray just five minutes earlier as a substitute. The winger dashed into the box, rounded Christensen and finished for his first goal of the campaign.
Atlanta was already condemned to defeat deep in second-half stoppage time, but it didn’t prevent Melia from making a save on one of the final plays of the game. Almiron’s 20-yard attempt was destined for the upper corner, but the in-form gloveman leapt at full extension to touch the ball onto the crossbar and compound the home side’s frustration.
With a third of the MLS regular season in the books, Sporting KC won’t return to action until Sunday, May 20, when the side visits Minnesota United FC at TCF Bank Stadium in Minneapolis. Kickoff is slated for 1 p.m. on FOX Sports Kansas City Plus and FOX Sports Midwest Plus. – Story from Sporting KC
