WBBM<\/a>) \u2014 Ahead of this weekend\u2019s NASCAR Chicago Street Race in Grant Park, Chicago kids on Thursday raced push karts on part of DuSable Lake Shore Drive.<\/p>\nTeens competed on the NASCAR track in Grant Park for the 13th annual X-Stream Push Kart Derby.<\/p>\n
The winners of this year\u2019s race, the team from Columbus Park, built their homemade karts in three days.<\/p>\n
Michael Curry, 16, said he and his teammates worked well together.<\/p>\n
\u201cLike building the kart brick by brick by brick, and building it together all as a unit, that really helped out chemistry and helped our believing in each other,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Chicago Park District program specialist Sonica Ruiz said they started the races 13 years ago as part of a STEM program in their camps.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur first year, we had about a dozen parks, 12, and now we\u2019re up to 38 parks that are racing,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
For years, the races were held in Garfield Park and Humboldt Park, but in 2022, the Park District teamed up with NASCAR for the inaugural Chicago Street Race.<\/p>\n
\u201cHopefully we have new race car fans. Hopefully some of them are potential are NASCAR Cup Series.<\/p>\n
The Chicago Park District said 300 kids have been split up into 20 teams to participate in the 13th annual Push Kart Derby race. Ruiz said this was the first time the teens have been able to race on DuSable Lake Shore Drive.<\/p>\n
\u201cLast year, they brought NASCAR cars out to us, and this year we\u2019re bringing our karts out to them. So we get to be on the ground. We get to see how the races look pre-race. We get a sneak peek. It\u2019s very exciting,\u201d Ruiz said.<\/p>\n
Antwan Curry, 14, pushed his teammate, Michael Curry during the race. He said the derby was an opportunity he\u2019ll never forget.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think it\u2019s great. I think it\u2019s really one way to bring the community together. You know, with all the stuff that happens in Chicago, it\u2019s just one thing to distract the kids, like give them something to do, keep them busy, being with the community. I think it\u2019s amazing,\u201d Antwan said.<\/p>\n
The Chicago Park District said each year\u2019s race has a theme, and this year they were advocating for the environment.<\/p>\n
Please note: This content carries a strict local market embargo. If you share the same market as the contributor of this article, you may not use it on any platform.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Shardaa Gray Click here for updates on this story \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0CHICAGO, Illinois (WBBM) \u2014 Ahead of this weekend\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":38470,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[46],"tags":[1406,62,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-38469","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nascar","8":"tag-nascar","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-united-states","11":"tag-unitedstates","12":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114795864652477739","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38469","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38469"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38469\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/38470"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38469"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38469"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38469"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}