Sports & Recreation >>

• Best Athlete (1 Comment)
  Rob Kimmons
  An injury to another competitor in June opened up a spot for middleweight Rob Kimmons on an Ultimate Fighting Championship card in Las Vegas. The 27-year-old Kansas City, Kansas, resident made the most of the opportunity. The Rosedale Reaper, as Kimmons likes to be known, forced his opponent to... More >>
• Best Power Player
  Melissa McKibben
  Rugby is still an enigma to many Americans. Players toss around something that looks like a football-volleyball hybrid. They muscle their way to the end of the field, avoid being tackled and dart under the goal posts. But they don't call it a touchdown; it's a "try." Playing an under-recognized... More >>
• Best Olympian
  Muna Lee
  In 1997, Muna Lee won three state track titles as a skinny freshman at Central High School. Eleven years later, Lee, still skinny at 109 pounds, ran a personal best and finished first in the 100 meters at the Olympic trials. The road to becoming a medal contender at the Beijing Olympics wasn't... More >>
• Best Park
  Cliff Drive
  Walkers, runners and cyclists can take revenge against the exhaust-pipe set and claim the center line of Cliff Drive after 2 p.m. on Fridays, when park workers close the road to traffic. The leafy route begins at the Paseo, winds past limestone bluffs and a lake, and skirts the entrance to... More >>
• Best Outdoor Activist
  Laurie Chipman
  Laurie Chipman will be damned if her bike isn't allowed where cars are free to travel. Don't tell this Brookside cyclist that the bank drive-through is reserved for customers on four wheels or that crossing the Missouri River should be a privilege of the motor class. In her efforts to create... More >>
• Best Nude Beach
  Heartland Cove at Smithville Lake
  Let's speak hypothetically for a minute. Suppose there were a strip of beach about 40 miles north of Kansas City. It's not the most beautiful beach you'll ever see, bordering as it does on a lot of tall grass and some woodlands, with a mixture of clay and sand in the water, along with a few dead... More >>
• Best Sports-Talk Host
  Soren Petro
  Soren Petro jokes on WHB 810 that he's known in the industry for being a guy who talks about sports — not hotties, farting or other preoccupations of the subliterate sports yakker. The Program, which Petro hosts middays, routinely features the sharpest analysis of any show of its kind.... More >>
• Best Gym
  North Kansas City Community Center
  When it comes to gyms, the more variety, the better. This is the land of short attention spans, and most of us need a range of classes and equipment to choose from in order to have any hope of getting that ol' momentum going. Which is why the North Kansas City Community Center is tops. For... More >>
• Best Yoga Instructor (1 Comment)
  Sarah Kucera
  The purpose of yoga isn't the strength to balance on your forearms or the flexibility to arc your leg upward until your toes touch the crown of your head. The physical acrobatics are just a fancy way to get the mind to calm down and give the body permission to do nothing but breathe. So Sarah... More >>
• Best Runner
  Karen Raymer
  If there's one thing that's more difficult than actually running 26.2 miles, it's being responsible for all the legwork that goes into organizing a marathon. Especially in a city where most transportation is motorized. But Karen Raymer, like her man Elvis, doesn't get "all shook up" that easily.... More >>
• Best Jog
  Wyandotte County Lake Park
  There's nothing wrong with the Trolley Track Trail. For the urban runner, it's a quiet place to tune out, turn on the iPod, and put in a few miles with fellow runners and the odd bunny rabbit nosing around in the manicured grass. But the flat terrain can get old quickly. Same goes for Loose Park... More >>
• Best Weekend Adventure
  Katy Trail: Boonville to Hermann
  It's been a long time coming, but the Katy Trail may soon touch ground in Kansas City. Even when it gets here, though, the best of this 225-mile gem will still likely be a weekend getaway for all but the hardcore cyclists. Not to dismiss the scenic potential of traveling through agricultural... More >>
• Best Hike
  Eddy-Ballentine Trail
  Most followers of civic affairs know Bill Eddy as the retired business professor and former school board member who has become a citizen activist, lobbying for better education in the city's dysfunctional schools. But Eddy is also half of the writing duo who has compiled the definitive guide to... More >>
• Best Bike Ride
  Bicycle Shack Saturday Morning Rides
  It's a bit of a catch-22 for the novice cyclist. Those slick athletes in aerodynamic helmets and colorful spandex can be inspiring — and more than a little intimidating. Group rides are good motivation, but they're tempered with the potential for public displays of rookie mistakes and... More >>
• Best Wii Bowling
  Willie's Field House
  It's easy to love The Big Lebowski — consider all those people shouting lines at the movie during the Screenland's midnight showings. It's not the detective novel plot that gets us but the gorgeously rendered bowling fantasies. If we know the Dude, a truly lazy man after our own heart,... More >>
• Best Kickball
  World Adult Kickball Champions
  The biggest bullies in Penn Valley Park wear light blue and kick big red-rubber balls: Shake n' Bake, two-time World Adult Kickball champions of Kansas City, are the New York Yankees of Kansas City kickball, a team stacked with playground ringers. A third championship was within Shake n' Bake's... More >>
• Best Coach
  Mark Mangino
  Kansas Jayhawks football was like the stoner kid toking in his parent's basement — the slacker in the Big 12 cellar. Until last year. After five seasons and a 25-35 record, KU coach Mark Mangino needed to win and win big. The schedule looked favorable: no Texas, no Oklahoma and a... More >>
• Best College Athlete
  Chase Daniel
  Missouri quarterback Chase Daniel is the type of signal caller you want leading your team. He's tougher than a junkyard dog spitting spikes. He's worthy of Heisman consideration. (Last year he finished fourth.) He's gutsy enough to leap headfirst into eight angry 300-pound men violently blocking... More >>
• Best Highlight
  Mario Chalmer's 3-pointer
  The Kansas Jayhawks trailed the Memphis Tigers by three points. Only 10.8 seconds separated the Tigers from coronation as college basketball's 2008 national champions. The Jayhawks' Sherron Collins dribbled wildly up the court as time escaped. Collins lost the handle when he reached the 3-point... More >>
• Best Competitive Eater
  Howard Harrison
  Sadly, Kansas City has yet to produce an eater voracious enough to be listed on the International Federation of Competitive Eaters' Web site. But there's hope, and his name is Howard Harrison. You'll find the 36-year-old regularly tearing up the competition at local taco-eating contests —... More >>
• Best Exercise Class
  Aerial Fabrics with Rachel McMeachin
  A year ago, 16 amateurs who stared up at two strands of silk hanging from the ceiling of Rachel McMeachin's industrial loft in the West Bottoms were crazy enough to think they could fly. McMeachin had become fascinated with the art of aerial fabrics — the way lithe acrobats twirled... More >>
• Best Sports Blog
  downthebyline.com
  Soccer is the heavy metal of sports here in the United States. It might not have many fans, but those who follow it are fiercely loyal. And just like metal, it never gets quite the serious press it deserves. It'd be easy for the author of downthebyline.com, known simply as "Mike," to post soccer... More >>
• Best Rugby Team (5 Comments)
  Kansas City Rugby Football Club
  On paper, the best rugby team in town should be the Kansas City Blues, which is the city's only Division I rugby team whose players are regularly called to service for national and international rugby play. The Blues also have plenty of cash from local donors. But the reason the Blues is the... More >>