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Top Fuel front-runner Leah Pruett leads a busy life, running from sponsor appearances to marketing promotions to maintaining a top spot in the 24-race NHRA Mello Yello Drag Racing Series. This daily regimen was life for Pruett, until the global Coronavirus Pandemic hit, bringing her schedule to a grinding halt.

The high energy Pruett isn't sitting idle and instead has found a cause to get behind in her newfound open schedule.

Pruett couldn't help but notice how food pantries are in dire need of donations with increased demand during the mandatory stay-at-home orders ordered by government officials.

Pruett resides in Lake Havasu City, Ariz., and for her, the local food bank Havasu Community Health Foundation Food Bank has been hit hard during this time.

Pruett took notice and immediately found a way to insert herself into the drive to help the struggling food pantry.

Enter Cameo, a digital app which connects outdated and often c-listed veteran celebrities from music, sports and film industries with their fans who'd like to send their friends personalized video messages.

From now until Friday, April 17, Pruett will be on Cameo interacting with her fans, and delivering messages upon order, and has vowed to donate 100% of the proceeds from all of her requests to the Havasu Community Health Foundation Food Bank.

"I'd participated in Cameo before," Pruett said.. "And so I thought, man, it's the perfect opportunity for me to give back with social distancing and motivational, and part of the Uplift Challenge and donate the proceeds to that. So I've been doing it for about a week."

Havasu Community Health Foundation Food Bank feeds nearly 2,000 people annually. The 501c3 nonprofit and carries only one paid staff member with 45 volunteers to run the organization. The patrons of the organization are primary the working poor, seniors and 200 homeless visitors, many of whom are military veterans. They do receive some food through the Feeding America grant, but their primary source of funding and inventory comes from donations.

 

 

 

GET YOUR LEAH PRUETT CAMEO TODAY 

Pruett is committed to the project to the point she says even if she's out mountain biking or working out, she'll take a break and get her cameo duties fulfilled then and there on the spot.

"I'll do it from the top of the hill I'm on," Pruett said. "It's just showing people that, A, stay motivated, stay healthy and whatever particular message there might be that's car-related or not, so we're still out there, and we're all in this together."

It was the Uplift Challenge, a social media initiative which promotes positive works to others which provided the impetus for Pruett's involvement.

"I was actually inspired by one of our biggest MOPAR fans and a friend that I met at the ropes a couple of years ago, who challenged me in something called the Uplift Challenge," Pruett admitted. "The challenge came when I was just trying to work out, motivating people on staying healthy, not catching the Corona 15, the 15 pounds you stack on by snacking all day.

"The Uplift Challenge is intended to reach out and just be very positive to the people around you on social, make somebody laugh, maybe inspire them with a new idea. So I thought, 'Man, what could I do for that, for the people across the country that aren't in a sunny spot and, maybe there's six people locked up in a tiny little condo."

"I kept hearing stories of family and friends with kids graduating high school and college and having a cap and gown and nowhere to wear it. No prom that goes, graduation, kids that have worked their entire life in a particular sport, waiting to be drafted or find an agent and don't have the chance to try out for what was their dream goal or career."

Pruett understood the importance of becoming a beacon of positivity in a sea filled with negativity.

"Watching from a sunny, windy place in the middle of the desert, for the rest of the country, be on lockdown more than a month before we did, we all feel helpless and watching some of my closest people in my life that are in the service industry, in personal care, not central care industries, go through struggling with feeding their families, paying rent, going through foreclosure, things like that," Pruett said. "It takes your mind off your own situations of racing, not racing and stabbing the gas is the least of the problems from the real world facing you."

 

 

 

GET YOUR LEAH PRUETT CAMEO TODAY 

To ensure the program is a complete success, Pruett has knocked her Cameo fee down to half-price.

"I want to see how many more requests I can get; it's been a lot of fun," Pruett said. "I've had a lot of car clubs, a lot of birthdays and I'll record them wherever I'm at. I made the video for an eight-year old's birthday, just having a little bit of fun."

Pruett isn't just offering blind support. Before she began her support of the food pantry, she paid a visit.

"I visited it during our social distancing time," Pruett confirmed. "I've seen it before, I've driven by it before, I'd never been inside, and I made an appointment to check out what they were all about. It's more than just food and resources, they have gifts for kids, not just for Christmas time, but they have some leftover right now to be able to help families out with delivering a birthday to their family, and that's clearly very important too as well.

"I was very delighted to see firsthand how they were coping with [the Pandemic]. They don't do a background check or anything on if you qualify to be given food, they're not going to turn away anybody that's hungry.

"When I was there taking the tour, I spent two hours there talking with individuals seeing the place, seeing how they organize the food, who gets what, the different baskets. And the people come by, and they have a drive-through service is what it is, and you drive up, and one person goes out there with gloves and a mask and gown and canned food and no questions asked. It's a judgment-free zone too because we all know the income. Nobody's working, the income isn't coming, there's no expenditure, and they're having a hard time just keeping in their houses and their apartments, the food on the table.

"I would say that the highlight out of all of this quarantine mess has been able to help and that has far surpassed any mountain biking or any other activity I may participate in.

"I want to encourage people to get the app or find cameo.com/Leah Pruett, make a request and then at the end of the week, be able to see how much money we've been able to give so that they can buy food."

 

 

 

GET YOUR LEAH PRUETT CAMEO TODAY 

Life will not be the same for many once the Pandemic runs its course, and for Pruett, she's learned quickly what her biggest takeaway of the situation has been.

"How important family has been," Pruett said without hesitation. "I don't have any family here in Lake Havasu. It has been a reality check of what the day to day life has been, the toll it's taken on family, and it really has emphasized what's important in our live and really human interest, humanity and relationships. That's actually what's highlighted for me, and then it puts your ambition in check.

"There are lots of people who have watched every single episode of everything on Netflix and they're happy with that, or you have people that are pulling their hair out cause they feel like they're not productive either way, you don't need to be productive. I guess my reality check is you don't need to be productive in the sense of what you thought was production before.

"I feel like, as long as you continue to feel productive in things that matter in your life. The things that matter in my life is, FaceTiming my mom and my dad, repairing a relationship with my dad, getting excited about that and, heck, I haven't lived a normal life in a really long time, and it feels kind of cool, but at the same time it's a good little time to be in it, but it makes me realize that the race track and my race and family, it's the longest time I've ever spent, I mean ever in 10 years, the longest time I've ever spent without seeing my team in any capacity.

"I feel like, if you don't come out of this grateful as heck for the people that are in your life and the opportunities when they do come back to make money and live how we do in a free country, then maybe you're not looking at the quarantine the right way."

One thing she is appreciative is the way her team owner Don Schumacher has looked out after those in his organization.

"How Don Schumacher has handled the situation, being a very smart businessman, not laying anybody off, putting his employees first in a time he could've easily taken a different route," Pruett said. "But he has really shown through to what I've always known about him, but he has done it on such a grander scale of, doing what's best for his employees and treating them as family members. And when I say that, I mean from executing and exasperating every opportunity that the government has given to be able to keep employees employed, and eyes set on remaining competitive for when we get back racing and just having an overall vision.

"t came from leadership, and it came from love, and I'm proud to race for Don, and I look forward to getting back on the track for him and the partners."

Until then, Pruett understands she's embedded in the most valuable race she's ever been in; the race to feed the hungry and she's hoping the drag racing community will come along for the ride.