Pinks is the primary television series in a franchise series of television programs on Speed based on street racing, held at legal closed drag strips with a theme around drag racing. The original aired from 2005 to 2008, with the spinoff Pinks: All Out following in 2006 until 2010. The name of the show, and the tagline "Lose the race – lose your ride", refer to common slang of pink slips representing a vehicle's title document recording ownership, and the derivative street-racing phrase, "racing for pinks," meaning a race in which the winner earns the loser's car. (In California, until recently, the vehicle title was on a pink slip of paper.)
The original was aired by Speed in the United States and Canada, and also airs on Fox Sports 3 in Australia. The series is produced by Pullin Television. The 2016 version aired on Outdoor Channel and Fox Sports Racing starting in March 2016 Produced by Brian Bossone's production company Boss One Media llc.
Competitors compete in a drag race (although in the original Pinks, there was a stepladder shifter kart race in Series 1, and the original franchise was based more on illegal street racing) in the franchise. The formats differ between the franchise's formats.
In the original series, the illegal street racing style drag race has provisions of the winner claiming ownership of the losing vehicle.
The race format changed slightly through each season: Early Series 1 (2005): 2 out of 3 races Later Series 1-Series 4 (2005–2007): 3 out of 5 races Series 5 (2008): 4 out of 7 races
As the show starts, the host, staff, and contestants sign a binding contract that will transfer the legal title of the two cars in question to Pullin Television, the production company of the show. Since the production company owns the vehicles it guarantees that the show will award the titles to both cars to the winner of the race and eliminates the chance that the loser will refuse to forfeit his/her car after the race.
Negotiations
Each team is allowed to inspect the opposing team's car to attempt to assess its performance before negotiations for the first race, or in cases where the negotiations are not held for the first race, before the second. Each team chooses a negotiator to act as its spokesperson to discuss the terms of each round. In recent seasons, the first round of each match is often held without negotiation except for terms over the use of nitrous oxide, and features a heads-up start (each car side by side with no time or length handicap)
Negotiations generally deal with starting position, similar to bracket racing (except it is negotiated in car lengths, not seconds), nitrous use, and other such issues, the purpose being to handicap the perceived stronger car and create an even race. In Series 5, negotiating car setup for bracket racing times were permitted. After the negotiations (which can last considerably longer than what is shown), the cars are sent to the start line for the burnout.
Race
As is the case for a regular drag race, the cars are allowed to perform a burnout, after which they are staged according to the negotiated starting positions (if any). If a track official finds suspicious fluids leaking on the track, he may order the car shut down and the round automatically forfeited to the opponent. If there are mechanical or weather questions, the race may be delayed. In some cases, a show taping may be called off if the weather prevents a full race from being filmed.
Pinks uses a street-race-style arm-drop start rather than the "Christmas Tree" electronic starting system used in modern drag racing. The show's signature start signal was devised by show creator and host Rich Christensen. Christensen points at the driver of the car on his right (left lane), waits for the driver to respond with a thumbs up, then drops that arm. Christensen then repeats this with the driver on his left (right lane). Next, Christensen raises both arms, waits for 2 – 5 seconds and then lowers his arms to start the race, which eliminates a popular tactic in drag racing, the delay box, from being used by the car.
Officials, both from the show (since Series 2) and track, observe conditions and tape them for replay in case of false starts (leaving before the hands drop), race infractions (standard drag racing rules apply), and photo finishes. In the case of a photo finish, the video tape of the finish is brought to the start line to allow the teams to agree on the result.
Fouls
As in drag racing, the following are declared fouls on Pinks and the offender loses the round: Leaving before Christensen drops his hands. It is a clean start if the car moves once the hands begin dropping. Officials may use replay to verify the legality of a start. If a driver leaves as soon as the hand begins to drop from its highest point, a driver is said to have tree'd their opponent. If both cars jump, the first to jump loses (red light). Rich will often point at the offending lane if he spots the infraction. Crossing either boundary line Leaking fluid during staging At that point, Christensen will point to the opponent and point him down the track for a bye run and an automatic win. Breaking down and not finishing the run Although it has never happened, it is unknown what would happen if one car commits a foul start and the opponent crosses the boundary line. In normal drag racing, the foul start driver wins. In Series 5, if negotiations call for bracket race rules, and one car clearly breaks out while the opponent does not break out, that can be grounds for disqualification for sandbagging. Technical advisors will determine time through the timing traps as the scoreboard is turned off, officials still have the ability to observe track timing through the electronic timing system. Times will be taken from standard points at the track and compared to the times from the vehicle's earlier races in order to see where the car "breaks out", with the timing of the racer's start taken into account. The standard timing points in drag racing, excluding the 60-feet time (which Pinks does not use because of the nature of head starts), used by officials are at: 330 feet 660 feet 1,000 feet 1,320 feet It is important that times be compared all along the track as opposed to merely the finish line as a driver, once he has reason to believe he's going to win the race, can easily "pedal" or "fender" his opponent giving him smaller margin of victory, and a higher lap time.
Winning
The match ends when one driver has won the said number of rounds above (2, 3, or 4). After Christensen debriefs the two teams on the previous race, he announces the winner. He then hands the title of both cars to the race winner, and often the winner drives the loser's car down the strip after claiming the car by winning the match. A team may also concede because of a catastrophic breakdown. In the spirit of sportsmanship, such a win will often not include the loser's car and often calls for a rematch on a later episode, believing that they will not take the car unless it was a clear win on the track, and not by default.
Notes
A common occurrence is "set matches", such as import vs. domestic, new vs. old models of a certain make, or races of popular former cars, such as current technical advisor Charles Hendrickson's "Woolly Mammoth", an altered 1976 Chevrolet Vega wagon that beat several more sporty cars. Other matches have featured motorcycles, trucks, and even snowmobiles.
Recent shows have been sponsored (with prizes going to the winner such as free Bridgestone tires or several cases of Shell Q Motor Oil), with Series Four featuring NAPA Auto Parts as the series presenting sponsor for both the regular and All Out series, owing to the show's growing popularity. Current sponsors are NAPA and Valvoline.
The arm-drop start prevents bracket racers from using the delay box, a popular device that is typically used in this genre of drag racing. Typically, with the Christmas tree, the delay box is designed to allow a driver to press the throttle pedal on the second amber, allowing the box to launch the car one second, or in the case on the third amber, a half-second later. The arm drop's unpredictability prevents this popular technique from being used, which forces drivers to watch the official to launch the car.
In 2008, the American Drag Racing League was forced to a Pinks-style arm drop start for the final two rounds of their 1/8 mile races when lightning damaged the Christmas tree at US 131 Motorsports Park in Martin, Michigan.
On the May 28, 2006 episode of WindTunnel with Dave Despain, the show's producer and host Rich Christensen claimed that some losing racers tried to buy back the vehicle after the race, which Rich tried to eliminate in later seasons. However, one race resulted in a win by default when the engine block overheated, leading to a win by "catastrophic failure". In the spirit of sportsmanship, the winner gave the car back to the loser, noting that a win by default caused by such severe mechanical failure is improper, and promised a future rematch. On multiple episodes Rich has allowed a car that has lost due to mechanical failure to be granted back or purchased back by its original owner so it may be raced again. In each of these cases the original episode was unusable due to the nature of the catastrophic failure, so had another race not been held, the episodes likely would have never aired. In 2008, a special episode, "Quitters, No Shows, and Breakdowns" featured many aborted races.
Because of the nature of the show's premise of racing for titles, taping the show is illegal in 40 states. This problem led to the development of a spinoff that does not involve titles and is legal to be taped in all 50 states.
Pinks: All Out The popularity of the original show led to a full drag meet devised by the staff, with this title in 2006. The goal is to take over 400 cars, run them in trial runs to see which 16 cars will provide the most competitive racing, then race those 16 cars against each other, all in the course of one day. The format later changed to 32 cars.
Qualifying As the show opens, a scene shows Rich Christensen discussing how many cars have filed for entry, usually between 250–450, but some Season 3 races feature over 500 cars. The popularity of entries have resulted in the possibility of filing a Pinks entry to be nearly impossible (only 400 cars) that Christensen and the tracks have added "runoffs" weeks before the Pinks meet. Once entries have filled, most tracks will run a special qualifying race to fill out extra entries.
As cars prepare to compete, they are inspected by track officials and technical advisors, including former Pinks contestant turned technical advisor Brian Bossone, and cars are eliminated for problems that may lead to mechanical failure the most notable of which being fluids spilled onto the track, as that can take an hour or more to clean up so racing may resume. Starting in Season 3, automatic disqualification is called for any car that causes a leak of fluids that requires a long delay, especially in violation of track rules.
Unless situations require altering the schedule (inclement weather), the cars take part in one pass per car, using the Christmas tree. This pass uses the Pro Tree (all three ambers light at the same time, then the green four-tenths later) instead of the Standard Tree used by the sportsman drivers that participate in the show (each amber five-tenths after the other), and with the track clocks running and scoreboards displaying time.