Pimp My Ride was a wild TV show from the mid ’00s that would not only fix up, but wildly customize absolute beaters for people from the LA area. The crew put TVs in just about everything that could hold a TV (mud flaps, mirrors, visors, etc.) not to mention in-car chandeliers, coffins you could grill out on and a whole hot tub. They pulled out all the stops on every vehicle, but nothing was as crazy as what the show did for one young woman who was working in the medical field.
Shout out to @MariaZielger_ for posting this video and taking us all the way back to the ’00s.
If you aren’t familiar with Pimp My Ride, it ran on MTV for six seasons from 2004 to 2007 and was hosted by the rapper Xzibit for its entire run. West Coast Customs worked on the cars for seasons one through four. The last two seasons of Pimp My Ride used Galpin Auto Sports to customize cars.
On this particular episode of the show from ’07, a young EMT named Therese drove a 1984 Ford Crown Victoria Wagon. She must’ve had her own ideas about the customization and what she wanted. If you watch the episode, she makes a few statements about the “Family Truckster,” a modded Country Squire wagon used in the National Lampoon’s Family Vacation movie. So maybe she wanted that? The show had other ideas.
Galpin Motor Sports gave her a whole medical-themed car instead. From the EKG themed stripes to a defibrillator in the backseat that had a small TV display built into it because of course, it did.
That wasn’t the best though...
Around back, in the huge cargo area (Crown Vic Wagons had almost 90 cubic feet of space), a whole CT scanner with subwoofers and TV screens was installed along with a slide-out tray for a person to lay on.
It also came with its own set of controls so you could control the slide-out tray. They pretty much turned her wagon into a hospital.
I gotta be a bubble-burster here and say that, honestly, they made her car worse in every way. From the added weight of all this affecting fuel economy (gas prices skyrocketed around the end of this show’s run) to becoming a target for thieves with all that aftermarket stereo equipment, to taking away her cargo area to screwing up how it rides. They put 22-inch wheels in the back and 20s in the front!
I dug around a bit and couldn’t find out what happened to her car. Over the years many of the owners of these cars ended up getting rid of the vehicles. And it turns out, a lot of time things weren’t always what they seemed with some of the mods. Other owners were able to flip theirs for profit.
All that said, with reboots being a thing now though, it’d be cool to have a show like this come back for a new generation.