Photo: Hai Pham

What cars can be a donk?

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Make Your Bookie Cry And Pull The Hair By Generating $23,187

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You're happy to take that guy's money. What could possibly go wrong?

Historically, high-risers have had a tough time in the hot rodding hobby. Their tall profiles and apparent inability to do anything very well has stumped many, setting the build style up as a poseur trend from the very start. Hold that thought, because first we need to explain what a high-riser is: It's an American sedan with a body-on-frame construction that is highly customized, characterized by large-diameter wheels and a high ground clearance. Types of high-risers include donks, boxes, and bubbles. (There's more, but we're just learning!) The trend began in South Florida in the 1990s then spread to other Southern metropolitan centers, and finally throughout the country.

What Does Donk Mean?

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In the strictest terms, the word "donk" is any 1971 to 1976 full-sized Chevy Caprice or Impala that has been subjected to a high-riser treatment with tall wheels (24 inchers would be considered the bare minimum), low-profile tires, and lots of ground clearance. That's just the beginning. Most true donks have also been highly customized with graphic and paint treatment, additional chrome plating, elaborate interiors, programmable lighting, and commanding entertainment systems. Increasingly, donks are also modified for performance and have been seen in recent years at mainstream drag events like LS Fest.

Donk Cars

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Only a 1971-to-1976 full-size Chevy can technically be a donk, but other makes and models sometimes get the moniker. Some clubs and social media blogs will loosen the definition to include other forms of high-risers, like Panther-platform Ford Crown Vics or GM G-bodies, but if you really want street cred, you better learn the lingo. A 1977-to-1990 Chevy Caprice isn't a donk; it's called a "box" because of its square shape. A 1991-to-1996 Chevy Caprice (or Buick Roadmaster) is called a "bubble," also for its physical resemblance. Everything else built in the same style is a high-riser, but nobody is going to bloody your nose for getting it wrong—they'll just laugh at you.

Donk Racing

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Our first exposure to donk racing was at LS Fest. We were prepared to be amused, and this author didn't even bother to raise his camera to take a photo. (That'll be the last time I make that mistake!) The car was a rust-colored 1973 Chevy Impala from Miami with giant-by-large Rucci Forged wheels that did a long, over-the-line burnout. After building some boost, it left the line at a gentle roll, rapidly picked up speed, then swooshed smoothly through the quarter-mile traps well into the 10-second zone. Donks now had my attention. We had to take a closer look, so out to the pit area we went. We never found the driver of that car, but we did find the team from Kaotic Speed, a donk shop based in Fayetteville, Georgia, that is run by Shane Speed.

Meet the Bill Collector

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The Bill Collector is Shane Speed's donk: a gold 1971 Chevy Impala that has no problem fitting in with the typical big-city high-bling car show. Its most notable visual feature is a freshly minted set of Forgiato Twisted Maglia wheels, size 26x9 up front and 26x12 in the rear. (Lexani tires take the abuse.) Look a little closer, and behind those wheels you'll find a set of carbon-fiber brakes from a 2019 Corvette ZR1. (Shane fabricated the hub and mounting brackets on a mill in his shop.) Inside, you will see a carefully crafted rollcage with a pair of Kirky racing seats, a Hurst Pistol-Grip Quarter-Stick shifter, a Longacre dirt-track steering wheel, and lots of engine management electronics. (Check out a sensational video by Whip Addict of the Kaotic Speed shop here. )

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Under the hood is a Steve Morris-built 427ci LS V-8 with an F3 Procharger that puts out 2,200 hp to the flywheel on methanol. An FTI-built Reid-case PowerGlide sends scads of torque to a Fab 9 rear that houses a set of 3.90 gears. Managing all that snot is the job of a custom triangulated four-link rear suspension, Afco adjustable coilovers out of Troy Perez's Innovative Racecraft shop, and an anti-sway bar. What were we saying about donks having an inability to do anything well? That high-risers were a poseur trend from the start?

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At first blush, it seems a heavy sedan with giant wheels that must weigh 100 pounds each has no business on a racetrack. After all, the instability from its high center of gravity, ginormous wheels with performance-robbing inertia, and the car's intrinsic as-built massiveness ought to doom it to a life of hanging out in parking lots, rattling its own windows out with a million-watt subwoofer, right? Ha! That's exactly what grudge-racing donk lovers want dweebs with money to think, and here we come full circle to our original thought: The donk is such an improbable performer that seeing one rip a 9-second quarter-mile pass elicits unabashed cognitive dissonance. You really aren't convinced you even saw it happen. From a grudge-racing perspective, it's pure brilliance.

Battle of the Donks

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Kaotic Speed's Bill Collector donk is really good at performing this drag racing analogue of a head fake, and if you haven't figured it out by now, the Bill Collector's name is a function of its ability to relieve rubes of their cash—so far Speed admits he's won about $25K since building it. There's a donk grudge-racing circuit, a fringe subculture that has lived mostly in the shadows, but with the COVID lockdown coming to an end, donk racing is going to explode mainstream this summer at a dragstrip near you. At the top of Shane Speed's hit list is a date with Donkmaster, one Sage Thomas of Charleston, South Carolina, who runs the donk shop, In And Out Customs, a shop featured on the recent reality show, Donkmaster.

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Donkmaster is a legend in the world of donk grudge racing, and Thomas is betting that folks will want a heaping helping of donk grudge racing when he opens the gates at his event at Maryland International Raceway in Budds Creek, Maryland, later this summer. Called "Donkmaster Invades Maryland," the car show and drag race will feature Donkmaster's many creations, including a 2,000-hp, LS-powered, Ferrari-eating high-riser with 30-inch wheels that many have called the fastest donk on the planet. Shane Speed plans to be there with the Bill Collector on July 17 for a high-stake grudge match-up against Thomas that (both men hope!) will have lips flapping for ages. Be there, or, umm, be a box.

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Got a high-speed donk or high-riser you want the world to know about? Send a few good pix (and a video link, or it didn't happen) to john_hunkins@motortrend.com.