The Price is Right fans have proposed an interesting question. They know how the game Rat Race works in the sense of what has to happen in order for the contestants to win, but now they’re wondering how it works in terms of mechanics.
Rat Race, which was created by host Drew Carey, has a contestant bid on prizes that increase in value. Every time they bid correctly, the contestant gets to choose one of the five mechanical rats, which are wound up, on the track in front of them. They can pick up to three rats if they guess all of the prices correctly.
The rats race to the end, and if the rat(s) that the contestant picks gets to the finish line first, second, or third, they win a prize. If their first-place rat wins, they win a car.
A woman named Nemia, on the Monday, March 3, episode, went home with a car. She also had a chance to win cookware and a meal delivery service prize.
“We’re going to play a really fun game, probably the best game ever in The Price is Right history,” Carey said to the women.
Nemia correctly guessed the price of the wafers and picked the green rat. She did not guess the price of the birdhouse, but that was OK because she had another chance. The game show contestant correctly guessed the price range for the juicer, giving her two rats lit up on the board. Nemia picked the blue rat for her second one. When the model let the rats go, the green one flew to first, which meant that Nemia won the car.
But, Reddit users are wondering how the mechanics of the game work.
“How does the rat race work? I don’t mean how the game is played, but the mechanics of it. How do they randomize the rats to move at different speeds? Today, the green rat won, but next time they play the game, I assume that it won’t be the green one again,” the original poster asked.
One fan said that it is “the luck of the draw.” “One jumped the track today; I’ve never seen that before. Drew always says, ‘we’ve got hundreds of them backstage and chose these randomly,’” the person continued.
“They’re wind-up toy rats, so they’re completely random. Sometimes one of them doesn’t even start up,” another said.
To that, someone replied, “They really need to fix it so they all work. It’s so lame when they don’t move or stop.”
The Price Is Right, Weekdays, 11a/10c, CBS