Rainbow Road (DS)

This article is about the DS variation. For a list of articles with the same name, see Rainbow Road.

Rainbow Road
Information
Cup(s)	Special Cup
First appearance	Mario Kart DS (2005)
Appearance(s)	Mario Kart DS
Map(s)

Rainbow Road's icon.

Rainbow Road (レインボーロード Reinbō Rōdo) is the last track of the Special Cup in Mario Kart DS. This track hasn't appeared in a recent Mario Kart game yet.

This Rainbow Road is unique to the Mario Kart series as it contains an upside-down loop and a twisting corkscrew, the only inversion in a Mario Kart track before the advent of anti-gravity sections in Mario Kart 8.

It begins with an intense downwards stretch, spanned by multiple Boost Pads to help kick off the race, and evolves into a course of long turns, sharp drops and inclines, narrow paths, and- the first of its kind in the series, upside-down loops. Players must survive through two of these loops with connecting paths before returning to the finish line.

Aesthetically, This Rainbow Road appears differently from its predecessors. While the previous Rainbow Roads have featured either tiled colors or horizontal stripes for its rainbow pattern, the pattern on this Rainbow Road is lined up vertically to the path. This has become a standard feature in later renditions. Like other Rainbow Roads, it takes place in outer space with a similar background to that of the N64 version.

Mission Mode

• Mission 7-1: Peach must complete a lap performing 6 Mini-Turbos.

Shortcuts

• On the first turn, after the first two small boost pads, the player can turn around and use either a carefully-timed Mini-Turbo or a Mushroom to rush off the course. If done correctly, the player should actually land shortly before the first upside-down loop ends, skipping a large portion of the track.
• After the first loop, on the stretch with the rings, the player can once again turn themselves around and speed off the course to their left with a Mini-Turbo or Mushroom. If the player travels far enough this way, Lakitu will pick them up and place them before the start of the second loop, once again skipping a large portion of the track.

Time Trial data

Staff Ghosts

Course	Time	Player	Character	Kart
Rainbow Road	2:16:246	Ninten★たえこ	R.O.B.	ROB-BLS

World Record

Although PRB is useless on this track due to the lack of off-road, Rainbow Road categories on World Record sites use "PRB"/"Non-PRB" to differentiate between the use of a large respawn shortcut (the "pipe glitch") that involves driving off the track at high speed to the right of the first loop. PRB runs allow the use of this cut, while Non-PRB bans it.

Course	Time (PRB)	Player	Character	Kart
Rainbow Road	1:37:561 (video)	MKDasher	Peach	Egg 1

Course	Time (Non-PRB)	Player	Character	Kart
Rainbow Road	1:53:867 (video)	MKDasher	Luigi	ROB-BLS

Gallery

Mario in his B Dasher racing on Rainbow Road, about to enter the loop.

Dry Bones in his Dry Bomber, racing with Toad.

Daisy in Yoshi's Egg 1 kart, about to enter the corkscrew.

Trivia!

• The double helix at the beginning of the track is extremely similar to the one in Mario Kart: Double Dash!!'s Rainbow Road.
• Most of the music from this course sounds somewhat similar to the song "Climb ev'ry mountain" from the movie "The Sound of Music". Whether or not this was the case remains unknown.
• This, Figure-8 Circuit and Bowser Castle are the only tracks introduced in Mario Kart DS that have yet to make a retro appearance.

Previous track: Bowser Castle	Current track: Rainbow Road	Next track: SNES Mario Circuit 1