Motorsport Network has named former Fox Sports and Speed Channel executive Kevin Annison president of Motorsport.tv, the racing network’s planned expansion into traditional and internet TV.

The appointment comes one week after former NASCAR Digital Media vice president Colin Smith joined Motorsport Network as CEO.

Motorsport Network acquired European cable network Motors TV last year and Annison will lead the team as the newly renamed Motorsport.tv expands from its European cable and satellite roots, to a global internet television network reaching large and small screens of race fans around the world. Motorsport.tv is available in about 31 million homes in 42 counries throughout Europe through cable and satellite agreements and airs more than 125 different motor racing championships.

“I’m very excited to help expand Motorsport.tv networks reach by tapping into the large and passionate global motorsports and auto enthusiast audience," Annison said in a statement. He likened is new job to the launch of Speed Channel in 2001.

“My new role at Motorsport.tv will be similar except now we are creating a global network rather than just a North American platform,” Annison continued in the statement.

At Fox, Annison also served as VP and general manager of the digital media division and oversaw the launch of SPEED2.com, the over-the-top network dedicated to motorsports. He also managed the network’s expansion into live and multi-camera streaming, rights renewals with NASCAR, Formula One and MotoGP and the launch of mobile apps.

“We’re thrilled to welcome Kevin to the team,” Smith said in a statement. “Having somebody with his experience and knowledge of motorsport, television and the rapidly changing digital marketplace will be a huge help in our future expansion.”

Outdoor Channel tonight (Monday, March 7) premieres the first of four new episodes of PINKS: All Out, the amateur drag-race competition series that aired for several years (and more than 100 episodes) on Speed Channel before Fox Sports converted the network to FS1 in 2013.

The new PINKS: All Out will air at 8:30 p.m. on four consecutive Mondays, Outdoor said. The theory is the same core audience that watches hunting shows will respond to a program about people who like to fix up and race their own cars.

It’s part of the same bid to win new viewers that led Outdoor’s owners to buy rights to the first six seasons of Duck Dynasty, the A&E reality series that starts, with season two, on Outdoor Channel tonight (7 p.m.).

After series host Rich Christensen obtained the rights to PINKS: All Out, the predecessor series PINKS and another drag-race series, Pass Time, from Fox, he secured a berth on Outdoor Channel for new P:AO episodes in talks with Jim Liberatore, the former Speed president who is now CEO of Outdoor Sportsman Group Networks.

Christenson and executive producer Brian Bossone produced the four new episodes during a week of racing at Rockingham Speedway in North Carolina last July, Bossone told Multichannel News.

Bossone and Mitch Petrie, vice president of programming at Outdoor Sportsman Group Networks, said if the four episodes perform well, the series might get a full return on Outdoor Channel.

Nearly 500 drivers and cars competed at Rockingham, despite rainy conditions, and generated some fine TV, according to Bossone.

He said racetracks are eager for the show to be revived and fans have responded enthusiastically since word got out several months ago that P:AO was coming back.