Invertalon

NL, RCT2 and Flight Simulator X.

Steel: Kingda Ka Wood: Son of Beast

After this weekend, I think Gatekeeper may be making its way into my top spot at CP next to Raptor. I thought the ride was just "meh" at media day but it has gotten better as the season has went on... The second half of the ride is much quicker now that they seemed to have found what wheel combination works best, so the pacing has improved drastically. This past weekend every single one of my rides had the loose vests... Amazing difference... They did not bother/hurt me that much before, but now the riding sensation is completely different for me. Riding front seat and leaning out into the restraint on the drop and inversions just add a whole new dynamic. You get legit airtime now since you are not bolted into the chair and just overall, the ride moved up a TON for me. Every single one of my 8 rides or so this weekend were fantastic... Two rides may have had some very minor vibration but the rest were just as good as opening weekend. I was extremely impressed. That moment though in the front seat when the track flips and you fall into your vest and out of your chair... Incredible.

Friday and Sunday (tonight). Easily.

Agreed. I will never understand the Magnum following... In my opinion, it is a near terrible ride. Once a season is enough for me.

Not sure how they win "Best Food" year after year. Other than maybe being cheap, anytime we have eaten at the park it was just sort of "meh". My parents also went back to Knoebels for the first time in years this season and said they were both pretty disappointed by what they had gotten. I think Dollywood had much better food offerings, as well as a few other parks (Busch Gardens, Universal/IOA, Disney)

I also agree about MF .. Two rides in 1-2 and it was so smooth and had loads of air. Best it was running in a long time!

Was at the park tonight... Got three laps on Gatekeeper and all had loose vests. Best rides I ever had. Front seat is epic now if you lean forward. Really allows better sensations while riding. Ride was flying tonight and ran really smooth each ride. I was blown away by my rides tonight, honestly. Btw, park was so dead tonight. Walkon everything. Longest wait was for blue streak, believe it or not! In a little less than three hours: 3x Gatekeeper (2 front seat) 3x Dragster 2x MF Raptor Blue Streak Magnum Maverick

I usually avoid Millennium Force during morning ERT because it runs so sluggish. When it warms up it really runs so much better with great air on the third and forth hills.

Made Maple & Bacon ice cream yesterday. Simply incredible. Beat out the sweet corn and strawberry ice cream we made last week, even though that was just insane as well.

I grew up going to Holiday Sands every summer! Along with Dover Lake. I really liked the multi-level lazy river/slide hybrid. The raft slides were awesome as well. Don't remember much else, though. I LOVED the steel basket thing... Used to spin that thing like crazy and hold on for dear life. People used to fly off of it, it was crazy. WATER SAFETY CHECK!

El Toro in the backseat or close to it. I also really dig Ravine Flyer II's drop at dusk/night.

I would love them to just use RMC topper track on the entire ride... I could care less if it still felt like a wooden coaster or not. With that great layout, as long as it was smoother it would be incredible.

I really *loved* the classic Raging Wolf Bob's at Geauga Lake prior to the new trains, retracking, etc... I always had a blast on that ride... The classic PTC's with the buzzbars were so nice. The roughness made it feel much more aggressive than it really was, and once they retracked the entire ride and put G-trains on it, it got really boring. Some of my best park memories are riding that during Fright Fest when the fog rolled in and you could not see a thing.

I rode front left on Friday night on Gatekeeper and the vest was still as it always has been. It does not bother me that much for two or three rides, but if you marathon it like on media day it can get painful. I did not notice it until about 8 rides in on Media Day. The train we rode (shockingly) had all the lights working. First time I had seen that. Usually 2-3 rows are always burnt out. It was running good though... Some bumps here and there but overall still smooth in that seat. The other train though, sounded terrible. Walking into the park I could not believe how bad it sounded. Thankfully, we got the good train when we rode. Waiting 10mins for front row, left side (no fastpass) at 8:30pm on Friday night... They had a platinum ride night that night starting at 9:30 or so, and after we rode Raptor and came back to ride again, the line was HUGE. It was shorter prior to "ride night", so we went home.

I never had much of a problem with standups... I ride Mantis a few times a year and always have a pretty good ride on it. I really like the ending of the ride personally. My favorite would have to be Green Lantern at SFGAdv though, followed by Georgia Scorcher. I actually did not like Riddlers Revenge at all though, go figure. It was running extremely rough/vibrationy though when we did ride it, so that could be why. I like the standing sensation but I can see why many people don't like them... I would be all for converting Mantis into a sit down of some style though, for sure. I think if Cedar Point really wanted to B&M would... I don't believe all that "can't do it because of the heartline" theory... The wildfire trains for example are raised quite a bit up compared to Kumba and the old school B&M sitdown trains... I doubt the heartline would be THAT far off to be any issue. Cedar Point would just have to pay some $$$ for new trains basically.

Yeah, I really like riding it a few times a season. Bummer to see it down so long.

How about a reliable ride engineered properly from the start? I kid... I kid... Intamin makes some amazing rides. I would like to see them do more wooden coasters here in the US... El Toro was a great ride. I wonder why more parks have not gone with them after the success of El Toro.

I have been to CP maybe 10-12 times this season and never saw it run once. I never made it the week it supposedly open, by the time I did go it was back down again for the cable. Bad year for that ride!

Looks like a beach on the bottom there, color wise... Maybe the awaited beach improvements with stuff for the family and whatnot.

Some pics from CP the other night 5D3_7090.jpg by invertalon, on Flickr 5D3_7093.jpg by invertalon, on Flickr 5D3_7099.jpg by invertalon, on Flickr 5D3_7100.jpg by invertalon, on Flickr 5D3_7103.jpg by invertalon, on Flickr 5D3_7104.jpg by invertalon, on Flickr

I think it was Raptor at CP.

I personally, am not a big fan of excessive positive g-forces. I prefer laterals and short abrupt airtime (like the GCI pops of air in and out of turns, for example). Not a big fan of helices... Goliath, Titan, Raptor, Silver Bullet... Those helices are my least favorite part of the ride.

It has been very busy non-stop the past month or so. Even during the week. It won't slow down until school is back in, and even then, Halloweekends is one of the busiest times of the year. Beyond May and June, it is hard to find any non-busy days unless weather looks absolutely horrible for the day.

I enjoy all B&M rides... Even the new so-called "forceless" ones. Extreme forces are not that appealing to me anymore (never really have been, either). Banshee is going to be incredible, I have no doubt about that and look forward to April.