tororific

I am amazed that nothing specific has leaked out yet, in this day and age.....

i agree with this -- I rode it in its original form, and it was mostly uncomfortable.

Keep in mind that Goliath is *technically* still a wood coaster; it uses topper track, whereas this will most likely feature the steel I-Beam track, thus the hybrid designation. oh no, they can now create even more subclasses within subclasses coaster records! pretty soon, it will be highest hybrid coaster with I-beam track whose structure is not painted white. But what you say makes sense and it would be very odd to have a new Colossus that didn't break some significant record, so maybe we do get a 200 ft-ish lift (assuming the angle could work on the existing structure to steepen from 120-ish feet to 200 ft -- not sure).

well, based on the unsubstantiated speculation in this thread and screamscape (and unsubstantiated, wild rumors are the things i rely on most in my predictions), I am starting to doubt my initial guess that RMC will convert the entire double-track length of Colossus into a single-track length to break the coaster length record, much less use a double lift hill. Those words "longest HYBRID coaster in the world" sound suspiciously apt and it would be typical Six Flags style to have a "record-breaking" coaster qualified as a "HYBRID coaster" record - not that Six Flags is alone in creating "records" for every conceivable subclass of coaster. So, my final guess is that they will: * Raise the Colossus lift hill to give a drop 180-ish drop (I would think they would break Goliath's record drop, but I thought Schilke gave an interview indicated that their agreement was to not surpass Goliath for a period of time?) * Single track only that generally follows the Colossus footprint, but RMC'ed up with overbanks and inversions * Track length around 4,300 feet to give it the "longest" hybrid coaster "record." That would still be a great coaster, and I would be happy -- BUT it would be an opportunity lost, in my humble view. You could create an 8,400 ft. long single-track monster coaster using the two lifts. The first "side" run could more closely mimic Colossus profile, but with overbanks and airtime pops but simply lowering (or raising) and/or banking the respective hills, depending on much higher you go on the lift. The second "side" run could be a more intense, typical RMC inversion fest, to finish with a bang. Two very different ride experiences, on one lengthy, epic ride. Think about it, with the bulk of the wooden structure already in place, Six Flags would never again have the opportunity to break the coaster length record at a fraction of what it would cost to build it from scratch (setting aside American Eagle for now!) I don't see it happening, however.

I think SFGAdv is worth it. El Toro is a truly GREAT ride that should be experienced by any coaster enthusiast. Nitro is probably B&M's best hyper (in my humble view). Kingda Ka is great fun. The park is pretty (comparatively speaking) and has many other solid rides.

Fury 325 looks fun. nice combination of some floater airtime hills with some low to ground banking turns -- hopefully those turns will have some Intamin-like snap and pop. Plus, a beautiful layout, great ride presence at the front gate, etc. I am very impressed with Cedar Fair's commitment to put in this huge rides at parks like Carowinds. I would love a GIga at SFGAm. An El Toro-clone but in a Giga form! (hey, it could happen!)

No, I think what RMC is doing is not really comparable to "fads" like stand-ups and flying, in fact I see RMC, at its core, being more of a return to "old school" tried-and-true coaster designs than a newer fad. The success of their designs are based mostly on what has always been a successful design for a coaster: steep drops, airtime, intensity, and pacing (well, maybe not so much on the pacing aspect).* (In truth, it's probably unfair to really talk about their designs because most of their work so far has used the underlying structure of older coasters, but Goliath is not light years different.) You sit in a traditional coaster position (sitting down). Their main innovations are the types of turns and inversions on these coasters, but we are only saying this because these rides have a wooden structure -- these are basically steel coasters in many ways. There is nothing that is "fad"-like about inversions -- they have been a staple of the modern steel coaster for the past 40-ish years. So, in my view, RMC looks and feels closer to traditional coaster designs, albeit with updated computer modeling designs for quicker turns and inversions, than something like Gatekeeper, Mantis or Raptor. Put a different way, Goliath at SFGAm is closer to the Coney Island Cyclone in my brain than it is to a more fadish ride like, say, Gatekeeper or Tatsu.

I love those bunny hops and the airtime on that return leg on Magnum. But I do think they could pad the bars a lot better, which would make it even more enjoyable.

yeah, I have mixed feelings on the RMC conversions, but really only in a hypothetical sense. Specifically, I don't want all old wooden coasters to eventually be redone or have all new ones be like RMC's Goliath -- not that all of this is happening, but the trends down the road point away from old school woodies. At the same time, being realistic, the rides the RMC is converting were not being properly maintained and probably never would be. If it's a choice between a shaking, virtually unrideable old woodie or an RMC conversion, it's a no-brainer for me. I will take RMC every time.

I see what you are saying, but you could still have very different ride experiences on those similar layouts based on choices of where to put inversions, overbanks, bunny hills, etc. For example, consider the bunny hill after the second turnaround (where the block brake was installed years ago), the right side could install a zero-g-roll at the point and the left side could be an airtime hill. On the second turnaround, the left side could do a barrel roll and right side a severe overbank -- basically at each critical point in the ride layout, each side could be doing something very different. but I agree that the best option would be to the extend the hill to 200+ feet and have one massive layout that runs most of the entire course. In fact, nothing says that you even have to use the entire Colossus layout for both sides of the track - you could have one massive drop, run the course through one entire side and then just use part of the second side course to return back to the station without completing the whole second circuit. Lots of cool possibilities - i am intrigued to see what they end up doing.

I really hope that they convert it to one long track with 2 lifts. It would be perfect to break the distance record and you could certainly have different elements on each "side" of the track, although I am not sure that you would have radically different profile for each side because part of the cost efficiency of doing the RMC makeover is being able to rely on re-using the underlying wooden structure. Still, i could easily see a situation in which one side does an inversion as it enters or exits one of those flat turnarounds, and the other side has a huge overbank, just so that your experiences are quite different on each side, and maybe interact with each other at times. In terms of capacity, if RMC sticks with the short trains (which are a capacity nightmare), I would keep both stations for loading and you could probably have a ~1 minute dispatch without a midcourse block, just using the lift hills and variable speed motors as a blocking device. RMC circuits run superfast and I would think it would kill the flow to try to create a block at the right place on this layout. If the course ran super fast, like the pace in Outlaw Run and Goliath, so that it was one minute from the top of the lift hill to base of the "second" lift hill, then your blocks could be top of the lift hill to a base break at the end of the first course, at the base of the second lift hill. The New Texas Giant runs about the same length course in about 1:20, but that is a profile with lots of up and downs - if they lower those huge, slow colossus turnarounds (which I am sure they will do), lots of Colossus runs should low to the ground and fast, so it might be a 1:00-ish run per side. You really would not need a mid-course block under those circumstances because I don't see a better than 1:15 dispatch interval. So, they could maybe get a 1,200 pph capacity without a mid-course break, IF they loaded both sides so that they had trains stacked at the base of each lift hill ready for immediate dispatch when the block clears, and ran the trains full. I know, this SFMM we are talking about, so we are probably looking at a miserable 800 pph.

Magnum's is very loud.

You forgot Afterburn and you forgot Raging Bull! And Dragon Challenge. I agree 1999 was the best year (when you include all the coasters!)

There are lots of good possibilities in redoing the Cyclone. i agree that limiting inversions would be good with this layout, but it is an RMC staple.

Yeah. I'm no doctor, but I imagine that if it fell on somebody right after the snap, that would be permananent debilitating injury or even death. If it dragged at somebody after the cable used up the "snap energy", depending on how they were hit and how high and fast the swing was, I would expect anywhere from severe bruising, large lacerations, and broken bones to severe injury or death. yeah, i kinda shudder to contemplate it -- I can see them standing right there. I mean, life is full of risks, and certainly crossing the street, driving on the freeway, etc., statistically is much more worrisome, but it is eerie nonetheless.

T-Express (Korea) journey to center of the earth (Tokyo Disneysea) nemesis expedition ge-force outlaw run boulder dash

the cable snap on Skyhawk actually looks fairly scary to me in terms of the people on the ground. When I went to cedar point in june my 10 year-old daughter and friend stood just about at the spot where it looks like the cable hit the fence. I do wonder what kind of damage that cable would have done striking someone standing right there, particularly a kid?

Gwazi is just about unrideable nowadays. I understand a smaller park not being able to keep up with the track, but Busch Gardens should be ashamed to let passengers ride on that.

Well, part of it is that it is a ride with pretty good capacity (at least compared to Goliath and American Eagle and others), and last time I was there, they still staffed it and ran it pretty efficiently. But I don't disagree that there is also some component of the public not quite responding to the ride the same way they respond to Raging Bull or Goliath or Batman (when it first opened -- it was a HUGE hit). Which is my concern about wingriders -- to-date, they have been fairly mild and people seem to "like" them alot, but don't 'love" them.

I could not agree more. The majority of coaster riders can tell a forceful intense ride from a non-intense one. And the majority of the so-called "GPs" tastes converge with the "enthusiasts." All you have to do is think about which coasters tend to have longest lines at major thrill parks -- it tends to be the same ones that enthusiasts love, which tends to be the more "intense" rides. El Toro is massively popular among the "GP," not just enthusiasts. As is Nitro and Batman and kingda Ka (lines can sometimes be deceiving, though, if you don't consider capacity issues). At Cedar Point, the most popular rides are Millennium, Maverick, Top Thrill Dragster, and Magnum -- all fairly intense rides (we can quibble about millennium forceless, but it's not a family coaster). At SFGam, Raging Bull is the king, Goliath may well be the new one, Batman remains very popular, etc.. Same concepts apply. That said, parks are wise to have a variety of coasters so that ALL members of the family have something to ride. It was great to go to Cedar Point with my 10 year-old daughter and see the variety of choices for her and her friends. Day 1 she did Iron Dragon (a forceless horror for us, but she LOVED it and I looked at it with fresh eyes through her joy), Blue Streak (too rattly!), Gemini (she LOVED it), Cedar Creek Mine ride (liked it a lot). Day 2: same plus Magnum (loved it). But milliennium force, dragster, maverick, and all the upside down ones were too intimidating for her. Had the park only had Maverick-like rides, it would have been a lousy experience for her and her friends, and hence for the whole family. As it was, everyone along for the trip had something to ride -- that's a successful long-term approach. Next year she is going to take on Millennium Force and maybe Maverick. So, there is a well-rounded set of rides to build over time. So, I get what holiday world is accomplishing here: let's have a set of well-rounded rides that will please the majority of the family, with varying degrees of intensity. This Thunderbird thing fits the bill -- but so did lots of other options. Personally, I think for $22M you could have put a Cheetah Run-like Intamin racing through the woods and darting in and out of Voyage that would have met all your demographic goals but had longer-lasting staying power than a wingrider, but what do I know? Reasonable people can disagree on the best option.

Funny post. If I'm Kentucky Kingdom, I am impressed by Holiday World's commitment to buy a quality, high-press-impact ride and put a ton of money down. On the other hand, I'm not sure if I don't like them putting some gigantic capital expenditure on one ride. This is three Lightning Runs. KK will try to compete with volume: for the same expenditure, you could get (1) Lightning Run, a high quality, fun airtime machine ($7 million), (2) Gold Striker CGI woodie (probably in the $7-$8 million range) and (3) another medium wooden coaster or small steel coaster. Not sure which plan brings more repeat customers.....

I think there are lots of cool possibilities to explore with wingriders (and even flyers). I have really come to appreciate Gatekeeper and think it is a very solid ride. The slow near upside down twist at the top of the lift is pretty awe-inspiring you can really get a sense of "flying' on this type of ride. I still think these types of rides can benefit from alternating more effectively from up high (for the "oh crap, look how high we are" moments) to way down low (running close to the ground). In general, I think many coasters don't effectively use proximity to the ground, and terrain / trees / etc., all which can dramatically improve the ride experience. If you think about it, the best referent we have for speed is the ground or ground-based objects flying by us -- when a coaster is low to the ground, the perception of speed is great enhanced, and very-low-to-the-ground turns are always thrilling and effective -- think about the second turn on the Whizzer, the quick back and forth turns very low to the ground at the end of El Toro, through the first rock sequence on Maverick, even the helixes at the end of X-Flight and Gatekeeper have great potential to be thrilling (if they didn't occur as the ride was losing speed). I think Thunderbird does a slightly better job of taking advantage of low to the ground features at the back end, but could have done a lot more. I hope that B&M designs really push wingriders further with features, because the promise is there. I am not terribly optimistic because when I consider all the possibilities with inverted coasters, they largely have recycled past elements and followed very similar profiles -- for every Nemesis there are a billion Batman-like clones. Again, I know the park has some say in that, but ....

shoot, we got socks for Christmas again! I kid, I kid. Look, I obviously did not manage my expectations well and took the ONE.BIG.THING a bit too literally in terms of the size/ length of the coaster, as well as the reports about the "massive" size of the plot for the coaster. For Holiday World, this really is a very big thing, and I am very happy for them. But, truth be told, other than the launch component (which will be cool), this a pretty standard sized wingrider. I think they obviously chose a style and design that would have broad appeal for everyone, and probably saw the enormous hit that Wild Eagle was for Dollywood (assuming everything wasn't already ironclad with B&M before then). I'm not sure if I ran Holiday World and had $22M to invest it would precisely be this type of coaster because I do have some slight concerns about the long-term appeal of wingriders versus other coaster designs -- will these rides age well and remain as popular as more "traditional" well-designed sit down coasters over time? But I neither run the park nor have $22M (although I wish I did and had both), and they know what they are doing (obviously). I'm sure this will be a big crowd pleaser and a hit for their key demographics. I'm always rooting for Holiday World. The campaign was brilliant. (As a side note, I don't understand some of the quasi-angry responses to those who are not salivating over the coaster. I mean, I understand that the incessant whining and moaning about any new coaster by enthusiasts for not being "intense enough" or "what I wanted" gets old (because parks are purposely not always designing coasters for just our needs). But the comments above by some about a flyer maybe fitting the design better or other questions about the ride, are just that -- comments, observations, and opinions, often stated with a purpose, on a forum devoted to comments, observations, and opinions on coasters no less. What's wrong with that? Is it a prerequisite to only praise every feature of the ride because we love Holiday World?

Wow, I am dying over my final prediction. I thought for sure this would be a Wing Rider given the clues, BUT I can't resolve the proximity of that building with the footers -- there clearly is not enough space for a wingrider to pass by on, and that row of footers is definitely either a brake run or a launch. So, I am going to abandon my second guess and revert back to my first (and now FINAL) guess: B&M sit-down launcher (it is the first of its kind for B&M and they would make a big deal of doing their first launch coaster in-house) Terrain based, B&M maverick killer With inversions (although I don't want them). The BIG thing is the length rather than height-- over 5,000 feet long (within budget of $22M because lower to ground) maybe 2 launches?

stay away from the media tweets for the next few hours! someone might blow it. yeah, i suspect they have the media there now because if they want it splashed in the media tomorrow, the reveal tonight at 830pm will be too late for most local media, i suspect.