Arthur_Seaton

I wonder how many ads they'll sneak in to the film? "This lift hill brought to you by Samsung!" (cheers) "These jarring trims brought to you buy Coca Cola!" (trumpets) The whole concept is beyond baffling to me.

There's no easy answer, but ultimately aim to get on as many as you can. Tatsu, FT, Twisted Colossus, Goliath and X2 tend to get the craziest lines, so prioritize which of those you really want to try. The line for TC moves much faster than you'd expect it to; the line for Tatsu can be a hideous sweat box; the line for Goliath can move very slow (if it's in the switchbacks be warned that it can take a while); the line for FT moves reasonably fast (if there are two trains), but you have to endure terrible music at high volume played on repeat. My suggestion would be to start your day early with a FT, Goliath, TC sequence and hit X2 later. I personally don't think Tatsu or X2 are very good rides, but they provide totally unique experiences. Just be prepared to be potential beaten by X2 and plan your day around that beating (in other words, ride it late). Goliath is a tame ride in that it doesn't bruise you up, but I still find it one of the most well-rounded in the park. Twisted Colossus and FT are must-rides in my opinion, but I wouldn't necessarily skip a ride on something like Ninja just to get squeeze a second ride on FT. A second ride on TC makes more sense. For what it's worth, here's my own personal recommendations: 1. FT (back seat) 2. Goliath (front / middle) 3. Twisted Colossus (back seat) 4. Ninja 5. Revolution (if open) 6. Superman 7. Apocalypse (back seat) 8. Batman (unless you've ridden it elsewhere) 9. Scream 10. Drop of Doom 11. X2 (front seat) 12. Riddler 13. Tatsu 14. Gold Rusher 15. Viper 16. Green Lantern (you've been warned). I'm not a fan of the "biggest, extremist, most fastest" approach to coasters, preferring rides that strike a balance between fun and exhilaration. To me, some of the popular favorites here aren't very fun at all, so your mileage may vary.

I've been there when there have been cheer conferences taking place but didn't find that it made much difference on the rides as all the teens tend to congregate around the various theaters to see who can scream "OMG" the loudest and the longest. Aside from the persistent, high-pitch shrieking and the added risk of getting kicked in the head by an oblivious teen, their presence didn't impact the lines too much. Yesterday seemed like an anomaly, but I'd put it down to a combo of limited opening hours, limited "bring a friend" days, and the increasing ubiquity of the Gold Pass. Bummer that it trounced your day!

^ Damn! I don't think I've ever seen the place like that.

Crazy, right? We went last weekend and it wasn't bad, but I'd turn around and leave if I saw this. Great for business, though. If I'm not mistaken, they turn to the regular non-weekend-only schedule here soon, so Mondays and Tuesdays will most likely become the favorable day again.

That's weird. One night, a group of friends and I stood and watched it sway like crazy. I think I might even have video footage of it somewhere. The turnaround over by Beach Blvd. sways like mad — Rattler-style. You can really see it at night when the track's lit up, both when the train goes over the top and when it runs through the structure before hitting the bunny hops. With that said, the turns where it does feel like the structure is ripping itself up are buried deeper within the ride — specifically that undulating turn after the mid-course drop. Perhaps because that part of the track is low to the ground and stuck within a larger set of supports, there's less possibility to sway there and therefore more track shredding? I get the sense that some of the same problem exists on Apocalypse in that some of the most brutal parts of that ride happen when it's close to the cement with less flex in the structure. For example, the big figure-8 after the station fly-through can be brutal, possibly because the supporting structure is lower so there's less wood to flex. But also, if you consider some of the highly banked turns on the ride (after the first tunnel, for example), it actually handles those quite well with less shuffling. I'm no engineer either, but I can't help but think that the turns at the bottom of Ghost Rider's mid-course drop would benefit from some extreme, borderline 90-degree banking, closer to what Apocalypse has on that particular section?

Despite being a pass holder, and despite signing up for email notifications multiple times, I never ever get any emails from SFMM about deals. Although I'm not sure I'd get a food pass myself (there's next to nothing at the park that I would eat), I know some friends who might be interested.

The GAdv Green Lantern is bliss compared to the SFMM one (I've ridden both). If the line for GL is long, just ask a random stranger to restrain your arms and then have their friends punch and kick you in the neck until you pass out. That way you'll get a good sense of what the ride's like.

For the past few times I've been (including a visit just a few days ago), it was open.

Thanks for the tips. There are a few rides that I really don't mind skipping if the place gets too packed. Also, since I'll be staying right around the corner and my flight doesn't leave until 5pm on Sunday, I could probably do the gold pass early opening thing on both Saturday and Sunday if needed. Even with hideous WWF Fest nearby, I'm sure it'll all work out.

I probably will be going solo, so single-rider lines will be a must (La Vibora, Justice League, and Pandemonium are the only ones that seem to have SR, right?). I just read that there's some WWF thing happening down the street that same weekend, so the park will most likely be jammed and all the local hotels have cranked their rates up four times the standard rate. If I make it my goal to get in early with my gold pass, I'll haul ass to Giant, then make my way over to Shockwave and Mr. Freeze, the rest I can just play by ear. I've managed to get a terrifying looking hotel a couple of miles away, so if needed, I could duck out for a break and then head back until closing.

I almost always ride it when I'm there because I love the layout (same was true with Ghost Rider — even at its worst), but I've had a hard pinning down a pattern to the roughness. At times I've noted that one train gives a worse ride than the other, but it's inconsistent. I rode it a few months ago and found it absolutely brutal, then just a few weeks ago, I found it rough but tolerable. Then just yesterday, brutal bordering on Ghost Rider territory. Severe jack-hammering up into that first turn around, and then spine-readjustment-rough from the first tunnel through to the end. Maybe there is some luck to it, or maybe it's even something individual — like how tired one is at the point of riding it? Either way, it's a shadow of what it once was.

Ha! I've only ridden that once as well. It was such an abhorrent ride that I don't even care to find out if it was just an unlucky cycle. Conventional wisdom seems to suggest that it's consistently terrible, though. I'll be there with marshmallows on the day they burn it to the ground

3rd row from the back, in the middle seats. I'd never really understood the animosity people had for Scream until recently. I'd enjoyed it for years with no complaints, then all of a sudden it started to feel very shaky. I tried it a few more times just make sure I wasn't imagining it, and sure enough, it was rattling like crazy. Yesterday seemed much better though, so I don't know if it's incremental maintenance or just the case of a good seat, but it was pretty great. Apocalypse is so hit or miss. Just three weeks ago, I rode it several times back to back. It was as rough as it usually gets (it's a very rough coaster these days), but really only in the second half. Yesterday, however, was something else. I wouldn't skip it as, again, it's all a crapshoot it seems. Plus, roughness aside, it's a great layout with top-notch airtime in the back seat. I've never known Riddler be aggressive, but everyone in my train had their ears boxed in by the restraints yesterday. I've never liked that ride very much, but yesterday is went from "meh" to "side-eye." TC is more fun than anything. As I'm sure you know, there are no guarantees it'll dual as the design makes that very difficult. However, I've experienced nothing but excellent ride ops there (and I've ridden it at least 60 times now). Front seat is fun and aggressive, but the back seat is the place to be IMO. I wish the whole ride was scaled up a bit — not for additional height or length per se — but because the elements come at you so fast.

Did SFMM bail on the wait time function of the app? Took a quick spin up there today and that part of the app was dead. Also, the sign outside of Goliath said 5 mins but we found the line to be well into the switchbacks — which usually means at least 30-45 mins. Turned around to head out and asked the employee at the photo booth who laughed and said "yeah, it's not even close to a 5 minute wait — the sign is wrong" and that "the wait times on the app hadn't been working very well." Consequently, the visit started out a bit frustrating. Füll Throttle was only running one train — which broke down three times in the brief time we were there. They got it up and running again fast each time, but the line was regular FT length and with only one train, things were going slow. Operations in general were rough for the first hour or so that we were at the park (about 4:30pm to 8pm), but this was partly due to the GP doing the usual GP stuff. Saw several people trying to take what looked like luggage onto rides, lots of people just staring at the trains rather than getting into them etc. Saw one woman on Ninja who was actually sitting outside of the OTT restraint (it was down, and she apparently thought it was part of the seat). Operations can be disappointing at SF, but the GP don't help much. Anyhow, things picked up soon after. Jumped on Scream fearing for the worst and had two back-to-back excellent rides — very smooth with almost no rattle or head banging. Apocalypse, however, was in the worst state we've ever seen it and gave a brutal ride. It was jack hammering through most of the track, and at this point, it's far worse than either Ghost Rider or Psyclone ever were (IMO). Riddler gave a rough ride today, too. Massive amount of head banging going on that I'd never noticed before. Two rides on TC — one of which was perfect (impeccably timed races on both sides). Last visit, I noted that for a TC race to end at the same time, one of the trains must leave the lift a good 5 seconds or so in advance, but that wasn't the case today. From the first drop to the final bunny hops, the trains were perfectly in sync. Weight distribution? Weather? It was windy, which made for an interesting couple of runs through Goliath (complete stop on the MCBR for about 20 seconds gave a good sense of much that structure sways) Anyhow, we squeezed 11 rides into about 3 hours, and although the ops were a shaky at first, the night picked up soon after.

Thanks for the tip! I assumed that La Vibora wouldn't draw as much of a crowd. I'll try and knock it out early before it gets too packed.

Thanks! Early won't be a issue. And no problem skipping Titan or Batman since SFMM is my home park (not a coaster count guy). I've got my sights La Vibora as well (although I'm not expecting much).

I plan to visit the area at the end of March / beginning of April and so will visit SFoT for the first time. Any tips and tricks about the park would be appreciated (I can spend the full day there I think), and I'll probably grab a room at the hotels across the street. Also, I may take a quick trip up to Sandy Lake to ride the old-school pretzel (I'm a fan of such things), but that's kind of it for the Dallas area, right? I have a Six Flags gold pass, so I'll aim for early entry and head over to Texas Giant first, I guess. Anything that gets hideous lines that I should knock out fast?

Can't help but think that this ride is going to result in sudden, elevated nausea. I guess if someone were to puke while on the ride, by the time it landed the crowd below, it'd be more of a "light misting" than a direct hit.

It seems to be in their best interest to go for a big spectacle-style ride, and a drop machine would certainly check the spectacular visuals box. The concept doesn't hold too much appeal for me personally (although I've yet to ride one), but I could see the GP eating something like that up. The last few installations have done a nice job of merging thrills with fun (Yolo, Twisted Colossus, Apocalypse) rather than simply going for "most mega intense ride in the world everrr" — which is more substance than surface in my opinion. Although for the big 20th, I expect they'll revert back to the "mostest biggest" approach, I'd personally love to see a lengthy terrain hugger like Liseberg's Helix. I doubt it would deliver on visual impact though.

I wasn't that into Skyrush, personally (although I rode it a lot as it was a quiet day and wanted to burn it into memory), but I loved the park — far more than I expected to. Just looking through these great photos reminds me of how fun and well-rounded that place is. Fahrenheit was my personal favorite there, and I loved Lightning Racer as well. I'm all for extreme forces, but I found Skyrush to be too much of an endurance test to be totally enjoyable.

It's inconsistent, seemingly dependent on what train is running. At its best, its a rough ride, but not that much worse than other woodies. At its worst, it's horribly jarring and will give you headache within minutes. I've ridden it quite a lot as of late and haven't really been able to identify a consistent source, but if you look closely at the track on slower spots like the brake run, you can see how buckled some of it is. While I do think it's worth a ride as it's a relentless coaster, it's a crap shoot as to what state you'll be in when you get off it.

From what I can gather, "curve 9" is the turn at the bottom of the mid-course drop, right? The comment "banking is radically different in curve 9" sounds like good news as that's the section of the ride that felt like the structure was tearing apart. I'm assuming it'll be somewhat closer to that manic section of Apocalypse that follows the first tunnel turnaround. This is all very promising as Ghost Rider's layout was always fantastic.

I could be completely wrong, but I swear this is something that's increased over time. I seem to recall it being more aligned when it first opened, but now, if they leave the lift hill together, they don't finish together. Honestly, I could be imagining it. Anyhow, the ops were doing a stellar job of syncing last time we were there, so we got the best of the high five as well as the barrel roles. I'm still not completely enamored by the ride itself (I personally would have preferred something more like Wicked Cyclone), but there's no denying that the fun-factor goes through the roof when the trains are racing.

Ended up going to the park for a few hours this evening after all. Arrived about 5pm waited maybe 15 mins for Goliath. TC had about a 30-minute wait — largely due to the missing train. That, however, was the last line we waited in and everything else was a walk-on for the rest of the night with many rides allowing us to simply change seats and go again. Rode Goliath three times, Batman once, Ninja twice, Scream twice (ouch), Superman twice, Tatsu three times (not fans of that ride, but had to take advantage of an empty station), X2 twice (same as Tatsu) and then back to TC at 7:15 to find the station empty, so four more rides on that. The TC ops did a fantastic job with dueling all night, and they managed to sync us up for all five rides. Yolo was running sporadically for the last couple of hours, but we didn't bother with it this time as there was a short line, and we had already been spoiled by walk-ons by that point. A great night, overall — nice and chilly with a beautiful moon out. Also, something I noted several pages ago: When TC duels, the train on the left needs a good 5-second head start now for the top-gun stall and barrel roll to be synced. When the trains leave the lift at the same time, the hi-five moment is perfectly synced, but they fall out of sync soon after. I've noticed this more and more since the ride first opened, so I wonder if there's something structural in the track / train wheels that causing a disparity as the ride ages? Moon over Six Flags