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The Six Flags Magic Mountain (SFMM) Discussion Thread


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I had an early morning, and really cold, appointment with The Underground and the new for 2019/2020 West Coast Racers!

 

Theme Park Review was invited for a special sneak peak to ride West Coast Racers before the Membership previews kicked off today.

 

A number of coaster nerds congregated at the front gate early at 9am sharp. Any later, and you'd be left outside! Once inside, the great public relations person, Connie Lujan, escorted us back to The Underground. We made our way into the WCR queue, and waited for some test runs to finish then it was our turn to ride. Some of the West Coast Customs guys rode first, so when I got on, they would be our train's first race. We smoked them. lol

 

So the ride is A LOT of FUN! Don't go expecting a crazy intense roller coaster. This ride is all about fun, imo. It's made to race 100% of the time. Sure, there's some extended waiting from time to time, but for the most part, it didn't seem too long. From what I could time, the waiting varied from about a minute to two minutes.

 

I'm no fan of the comfort collars. But, they do seem faster to deal with than a seatbelt. I believe that was one of the reasons they are there and not seatbelts like YOLO coaster. There are also only 12 seats to check, helping out with quicker time to get the next race going. I got thrown around a bit in the seat in some of the elements, but i'd say the coaster is pretty smooth. The launch out of the station is very gradual. The 2nd and 4th launches feel a bit stronger. I slammed my head back into the seat on both of my rides. The interaction with the other train is very good in a few spots.

 

Height requirement is 54". That's too bad because I think it would be a great coaster for those just joining the 48" height. Overall, I think this is going to be a big hit at the park, and have a solid queue line when it finally opens on January 9th.

 

The whole area is looking great. New asphalt, lines mimicking a street. The newly painted buildings look excellent. Twin Charged Tacos had a good line coming out of the door all day selling tacos and some Holiday in the Park food. The candy store is all new. They completely gutted it and started out fresh, and it came out great. Nice and bright inside and fully stocked to satisfy your sweet tooth. The candy making side is still under construction and will open "soon".

 

Now on to some pictures!

 

 

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The side of the station and where you enter through the door.

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Outside queue area

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Train returning from it's two races.

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Front of the station. More details and signage to come.

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The line got really long.

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Really like this picture frame. I have one of Outlaw Run that's similar in construction.

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The Underground!

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Technical Rehearsal aka don't bitch if it goes down now and then.

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Park President Neal not paying attention and texting.

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Dueling! Or is it racing?

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Can't fake that expression. Well, you probably can, but doubt they knew i was taking their picture. :)

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Ready to race!

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Great photos! So what exactly takes place during the “pit stop”. Do you just sit there awkwardly or is there some basic theming?

 

more or less. there's currently one monitor on the left side. Ryan from WCC greets you, and then walks away to check on progress of something and says he'll return, which i never saw him do. the screen is playing a brady bunch video of squares from some of the old west coast customs tv shows, pimp my ride, inside west coast customs, west coast customs, etc.

 

the front row can't see the monitor at all unfortunately. there's sounds playing you'd here in a tire shop. also, some motor reving sound effects.

 

i'm following #westcoastracers on instagram. i saw a post from someone who said they had just finished doing all the voice over for the ride. well, the only person talking yesterday, was that short clip from ryan. so i assume there's more to come that just isn't finished yet.

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Having never ridden a coaster with comfort collars, are they just intrusive? Do you find yourself banging your neck against them? etc.

 

at times, it's possible. a lot depends on your height and body shape as well. they aren't ever tight. you'd have to be really, really big for them to be tight. since they are a certain length without any adjustment, the can just flop around. i'd say little kids could have the worst problem with them. i've seen smaller kids with the sides of them right next to their head. can't be fun.

 

since they are thin, and pretty hard, when getting hit with them, it can feel like someone karate chopped you to the neck.

 

all that being said, it's not bad on this ride really. they are just more annoyingly in the way. getting in and out of them quickly takes some technique without hitting yourself too. lol

 

from what i witnessed, it does seem like a faster alternative to checking seatbelts and lap bars on yolo coaster.

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The collars were less obtrusive than I thought, they didn't restrict much up and down movement but they were a bit stiff around the neck. I find them less objectionable than I thought they would be. I still think given the small amount of seats to check seat belts would have been fine. I can cheat those to be relatively loose though I suppose I can do the same thing with these as their tightness would be determined by the lap bar (they clip to the middle of the lap bar).

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Great report! Is the actual queue line not too long in terms of length or is it unfinished? Or did that many coaster nerds come out that an overflow queue was needed?

 

I think just that many coaster nerds came out that the overflow was needed. The line moves pretty quick though. Yesterday (Sunday) the line had died down to about a 20 minute wait by mid day, and a walk on at night (It started raining and cleared a lot of people out.) I got a total of 7 rides on it yesterday, 4 during the day, and 3 at night during the rain. I think it might end up knocking TC out of my top 3! I gotta ride both a few more times to be sure, but WCR is an EXCELLENT ride!

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Great report! Is the actual queue line not too long in terms of length or is it unfinished? Or did that many coaster nerds come out that an overflow queue was needed?

 

so there's some inside, and outside under a tarp on some lighting truss. i'm not sure if that's permanent or not. it was being held down by some straps and block weights and not bolted down. then, after the line filled that, it spilled out into portable sections of the queue.

 

the overflow was definitely needed during the day. i saw it cleared out pretty good at night. yesterday and today it was pretty dead from what i've seen on social media. the coaster nerds were out in full force saturday.

 

it doesn't seem like the inside and outside areas of the queue are that big. but now thinking about it, it's probably as big or bigger than Tatsu's queue line.

 

the actual inside queue is still being worked on. i saw some visual upgrades today that cleaned up some parts that had me thinking what the plan was before. i'm excited to see the full finished product when it's complete.

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Having never ridden a coaster with comfort collars, are they just intrusive? Do you find yourself banging your neck against them? etc.

 

I’ve been on several coasters with the “comfort collars.” I’m a little over 6 ft.... and while I never noticed the collars during the ride (no neck chopping or anything.) The real annoyance I’ve noticed with them is trying to board the train and get underneath the weird floppy harness thingy.

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Having never ridden a coaster with comfort collars, are they just intrusive? Do you find yourself banging your neck against them? etc.

 

In addition to the above comment, I didn't notice them when I was wearing a hoodie, but there was a bit of neck chopping in the back when I just had a t shirt on. It wasn't painful at all, but a little annoying, but in no way a deal breaker.

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Everyone has different experiences with them depending on height / body type / whatever. Personally (assuming they're the same as the ones on Tempesto) they don't bother me when I'm actually riding the ride but they make the loading process slow and getting in the train is just a convoluted clusterfuck.

Edited by coasterbill
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I just want to point out that the loading process on WCR is actually faster than Full Throttle because they don't have to check every seatbelt before lowering the lapbars anymore. WCR doesn't have the secondary seatbelts so you pull down your restraint once you're seated. Also, WCR has a loose-article system that happens well before riders load into the trains, so that quickens loading as well. This is possible because load/unload happens on the same side of the station (like Skyrush).

 

Also I have never had an easy time loading onto any Premier coaster. Their seats have always been designed with such minimal rider space that it's such a pain navigating into/out of them. The collars make that difficult process even worse. I seriously feel like I'm on the verge of spraining my ankles every time I have to shimmy into the far seat.

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^ That's actually a fair point that the comfort collars will speed up the restraint checking since the belts aren't underneath the restraint.

 

I'm just spoiled by the Premier trains at Lake Compounce on Phobia that have no seatbelts nor comfort collars.

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Ugh, of course Six Flags went with comfort collars for WCR. I don’t find them uncomfortable at all during the ride but they make an already-awkward train entry and exit have an additional degree of awkwardness. The one thing I do wish Premier would change would be to put soft-touch (or more than angular metal) material on the lower surfaces. 9 times out of 10 I bang my shin or ankle trying to get in and out.

 

And comfort collars f*ck up my hair.

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There's an interesting tidbit I found in a Los Angels Daily News article.

 

If you aren't a member or passholder, it looks like you can ride West Coast Racers in 2019 if you either buy a Flash Pass or a West Coast Racers t-shirt. So basically the ride is an upcharge for the few guests without a pass or membership.

 

Link to Los Angeles Daily News article

 

Not a Magic Mountain passholder or member? You can still ride the new coaster starting Dec. 23 if you buy a West Coast Racers t-shirt in the park. The same goes for park visitors using a Flash Pass during the passholder preview period.
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There's an interesting tidbit I found in a Los Angels Daily News article.

 

If you aren't a member or passholder, it looks like you can ride West Coast Racers in 2019 if you either buy a Flash Pass or a West Coast Racers t-shirt. So basically the ride is an upcharge for the few guests without a pass or membership.

 

Link to Los Angeles Daily News article

 

Not a Magic Mountain passholder or member? You can still ride the new coaster starting Dec. 23 if you buy a West Coast Racers t-shirt in the park. The same goes for park visitors using a Flash Pass during the passholder preview period.

 

Flash pass is understandable, but a shirt? That's so Six Flags.

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