European Coaster Club in Kansas News

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Roller coaster fans from Europe relish a visit to Worlds of Fun

 

Englishman Martin Valt has been on 1,199 different roller coasters, including the Mamba at Worlds of Fun in 2006. So he knows his coasters.

 

“The Mamba is one of the top steel coasters in America,” he said.

 

On Friday, he returned to Worlds of Fun to take on the 205-foot-tall coaster — six or seven more times.

 

Valt is a member of the European Coaster Club, which visited Worlds of Fun as part of a two-week tour through America’s theme parks. Club members were allowed one hour before the park opened at 10 a.m. to ride the coaster as many times as they pleased.

 

About 60 enthusiasts from Denmark, Norway, Germany, France, the Netherlands and England were on hand to enjoy the park.

 

For Norwegian accountant Mette Doving, this was the first time on the Mamba — for her, coaster No. 164. “My first was in 1979,” she said. “I was 5.”

 

Of the 164, she said, the Mamba ranked well-above average. “It’s got great air time and high speeds,” she said.

 

But her favorite is the 310-foot Millennium Force at Cedar Point in Ohio, which has great speed all the way through the 1¼ -mile ride.

 

As the first coaster cars left the station, they also celebrated the Mamba’s 10th birthday with a birthday song. After those cars returned, the club’s founder, Justin Garvanovic, got his chance to tackle the Mamba for the first time. A West London native, he created the club 10 years ago after realizing he ran into the same people at the theme parks he enjoyed.

 

As the lift chain pulled the cars up the first hill, Garvanovic studied the park from the summit. He offered some advice for novice riders as the cars approached the 205-foot drop. “Don’t close your eyes,” he said. “Your brain will give you signals to make it feel worse.”

 

Valt added: “Also, if you can’t see, you can’t brace yourself for the turns.”

 

After the thrilling drops, twists, and turns, the cars settled on the back stretch of the ride — the calm part. “The train is a bit slow now,” Garvanovic said of the ride, which tops out at 75 mph. “It’ll get faster once the oil grease heats up in about 45 minutes.”

 

The club members — average age: 35 — rode the coaster multiple times, changing seats for every run. “You typically get more airtime from the back,” said Garvanovic, who used to write video games but is now a photographer.

 

Valt is a theme park aficionado and has been to 352 parks in more than 20 countries. He spends 150 days a year at some type of theme park. The 215 remaining days he is a dentist.

 

His assessment of Worlds of Fun is that it’s special because of its atmosphere.

 

“You can’t just plop down a few rides and have a great park,” he said. “Great parks have more than good rides. They create an escape from the real world.”

 

After a few rides, Garvanovic, sporting roller-coaster hair and dried saliva on the corners of his mouth, said the worst part of being an enthusiast is he knows how safe the rides are. In fact, he remembers hearing that coasters are the second-safest form of transportation behind lifts — elevators, that is.

 

“I’ve never been stuck on a ride before, and I’ve ridden a lot,” he said. In fact, he said, getting stuck is “almost like the holy grail of coaster riding.”

[steel]

Yes, but what about Patriot?

Sounds like a lot of fun. Glad to see all this love for Mamba. I swear it has gotten better over the last two years.

 

I assume by saying that getting stuck is not the holy grail of coastering, one must be implying that the holy grail is a rollback from the front row at night.

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Justin Garvanovic wrote: getting stuck is “almost like the holy grail of coaster riding.”

 

He said "Almost getting stuck", I agree a roll-back on TTD or KK beats anything which can happen on a coaster, apart from a wheel coming off.

[Hobbesx2]

Glad to see all this mamba enthusiasm.