Top Thrill Dragster was introduced to Cedar Point in 2003. It was made by Intamin and has a height of 420ft, at one point it was the highest coaster in the world, only to be overtaken in 2005 by Kingda Ka at Six flags great adventure, New Jersey at 456ft.

The ride has a top speed of 120mph which is reached in a breathtaking 4 seconds.

For those that requested here’s some of my pictures taken during this trip. I hope you like them.

A couple of the ride entrance.

The Queue line, really feeling the heat about a 1 hour wait.

finally inside the entrance.

The Trains.

Waiting to Launch.

Seconds later.

End of the launch for the hydraulic geeks.

Some general shots of the ride.

Ride Structure.

Ride Exit.

And finally one of my favourite shots took about 8:30pm as the sun was going down.

If you want to use any photographs on this blog please get in touch paul@ridemad.com im quite happy to share and have high resolution copies of everything used.

Thanks for Reading.

The Incredible Hulk was a coaster I was really looking forward to riding in Florida, located on the Marvel Super hero island themed area in Islands of adventure the hulk dominates the skyline, it can also be seen from most other areas of this superbly themed theme park.

Built by B&M in 1999 and with a top speed of 67mph the Hulk is still entertaining thousands of visitors daily.

Huge Cobra roll.

On our visit in February 2008 the park was quite busy so we decided to buy fast pass for all the big attraction to save queuing for most of the day. Our party was 2 adults and 2 children with only 1 adult and 1 child wanting to ride the coasters. The queue lines were showing upwards of 40 minutes for most rides so although costing another 140 dollars the fast pass worked out for us and it saved the good old arguements between the kids about how many rides each of them had.

Like everything at Universal the hulk is brilliantly themed some of it over water and in the evenings Universal take advantage of this and light up the coaster.

For anyone who hasn’t ridden the Hulk its a launched coaster so you don’t have any of the click, click when going up the first hill. The hulk is propelled by tyres up to its max height of 110ft the launch is in a tunnel so you have the feeling of not knowing what is coming next and before you realize it your at the top of the launch hill and daylight is coming fast. One of the great elements of the hulk is at the top of the launch rather unlike a traditional coaster of going down the hulk flips you 360 degrees so your right into the action which continues over the full 3700ft of track.

My daughter who is 11 complained about the ride quality of the hulk and she suffered some quite bad ear bashing to both sides of her head, it was completely opposite for me but i am taller and her ears were right in between the restraints. Its worth bearing this in mind if you havent ridden it before It could put some children off, my daughter is a hardened rider and although she didnt want to ride the hulk again it didnt put her off wanting to try the other coasters.

Heres the pictures.

from a distance.

Bottom of the launch hill.

Another shot of the cobra roll.

And some general shots and a video.

Video i found on youtube. Theres loads of on ride videos but this seem to have the best quality.

Click here to view the embedded video.

If you want to use any photographs on this blog please get in touch paul@ridemad.com im quite happy to share and have high resolution copies of everything used, to see the complete gallery visit the Ridemad Gallery

Thanks for Reading.

Knightmare, one of the most anticipated coasters between enthusiasts finally opened this month with an offical media day launch on Friday 27th July. One of my Club pleasure beach friends Chris Hughes took the day off work and spent a few hours taking photographs at Camelot.

Thanks for Chris for the use of his photographs in this article.

King Arthur offically opening the ride.

Knightmare designed by Schwarzkopf and was originally called the Bavarian Mountain railroad before been renamed to BMRX in 1997 when the ride was re-themed.

King Arthur ready to ride.

The ride is from Kobe Portopialand, Japan. Where it had some very elaborate theming, check out the pictures on the RCDB Website.

Some general shots of the media day.

Locals forming an orderley line.

Some stats from courtesy of RCDB Website.

length of 2601ft
height 86ft
max speed 43.5mph
duration 1:56
g-force 5, although this is debatable at the moment as it seems a few people say different levels.

I would like to thank Chris Hughes for the use of his photographs.

Thanks for reading

Just got back from a long day walking around Alton Towers for this years adrenaline week event. Crowds as expected were low and queues for the majority of the big attractions were at a minimum for most of the day. It was a boys outing today, no families or partners just rides, rides and a few more rides.

First up was spinball whizzer one of the parks lowest capacity rides, queues were about 30 minutes which was expected and the staff were only sending half of the cars round with 2 people in.

Over at hex this was walk on as it was the weekend earlier.

Charlie and the Chocolate factory had no queues either, i love this ride it just gives you 10 minutes to relax after all the walking around.

Nemesis was quiet for most of the day, the front row queue had a 3 train wait and for the couple of hours mid afternoon we spent in forbidden valley it was quite common to see some of the trains got round half empty.

Ripsaw was out for the day.

Air was running well most of the afternoon with similar queues to Nemesis

Duel was walk on straight into a car. such a shame they introduced those blasters, this is a fantastic ride, theres so many hidden gems for dark ride fans. By having a gun you miss most of it by concentrating on targets. ;-(

Rita had a steady 20-30 minute queue for most of the day, the ride was only running one train which probably caused the queues.

At first i didnt like Rita it was just a launch and then it was all over, but its growing on me some of the airtime is great.

Water Rides.

As you would expect for March the water rides were pretty quiet if not dead for most of the day, at one point i spent a couple of minutues looking at the log flume and every car over the final drop was empty.

Conclusion.
A great day out, fantastic ride count and great company. im looking forward to the next one.

If you want to use any photographs on this blog please get in touch paul@ridemad.com or via the contact form im quite happy to share and have high resolution copies of everything used, to see the complete gallery visit the Ridemad Gallery

Thanks for Reading.