How to spot a coaster enthusiast:

6. Someone tells you they're going to Hawaii on vacation and your first thought is, "What a waste of a trip!"

7. You buy countless kids' meals at Wendy's just to collect at the Six Flags toys. ;)

-Tina

8. You Are stressing because you didn't know Wendy's had Six Flags toys.

You go to ERT events and have to drag your friends in line because they're busy talking about....gravy recipes... :)

Not sure if that says more about us or them... ;)

You don't frequent Cedar Fair, Paramount, Six Flags, Universal, or Disney, never rode a boomerang, never saw a Mr. Six commercial, and your fear of heights causes you to live in fear of having to walk down a lift hill; but you drive hundreds of miles to visit an obscure little park to ride a kiddie coaster. ;)

That last one reminds me of someone...

You know how many coasters *someone else* has ridden...and have a plan to catch them.

You can tell a coaster needs new wheels faster than the maintenance guys and have full knowledge of the process.

^Again guilty. Also you are a geek if you can tell that a new wheel has been put on recently.

OT: Mamba is using new blue wheels this year on the inside. Are any of the other Morgan hypers doing the same thing? I forgot to look at Wild Thing when I was at Coaster Craze.

^Geek! :)

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Swoosh said:
5. You will not fly into Salt Lake International Airport because it is referred to as SLC

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6. You do fly into SLC, but you do so ONLY ONCE to add it as a "Credit"! :)

9. You can tell someone the exact time and distance to your closest 5 parks as well as the speed, height, length, manufacturer, year built, cost, inversion names in order (if applicable), and specific color names for all of their rides.

10. You know the names of all the employees who operate your favorite ride, and they know you well enough to know where you are going to sit and what time of day and day of week you will show up at their ride.

11. you know that Vekoma is actually pronounced VAY-coe-ma

12. you'd rather be *in* a 'coe-ma' than ride a VAY-coe-ma

=]

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Jeffrey Seifert said:

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Intamin Fan said:
When we went to Sea World San Antonio on the Coaster Zombie Texas trip in 02', we had no idea that ACE would also be visiting the park and doing a walkback on Steel Eel. When were in the queue for SE and saw the group, I thought "Man, some of those people are strange and I think they're looking down at us." It could be my imagination, but I did feel some snobbery thrown our way.

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If you guys were up on the platform and we were down below walking along the road, would it not have been you guys looking down on us (literally)? :)

It must have been your imagination. We were there to take photos from some behind the scenes areas. I remember some of the zombies waiving, and we waived back. I don't know how you can perceive snobbery being thrown your way as you zipped by in a moving train while we were taking photographs.

*** Edited 8/15/2006 5:27:53 PM UTC by Jeffrey Seifert***

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I thought about the platform being up higher, but I still meant it the same way:) Actually, the Zombie crew got separated that day into different groups at times, so I do remember the ACE crew loading in. Like for example, 2Hostyl and another member rode before me (I still remember the 2Hostyl's comment about "Watch out for hill number three!" or something like that). I don't why, but for some reason I just felt like we were somehow different, even though there were some ACE members amongst the group.

And yes, there were a few friendly ACE members who talked to some of us after the photo shoot. You may have gotten a backstage photo shoot, but we got to do something much cooler at SFOT:)

At one point in time, I was an ACEr and had enjoyed going to a couple of events. Some of my favorite coaster trip stories come from this period of time. I actually remember talking with some ACErs at PKI, and they asked what my favorite rides were and I told them honestly that I loved OL:FoF -- BEFORE the OTSH were removed. I was kind of embarassed to say this, as after it was a "credit" I was "supposed" to hate that ride. I was also "supposed" to love the Beast, which I absolutely hate.

The person told me that while he hated Flight of Fear, he could totally understand why some people loved it, and he said that it was especially good that people like me went against the grain because if everyone liked the same types of rides, the world would be a lot more boring place. We had a great conversation about a bunch of strange, odd rides that other people don't like and how much fun they could be.

So before I go on, I just wanted to highlight that I appreciate some of the people in the group...

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Raven-Phile said:
I once saw someone flash his ACE card in line for a ride at CP while yelling at someone for standing on the rails or smoking or something. I can't remember the exact offense, but it was truly hilarious.

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I've seen much, MUCH worse and it is what made me decide that I wanted nothing else to do with the group.

You know that you're an over the top ACEr if you believe:

1) That your card is proof that you are a "professional"
2) That "professional" ride riders should be able to ride the ride with the restraints however they want them (oftentimes with no restraints at all)
3) When the ride operators question you, you flash your card and tell them you can ride without a harness because you're a professional.
4) When the ride operators tell you you still need to ride with the harness down, you get belligerent and scream at them to call their supervisor because "everyone knows" that people with "this card" like airtime, and they shouldn't be "shackled" in.
5) After the Supervisor has said no, you finally put down your harness screaming that you are going to tell the entire club what a horrible park it is and how poorly they treat ACErs, and how they will all boycott the park.

...and yes, I've seen someone do *all of this together*, and unfortunately on two seperate occasions at two seperate parks.

Needless to say, I had officially ended my days as a coaster "enthusiast" and entered my days as a person who knows far too much about how rides operate, and enjoys riding them once in a while.

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. . . officially ended my days as a coaster "enthusiast" and entered my days as a person who knows far too much about how rides operate, and enjoys riding them once in a while.

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Way too close to my truth with that statement.

^^ and ^

Most definitely. I'm not an enthusiast. I love amusement parks and I love roller coasters. I love going fast, and having fun.

I also like a lot of other things about amusement parks like the shows, and ::gasp:: shopping in gift shops. (hey, long term girlfriends will do that to you real fast.) Hell, Jen and I went to Cedar Point last Sunday, as we do pretty much every weekend, and it was packed so we saw all the shows and I tried to get pictures but my camera went nuts. We rode Mean Streak around 8:3o, shared a HUGE strawberry malt from coasters, and called it a night about 9:30.

I like to do what so many "enthusiasts" would rather not do. Relax, spend a day outside in the nice weather and fresh air, and enjoy myself no matter how many coasters I may have ridden in a particular day.

Sounds like you're an enthusiast to me. There are a ton of ways to be "enthused" about something, and I am tired of people running away from certain terms.

Call yourself an enthusiast and prove to the world that not all enthusiasts are jerks. Maybe the stereotypes will go away as the jerks get diluted by "normal" people.

I would call myself more of an amusement park enthusiast than a roller coaster enthusiast. I don't chase credits and I don't rank rides. I live in Ohio and I've never been on Top Thrill Dragster and I probably never will!

to add to the Coaster Enthusiast topic:

13. Everytime you hear the word roller coaster (no matther how the word is used in the sentence) on TV or the radio, you throw your hands up in the air

14. You plan your vacations specifically around amusement parks so that when you get to a with a kick arse coaster, you ride all the ones before it so you know it is a "monumental" number for your count such as 100, 150, etc

Yeah I am guilty as charged on that one, this year my 125th different coaster was a ride on Voyage (planned out for the 3rd park of the 4 I went to) so that Voyage would be #125.