SFOT's Shockwave & SFOG's Mindbender: Which do yo

Night of the Living Dead is one of my favorite movies of all time! "They're coming to get you, Barbara..." Return of the Living Dead is okay.

I have been re-watching LOST on Netflix Instant lately. I'm on the last season, and I have 12 more episodes to go. When Hurley, Jack, Kate Sawyer and the rest of the Losties finally meet up at the church and cross over together to the other side, I can focus on beginning Walking Dead.

I'm a zombie fan back to when my friends and I would sit right in front of the screen at midnight showings of Dawn Of The Dead chowing down..VERY noisily and VERY theatrically...on buckets of Kentucky Fried Chicken.

And, Billy...I always wanted to take out the TRASH. I actually developed a little friendship/correspondence with Linnea Quigley back then..I had SUCH a crush on her.

I haven't been on either coaster, but I have been on coasters with back to back loops like Shockwave. When I had high speed internet, I watched some POV footage of both coasters on Youtube, and the Mindbender coaster certainly looks more interesting, and seems to have slightly larger loops then Shockwave. So, if I were to have a wish list of which coaster I would be interested to ride more, I would pick Mindbender.

Speaking of back to back loops, the shockwave at Great America had some pretty intense loops on it. When it first opened, I thought it would be way too much like the Demon, but, it was much better. My friend and I rode it once, where the trains flew through the midcourse brakes and hit the rest of the loops on the ride at full speed! After we got off the ride, we voth had to find a bench. Most everyone that was in our train was walking funny, and one girl had to be carried out by her friends. That's a moment you don't soon forget. weak at the knees stuff. Of course the ride was shut down almost immediately after that.

^That's funny what you said about Shockwave. When it first opened, the park let it run full-speed; Arrow warned them NOT to, but they did anyway. That was way cool. I remember near the station, you could watch the corkscrews swaying back and forth like no other coaster I had ever seen.

Soon enough though, the block break would become a near-stop.

I think the Mind Bender and Shockwave loops are both standard 'large' Schwarzkopf loops - 54'. Seems like Shockwaves' are built on higher footers off the ground.

Mind Bender is the better package: airtime, terrain, woodsy setting, big drops, and PACING. Shockwave has more extreme airtime, but has a lackluster ending and no woodsy/terrain setting. It's kind of like comparing Voyage to El Toro. ;)

+1

Still the two finest steel loopers in the US. There's only one way to top them - HoliLooper. ;)

Acoustic Viscosity said:
Mind Bender is the better package: airtime, terrain, woodsy setting, big drops, and PACING. Shockwave has more extreme airtime, but has a lackluster ending and no woodsy/terrain setting. It's kind of like comparing Voyage to El Toro. ;)

Yeah, El Toro is infinitely better...

^I'll vote for Voyage, 100 days out of 100.

El Toro doesn't rate high for me. It peters out near the end, and the biggest negative (for me) - I prefer 'real air time' over being strapped tightly to my seat ('uplift forces'). Plus, it's at that park.

delan said:
Yeah, El Toro is infinitely better...

I was going to make the same joke/comment, but then I thought about the follow-up comments...and quickly vanquished the thought.

But kudos for having the proverbial balls to open that can of worms. :)

Ugh. Round and round and round we go...

Round an round - what goes around comes around - I'll tell ya why! Dig.

I have ridden neither, but I know both coasters anyway as they appeared prominently in the '180 degree cinema' attractions that toured the German fair circuit in the early to mid 80ies.
I distinctly remember seening what I know now must have been Mindbender, but it looked as though it had 6 or more inversions instead of 2 as different camera angles were intercut to make it seem like an endless sequence of vertical loops.
Shockwave on the other hand was painted blue and I remember that it looked *incredibly huge*.
I think the place were I saw Shockwave was the panorama movie theater that Europapark had.
I remember that these films left a strong impression on me and are definitely one of the reasons why coasters take up such a special place in my life.
I wish I could see them again... curious to know what they would look like now.