Here’s the top ten wooden roller coasters in Mitch Hawker’s annual Internet Coaster Poll along with their places in last year’s poll:
2010 Top Ten Best Wooden Roller Coasters
1 El Toro at Six Flags Great Adventure (New Jersey) Intamin (2nd)
2 T Express at Everland(Korea) Intamin (3rd)
3 Boulder Dash at Lake Compounce (Connecticut) CCI (4th)
4 Phoenix at Knoebels (Pennsylvania) Philadelphia Toboggan Coasters (8th)
5 Ravine Flyer II at Waldameer (Pennsylvania) Gravity Group (5th)
6 The Voyage at Holiday World (Indiana) Gravity Group (1st)
7 Balder at Liseberg (Sweden) Intamin (7th)
8 Colossos at Heide Park (Germany) Intamin
9 Aska at Nara Dreamland(Japan) Intamin (10th)
10 Fireball at Happy Valley (China) Gravity Group (9th)
See the complete 2010 wooden roller coaster poll results with all 180 coasters.
Intamin Pre-fabs Continue to Dominate
As was the case in previous polls, Intamin pre-fabricated woodies continue to rank atop the worldly Internet Coaster Poll. While they barely make an appearance in the Golden Ticket Awards. I have no complaints with El Toro’s first place ranking as it sits at the top of my top ten wooden coasters list and at number 2 in my overall Top Ten Coasters.
Other American Woodies
Worlds of Fun’s Prowler debuted at 6th last year, but fell to 12th this year. Other U.S. woodies in the top 25 were: Thunderhead at Dollywood (14th), Rampage at Alabama Adventures (15th), Tremors at Silverwood (17th), Renegade at Valleyfair! (18th), Hades at Mt. Olympus (19th) and the standing but not operating Ozark Wildcat at Celebration City (20th).
There’s nothing too shocking or interesting in this year’s results. Mostly the top ten shuffled around a bit from last year. The Voyage’s fall to 6th could easily be reversed next year. Especially if those Gravity Group Timberliner trains perform half as good as advertised.
I will say that I slept on Aska at the defunct Disneyland rip off Nara Dreamland when I wrote: The Best Defunct Roller Coaster on the Planet. Also, maybe TwoFifteen’s comment on that post about Ozark Wildcat being a great defunct coaster has some merit as it ranked pretty well.
What’s Your Take?
What do you think of Mitch Hawker’s Wooden Coaster Poll results for this year? Where did your favorite wooden roller coaster finish? Leave a comment below.
February 24, 2011 at 03:31
For some reason I can't get to the poll site it self.
February 24, 2011 at 08:45
Not sure what's up with that. His site may be down. I think I've got the link right.
February 25, 2011 at 03:45
It didn't work when I tried Google either, but the URL was the same.
February 25, 2011 at 03:48
Never mind, it's working now.
Sorry for the double comment.
February 24, 2011 at 06:22
Neither Colossos nor Fireball are GCI…
February 24, 2011 at 08:42
Thanks for pointing that out. I copied and pasted last years results and I forgot to change those coaster's makers.
February 24, 2011 at 09:18
I've noticed Gravity Group rides seem to dip in popularity after the first few years, I've yet to ride a GG woodie, but I would assume it's the PTC trains wearing on the ride? other than the Voyage, not surprising, hope to hit El Toro and Boulder Dash this summer and see what the fuss is all about.
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February 24, 2011 at 15:01
Yay El Toro! And Voyage dropping to #6, where were the HW fanboys that overrun every poll?
February 25, 2011 at 04:11
The Sixteen Year Chart isn't up yet, but all others besides the voter locations are ready for veiwing.
February 25, 2011 at 08:32
Interesting discussion about the poll and Voyage's drop. Some are alleging that a voter ranked it 96th as part of a nefarious plot to lower its ranking. Read more: http://www.thrillnetwork.com/boards/roller-coaste…
Someone's got beef with Holiday World? Maybe it was Mr. Six himself.
February 25, 2011 at 11:04
Hmm, that's interesting. Could be so, but there's certainly no proof that this actually happened. I haven't ridden it yet, but on TPR, people were saying it got much rougher in 2010, and that could be the cause, as Mitch adds weight to the voters that have ridden the coaster in the previous year. The Timberliners should fix that, and I wouldn't be surprised to see it rebound next year
February 25, 2011 at 15:16
I was thinking like you as I heard it got rough, but you can see all of the ballots if I'm not mistaken. That's how they knew someone gave it a ridiculous ranking.
February 26, 2011 at 18:34
Voyage as number 96? I've never ridden the ride, but from what I've heard of it, how could it be that low on someone's list?
February 27, 2011 at 09:40
I dug through the ballots, and it is from a dude named Meteornotes. His list isn't awful, to be honest. He has ridden a lot of international coasters for the fact he is a horror novelist who has written three books…
Oh well, who cares. It's not a big deal.
February 27, 2011 at 04:22
Well, Mitch releases the ballots, so the offender can be identified pretty easily…
February 25, 2011 at 17:40
After seeing this year's results, I began to wonder which parks had the best collections of wooden coasters. In order to find out, I subtracted each coaster's rank from 181 so coasters with a high rank got the highest numbers (El Toro was worth 180, Anaconda was worth 1). Then, I added the numbers of all of the coasters in a specific park to get a final number. Doing this got a nice balance of quality vs. quantity. Blackpool came out on top, with 493 points. Holiday World was #2, with 475. Mt. Olympus was third, with only 396.
Find the results HERE:
http://themeparkreview.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=…
By the way, I am registered on Theme Park Review as Big-M.
February 25, 2011 at 23:05
Very cool MDC! I'd be interested in seeing a similar analysis when the steel results are posted. Even if it's just for a few parks I'd like to pit in an upcoming coaster showdown post.
Your list points to a few parks that I still need to make it to. Indiana Beach, Six Flags St. Louis, and Silverwood.
February 25, 2011 at 18:44
I'm glad that both woodies from my park in the top 180. How Renegade beat out Hades is beyond me. Maybe its because of the lack of timberliners. I wonder how much Texas Giant will rise for next year. If the revamp goes according to plan.
February 26, 2011 at 18:45
The Comet, (Easily the best ride at TGE, my home park) gained a few places this year, (From 37 to 33) and I'm happy it remained in the top 50, even in it's 81st year of service.
I think many of the coasters that droped places this year could use some Timberliners.
February 27, 2011 at 04:25
In other news, Anaconda beat out Grizzly as worst coaster!
February 28, 2011 at 19:22
Yeah. I saw that. Grizzly's lost it's claim to fame. Or would it be infamy?
March 1, 2011 at 13:55
Fame, infamy… when anything is doing so badly that it's renowned for it, does it really matter what word you choose? Everyone knows the ride sucks!