As described in my recent blog post here, I would like your input on what parks I should visit that I have not been to.  Read the blog and cast your vote, and maybe I'll head to the park near you!  Thank you!

Voting in the first annual COASTER-net.com Coaster Poll has concluded, and we have compiled our list of top roller coasters in both steel and wood categories.  Rather than simply reveal our winners however, we are going to make a contest out of it.  If you are familiar with the NCAA Basketball Tournament and "March Madness," we will follow a similar format here for the first ever COASTER-net.com March Madness Bracket Challenge.  Now that you have voted, your job is to try and predict what rides the entire COASTER-net community has voted as the best in each category, and here is how to do it:

 

Background

 

1. Both brackets will be posted below on March 1st.

 

2. The top 16 wooden coasters and top 32 steel coasters that met the minimum rider requirements in voting have been put into a random number generator based on what their final ranking in voting was (1-16 for wood, 1-32 for steel).

 

3. Using the random number generator, the first round match-ups have been determined and placed into their respective brackets based on the outcome of the random number generator.

 

How To Play

 

1. Pick the coaster in each first round match-up that you think ranked higher in the overall voting in the COASTER-net Coaster Poll (do this for each match-up).

 

2. Your predicted winners from each match-up will advance to the next round (progressively moving to the right) and play the winner of the adjacent match-up.

 

3. Repeat the above process until the entire bracket is completed, including picking a winner from the final "championship" match-up.

 

(See below example)

 

Scoring

 

1. "Thrilling Thirty-Two" (Steel Only) - 1 point for each correct prediction

    "Sweet Sixteen" (2nd round steel, 1st round wood) - 2 points for each correct prediction

    "Elite Eight" (3rd round steel, 2nd round wood) - 4 points for each correct prediction

    "Final Four" (4th round steel, 3rd round wood) - 8 points for each correct prediction

    "Top Two" (5th round steel, 4th round wood) - 20 points for correct prediction

 

2. If all coasters are correctly predicted in a particular round, then 2 bonus points shall be awarded (except in finals).

 

3. Each round is worth 16 points plus 2 bonus points (except final round which is worth 20), for 18 total.

 

4. Total possible points: Steel - 92 --- Wood - 74

 

Tiebreakers

 

If two or more people are tied in points, the tie shall be broken by using the following criteria:

 

1. If only one person correctly predicted the overall winner, they shall be the winner.

 

2. Most "Final Four" match-ups correctly predicted

 

3. Most "Elite Eight" match-ups correctly predicted

 

4. Most "Sweet Sixteen" match-ups correctly predicted

 

5. Most "Thrilling Thirty-Two" match-ups correctly predicted

 

6. Prize will be split

 

Example: This example uses the bottom 8 coasters from the wood poll

 

Rattler (SFFT)         

                                .                                .

Wildcat (Lake Com)

                                                                  .                                .

Villain (Defunct)       

                                .                                .

Psyclone (SFMM)    

                                                                                                    .                                .

Rolling Thunder       

                                .                                .

Grizzly (CGA)           

                                                                  .                                .

Mean Streak            

                                .                                .

Cheetah (Wild Adv)  

 

Submission: How you would submit your bracket (trying to predict the worst ride)

 

Rattler (SFFT)         

                                .        Rattler             .

Wildcat (Lake Com)

                                                                  .      Rattler               .

Villain (Defunct)       

                                .       Psyclone           .

Psyclone (SFMM)    

                                                                                                    .     Rattler          .

Rolling Thunder       

                                .       Grizzly               .

Grizzly (CGA)           

                                                                  .      Grizzly               .

Mean Streak            

                                .      Mean Streak       .

Cheetah (Wild Adv)  

 

Result: From lowest to highest (Grizzly, Villain, Rattler, Psyclone, Wildcat, Cheetah, Rolling Thunder, Mean Streak)

 

The "corrections" would look like the following:

 

Rattler (SFFT)         

                                .        Rattler             .

Wildcat (Lake Com)

                                                                  .      Rattler               .

Villain (Defunct)       

                                .       Psyclone           .

Psyclone (SFMM)    

                                                                                                    .     Rattler           .

Rolling Thunder       

                                .       Grizzly               .

Grizzly (CGA)           

                                                                  .      Grizzly                .

Mean Streak            

                                .      Mean Streak       .

Cheetah (Wild Adv)  

 

4 points awarded each for predicting Grizzly and Rattler correct 8 points for Grizzly in next round. 16 total points.

 

Fully Correct Bracket

 

Rattler (SFFT)         

                                .        Rattler             .

Wildcat (Lake Com)

                                                                  .      Villain                .

Villain (Defunct)       

                                .       Villain                .

Psyclone (SFMM)    

                                                                                                    .     Grizzly          .

Rolling Thunder       

                                .       Grizzly               .

Grizzly (CGA)           

                                                                  .      Grizzly               .

Mean Streak            

                                .      Cheetah             .

Cheetah (Wild Adv)  

 

4 points each awarded for first round plus 2 bonus points for all 4 correct, 8 points each in following round plus two bonus points, and 20 for correctly choosing winner.  56 total points out of 56 possible.

 

This is long-winded, but I want to be absolutely clear as to how this will work for those who are not familiar with the bracket challenge style contest.  Obviously in the real contest you are trying to predict what coaster came in FIRST, not LAST!

 

Tomorrow I will post the brackets along with blog posts previewing each first-round match-up to maybe help you with your brackets.

 

E-mail your predictions (in bracket form or in list form) to dannymiller@coaster-net.com by March 18 along with your site username to enter!

 

Below I will post the brackets tomorrow.  If there are any questions, please ask!

So my aunt was over for Thanksgiving yesterday, and she mentioned that she and her husband were going to head to Europe in 2016 for their annual "summer vacation" that they always take. With her being a park and coaster nut, she threw out the idea of my sister and I tagging along since I'll be out of college by then. We spent a good part of the day mapping out routes and what not to go over with a travel agent in the future. Here is what our 3 week trip would include:

Numerous tourist attractions in Italy (Rome, Pisa, Venice), Germany (Berlin, Cologne, Stuttgart, Hamburg), and England (London, Liverpool). Along the way we would stop at 9 parks at various times which as of 2013 would contain 67 roller coasters. In order they would be:

Mirabilandia
Gardaland
Heide-Park Soltau
Phantasialand
Holiday Park
Europa Park
Thorpe Park
Alton Towers
Blackpool Pleasure Beach

How many people on the site here have been to some of these parks and what tips could we have to start planning time at the parks. Thanks!

So I have been talking with Daniel, and since so many people have posted this year in the Ranking thread, that I thought it might be interesting to put together a "site poll" where we "combine" everyone's ranking for lack of a better term.

I made a program in Excel not too long ago where I took my sister's rankings and mine and combined them into a single ranking.  The way I did it (I can explain how I did it IF we get enough people interetsed in doing this) removes the bias towards common rides (like Cedar Point rides) that polls like the Golden Tickets have and does not penalize rides at smaller parks less people have been to.  This same program could be changed pretty easily to accommodate MANY different people's rankings.

I would be able to do the rest as long as each person gives rankings, as simple or as complex as you want, and a number of how many coasters (we would divide wood and steel to start) you have ridden (or at least a close guess if you don't keep track) to keep it as fair as possible.

I know some here are against ranking rides and that is perfectly okay, but I thought this might be really fun to do for those of us who do keep track since there has been a lot of good discussion recently in the other thread.

What I need to know is how many people on the site here would be interested in doing one of the following:

-Either posting their own rankings in a thread and a total of how many coasters you have ridden

OR

-E-mailing me an Excel spreadsheet with your rankings in it (since I know many people do that and would find it easier to do that than re-posting here)

As I posted in my blog, I'm going to Texas right after Christmas to do both Six Flags and Sea World. SFOT will be Thursday, SFFT Friday and Sea World Saturday.

Batman, & Mr. Freeze will be closed at SFOT, Superman and Poltergeist will be closed at SFFT (major bummer) as well as Iron Rattler of course, and Sea World should have all 4 open from what I was told by the park. Flash Pass at SFOT in all likelihood since I am at 295 and want to try and get NTG as #300. Any tips on best seats? Especially NTG, Titan, Shockwave, and Steel Eel?