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Thorpe Park: General Discussion

RIPCorky said:
Not even sure it's that. I imagine you need to be able to fully brace yourself (neck, back, legs etc) because of the extreme forces of the ride. If you can't brace yourself then you could get severely injured or worse....
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Ohh, what has been said this afternoon on the Facebook groups linked is that anyone who can't climb down the lift hill unaided will not be allowed to ride.

A wheelchair user can theoretically ride as long as they can climb down the lift hill in the event of an emergency.

This would explain why some people were allowed to ride that I thought would've been caught out by the new restrictions.
 
owenstreet7 said:
Ohh, what has been said this afternoon on the Facebook groups linked is that anyone who can't climb down the lift hill unaided will not be allowed to ride.

A wheelchair user can theoretically ride as long as they can climb down the lift hill in the event of an emergency.

This would explain why some people were allowed to ride that I thought would've been caught out by the new restrictions.
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That's just my theory, But seems most likely to me.

I imagine not much has changed, if anyone who was riding previously could not brace themselves and could not evac safely then they were not only putting themselves in danger but other riders/park staff too.
 
Matt N said:
I stand corrected!
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Then you may ride.

It's an odd change if it is in response to Stardust racers. I was thinking the death was going to be the result of flailing around while unconscious, but anyone can go unconscious.
Please excuse my ignorance, but would wheelchair users who are unable to hold their own weight unaided (which I suppose is what being non-ambulant amounts to) be significantly more flexible at the hip to the extent their head and upper body could violently strike things that a person with a regular spine and lower muscles would not strike while retrained by a lap bar?
 
RIPCorky said:
I imagine not much has changed, if anyone who was riding previously could not brace themselves and could not evac safely then they were not only putting themselves in danger but other riders/park staff too.
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That's what I would've assumed, but in the app, the Hyperia ride restrictions page (which doesn't appear to have been updated yet, but screenshot below for the record) explicitly states that the ride is suitable for non-ambulant riders. Does anyone know what the proceedure was for evacuating a non-ambulant rider from the lift hill? I imagine it would've been very difficult to get someone who couldn't walk, down from the top of the ride.
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Interestingly, as well as yesterday and next Thursday closed, Stealth will now be opening at 12pm up until 24th October.

Hopefully this isn’t a cost cutting measure. Would be interested to know if any work was actually going on yesterday.
 
Bowser said:
Park is heaving today for some reason too, Hyperia on 2 hours and most other things around 60 min, any reason?
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Fridays are usually earmarked for school trips. The parks incentivise schools to book visits year round, rather than isolating them to the summer.

University of London member institutions spread their freshers events over three weeks, so they all overlap. UCL and Central's freshers weeks are this week, for example. Imperial College (not part of UoL) has their freshers week starting on Sunday. Many societies and groups will arrange trips to Thorpe Park during this period.
 
Bowser said:
Having a very Merlin day here so far. Loads of ride closures. Hyperia on and off all day. Managed one ride, which was very rattle rattle indeed. My wife’s first time on it, she asked “is it as smooth as Baron at Efteling”.

No, no it is not.
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It’s really interesting that you should say you found Hyperia rattly… because I found it perfectly smooth last Saturday!

I rode it twice, once in row 5 and once in row 8, and didn’t find it rattly either time; it was, if anything, smoother than I remember in 2024!

Despite some reports and me not having the world’s highest roughness tolerance, I’ve ridden it 5 times now and found it perfectly fine each time, with only a very mild rattle at worst.

I will admit Hyperia had iffy reliability last weekend, but I think the wind was at very least a strong contributing factor there. General reliability and throughputs around the park were pretty good for the most part, wind aside, but Hyperia didn’t open until 2:10pm for some reason.
 
Matt N said:
It’s really interesting that you should say you found Hyperia rattly… because I found it perfectly smooth last Saturday!

I rode it twice, once in row 5 and once in row 8, and didn’t find it rattly either time; it was, if anything, smoother than I remember in 2024!

Despite some reports and me not having the world’s highest roughness tolerance, I’ve ridden it 5 times now and found it perfectly fine each time, with only a very mild rattle at worst.

I will admit Hyperia had iffy reliability last weekend, but I think the wind was at very least a strong contributing factor there. General reliability and throughputs around the park were pretty good for the most part, wind aside, but Hyperia didn’t open until 2:10pm for some reason.
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The saying now is if its not glass smooth it's rough some people have lower tolerance to roughness now.

I have very high tolerance for roughness and Hyperia is smooth to me only problem restraints are a bit of a plums squeezer which is painful.
 
Hid said:
The saying now is if its not glass smooth it's rough some people have lower tolerance to roughness now.

I have very high tolerance for roughness and Hyperia is smooth to me
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I think people have grown acclimatised to rides being smoother over the years, but I do also think that social media has made it easier to overanalyse things than it used to be. Nonetheless, people do have differing tolerances, and the rides themselves of course vary, and some evidently do find Hyperia too rough for them.
only problem restraints are a bit of a plums squeezer which is painful.
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Really? I’ve never found this myself… I would have said that Saw across the plaza was far worse for this! I’ve never liked to mention it, but I have often felt like Gerstlauers with OTSRs are some of the worst coasters for inducing… pain down there that aren’t standup coasters…
 
Bowser said:
Having a very Merlin day here so far. Loads of ride closures. Hyperia on and off all day. Managed one ride, which was very rattle rattle indeed. My wife’s first time on it, she asked “is it as smooth as Baron at Efteling”.

No, no it is not.
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I mean Hyperia is half a coaster.

Baron is a quarter of one.

Hid said:
The saying now is if its not glass smooth it's rough some people have lower tolerance to roughness now.

I have very high tolerance for roughness and Hyperia is smooth to me only problem restraints are a bit of a plums squeezer which is painful.
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Mack restraints are the worst for it.
 
Matt N said:
It’s really interesting that you should say you found Hyperia rattly… because I found it perfectly smooth last Saturday!

I rode it twice, once in row 5 and once in row 8, and didn’t find it rattly either time; it was, if anything, smoother than I remember in 2024!

Despite some reports and me not having the world’s highest roughness tolerance, I’ve ridden it 5 times now and found it perfectly fine each time, with only a very mild rattle at worst.

I will admit Hyperia had iffy reliability last weekend, but I think the wind was at very least a strong contributing factor there. General reliability and throughputs around the park were pretty good for the most part, wind aside, but Hyperia didn’t open until 2:10pm for some reason.
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We did row 5 and row 9, was the same both times.

It wasn't rough, painful or injury inducing. All wooden coasters are like that to some degree in my opinion, it's part of the ride, the vibrating. But from an inverting hyper coaster it's not what i'm looking for. The airtime moments are all great and obviously the rattling stops during them then but as soon you go back into the dives it's a very intense shaking, which left me with a mild headache after the second ride.

As i've mentioned previously, i find my wife to be perhaps a decent barometer of the average rider or at least an interesting non enthusiast perspective. She won't ever go on it again because it wasn't smooth enough for her. She won't go on Vampire at Chessington for the same reason. Whereas she happily went on Baron at Efteling multiple times and always enjoyed it. In fact it's one of her comments about Efteling, that she can go on all the rides as they're all smooth enough for her (except Joris and the Dragon)

I don't think it's a case of intensity either. I've been on some more intense rides this year such as Ride to Happiness and Flying Dinosaur and they are both very smooth to me so that's what i enjoy the most in a coaster. Though i think the intensity does amplify the rattling.

I like Hyperia but i prefer Swarm because of the smoothness. Still very annoyed my son can't go on it as there's no logical reason it can't be a lower restriction. The restraints are applicable and the forces are almost the same as Hyperia unless 0.2g is the difference maker?

The UK doesn't seem to have many smooth coasters in general tbh!
 
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