Kingda Ka – Six Flags Great Adventure

Steel roller coasters are supposed to have physical limits. They can only go so fast, stand so high, or drop so much.

The developers of Kingda Ka challenged all of those assertions in designing their record-shattering roller coaster. This ride is 456 feet high. That’s 45 stories! Look at that number and then compare it to the tallest wooden roller coaster. It’s more than double!

What can Kingda Ka do with all that height? Well, it can drop people 418 feet at a 90-degree angle. It’s like an elevator suddenly falling 42 stories in the blink of an eye. Not coincidentally, Kingda Ka accelerates to 128 miles per hour during its 28-second journey toward oblivion.  Several of the record-setting rides are about the journey. Kingda Ka is about the rush, a short but oh so sweet velocity explosion.

Lightning Rod – Dollywood

While The Beast and Steel Dragon 2000 have held their records for years and years, the title of fastest roller coaster in the world, well, it’s the biggest. The coasters that hold this title are the alphas in the industry. Theme park tourists love velocity, and they celebrate any ride that delivers an adrenaline surge. The fastest coasters in the world are obviously the best at it, and that’s why ride engineers spend so much time working to squeeze another few miles an hour out of a coaster.

The current champion in the wooden roller coaster category is Lightning Rod at Dollywood. This one goes so fast that the park has trouble keeping it running. With a velocity of 73 miles per hour, it goes more than the speed limit, and that may be more than a wooden coaster is supposed to do. The magnetic launch system that Lightning Rod employs to generate that speed wasn’t ready in March of 2016 when scheduled. It finally opened in June of 2016 but only lasted a week before going back down for an extended period, not opening for good again until September. That was a full six months of additional maintenance required to make the ride safe for guests.

I say all of this simply as proof of how much engineering must push the known boundaries of physics to boost the velocity of roller coasters.

Formula Rossa – Ferrari World

Look, when you design a ride for Ferrari World, it had better go fast. Ferraris have a reputation as one of the finest car manufacturers of all-time. Their theme park has lofty expectations, and it was built with the Ferrari brand in mind. Its design is actually a record-setter. Ferrari World is the largest space frame structure ever constructed.

The main attraction at Ferrari World is also a record-holder. In fact, it claims the most important of all roller coaster world records. Formula Rossa is THE fastest coaster on the planet, and the distance between first and second place is dramatic. This attraction is the only one that goes more than 128 miles per hour. Its top speed is an almost incomprehensible 150 miles per hour, more than double the speed limit and 22 miles per hour faster than any other coaster in existence.

Formula Rossa goes so fast that the hydraulic launch system shoots coaster carts out of the game so quickly that riders face 1.7 Gs worth of force. During the ride, you’ll experience a maximum of 4.8 Gs, more than you’d feel while Top Fuel Drag Racing or re-entering the Earth’s atmosphere in a space shuttle. The closest comparison to that sort of G-force is luge racing, but you’ll be much safer on a roller coaster.

When you feel the need for speed, Formula Rossa is the best choice in the world. It holds the most important title out of all current record holders. It is the faster roller coaster in existence.