Remember your first roller-coaster ride? Most likely, the coaster climbed slowly up a steep hill, paused for an instant while you checked out the landscape far below, then plummeted back down to earth through various twists and turns as people, including you, screamed with delight and thought, “This must be what flying feels like.”
Garfield Heights resident Bob Kilner was 5 years old when his dad took him on his first roller-coaster ride, and the experience started Kilner on a leisure-time pursuit he still enjoys whenever he can.
Cedar Point's Maverick is one of Cedar Point's tallest and fastest roller coasters.
Kilner, a chemistry teacher at Eastlake North High School, is president of the Great Ohio Coaster Club, where he says he’s formed lasting friendships with fellow coaster enthusiasts — whom he describes as “friendly people who want everyone to have fun.” But the relationships, he says, go deeper than a common admiration for corkscrews and loop-de-loops. “I lost my dad last year,” he says. “I didn’t publicize it, so I was amazed at how many people from the club reached out to me.”
Kilner says the club currently has more than 900 members, though membership numbers fluctuate and in times past have been well over 1,000. They can be singles, couples, families with children and teens, or just groups of friends. They live in Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Kentucky, Pennsylvania, and Canada.
The Great Ohio Coaster Club started in 1992, when its three founders, who lived near Akron, wanted to take advantage of the proximity to Cedar Point and its several coasters (Kilner notes that either “coaster” or “roller coaster” is correct).
Annual club dues are $20 for one person, $25 for a couple, and $30 for a family up to six members, and benefits of membership are substantial, with discounts on travel and admission fees to theme parks in Ohio and elsewhere. The club also hosts three or four events at theme parks each year, as well as an annual holiday party. Members also receive the club’s magazine, which is published four times a year.
There is also a national club for coaster fans, called American Coaster Enthusiasts, and though Great Ohio Coaster Club is not affiliated with it, many members belong to both clubs.
Why do people enjoy riding coasters? “A lot of people like the thrill of it,” Kilner says. “Some people use it to overcome their fear and some of them go on to really like coasters. I love the thrill of it — you really feel like you’re flying.” He also stresses that roller coasters are carefully inspected and maintained for safety. “You’re not going to get thrown
off,” he says.
Just like people who participate in other activities, these coaster aficionados enjoy talking about their favorite subject: in this case, coasters they have ridden. Kilner says they compare their experiences and have their favorite coasters.
Among the members’ favorites are Cedar Point’s tallest and fastest coasters, including Steel Vengeance, Top Thrill 2, Siren’s Curse, Maverick, and Millennium Force. Besides being conveniently located for Ohio residents, Cedar Point has a large-enough collection of coasters to offer visitors different levels of speed and thrill, including slower, gentler ones for children.
Kilner’s personal favorite American coasters are Fury 325 at Carowinds in North Carolina and the Jurassic World VelociCoaster at Universal Orlando Resort in Florida.
And he says he hopes to add more to the list of those he’s ridden. New coasters, after all, are being built all the time, and though theme-park officials tend to be very secretive about their plans for new coasters, rumors say there’s one being built in Saudi Arabia that supposedly will be the world’s tallest and fastest. “It’s outrageous,” he says.
Click here for more information on Great Ohio Coaster Club.
