TPJThemeParkJames

Grizzly

California's Great America

Worst of the woodies...

Theme ParkCalifornia's Great America
Park AreaAction Zone
TypeWooden Rollercoaster
AudienceThrillseekers
Opened1986
Height91 ft
Length3250 ft
Inversions0
Max Speed55 mph
Grizzly

Grizzly

Grizzly is an infamously bad wooden rollercoaster at California's Great America.

The ride has a terrible reputation, and for fifteen years was consistently voted the worst wooden rollercoaster in the world in Mitch Hawker's Poll.

Grizzly was the first big investment in the park by the City of Santa Clara after they purchased Great America from Marriot in the mid-Eighties. They brought in Kings Island's Engineering Department to build the ride as a tamer version of the similarly named Grizzly at Kings Dominion.

Unfortunately the result is a rollercoaster which is both terribly rough and almost forceless at the same time: Airtime is non-existent as it slows to a crawl over the tops of its hills, and the parts where it does speed through are bumpy and rough.

Grizzly's reputation is well deserved. There are far better rollercoasters to ride at California's Great America, and Grizzly is only really good if you're after an extremely uncomfortable place to sit down.

TPJ Rating: star
Thrills: starstarstar
Experience: star

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