{"id":9604,"date":"2022-02-27T08:00:57","date_gmt":"2022-02-27T08:00:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.coastersonthecoast.co.uk\/?p=9604"},"modified":"2025-06-12T20:04:56","modified_gmt":"2025-06-12T20:04:56","slug":"the-smiler-its-14-inversions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.coastersonthecoast.co.uk\/?p=9604","title":{"rendered":"The Smiler & It\u2019s 14 Inversions.."},"content":{"rendered":"

Of course, The Smilers fundamental selling point is the fact it has the most inversions worldwide. That record still hasn\u2019t been beaten and honestly will it ever? But I thought let\u2019s discuss the characteristics of the ride. This blog is about my preferences and opinions. Please know I do understand not everyone will agree & I truly respect that.\"\" <\/span><\/p>\n

The Smiler is a good rollercoaster let me begin with saying that. As I don\u2019t \u201chate\u201d the ride at all I just solely struggle to re-ride it and some days even ride it once. There are a few elements that come into account when I weigh up whether I can be bothered to re-ride or not. One of which is the probability of the row we will be put on, which you don\u2019t know until the station. I am a sucker for the front row as I feel you get the whole desirable experience whereas the back can be sometimes a little too rough. By all means not the most uncomfortable of coasters we\u2019ve ridden for sure.\"\"<\/span><\/p>\n

Another thing that enters my mind is the queue. I like The Smiler but definitely wouldn\u2019t queue over 20 minutes for it. But I feel that comes from the reality of having so many rides over the years I don\u2019t feel it\u2019s needed to wait all that long to experience again. As nothing would have fluctuated from the last 20 or so times we\u2019ve done it. I have to admit another reason why sometimes I don\u2019t tend to ride this coaster. It\u2019s that \u201cdeath hill\u201d as I call it getting from the shop to the entrance of X Sector. I\u2019m far too unfit to be doing that level of exercise and I genuinely dread that climb so much. (Please don\u2019t judge lol)\"\"<\/span><\/p>\n

Of course, the reason why you probably clicked on this blog. The 14 inversions. Is that too many? My answer is yes if we ride it more than twice in a day. I find it becomes very sickly & fast when you re-ride often enough. But since I\u2019ve begun to struggle with my hearing I\u2019ve found inversions tend to make me quite dizzy in comparison to how they used to make me feel. So perhaps this is more on a personal level rather than an enthusiast point of view. But I can merrily take one ride on The Smiler each visit and feel entirely fine of course row depending. It\u2019s a fun coaster for sure and if your someone who hasn\u2019t ridden it yet you’re bound to want to simply due to this record it holds. It\u2019s a biggie.\"\" <\/span><\/p>\n

Do I think this record will ever be beaten? Yes, but not in the UK for sure or anytime soon. I can see in a few years more or less an American park will top this record. Potentially by 2 or more extra inversions. But then part of me feels as if 14 is the maximum for any enjoyment and anymore simply is been sold as a gimmick. But that\u2019s my personal opinion.\"\"<\/span><\/p>\n

\u2014\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

Are 14 inversions enough for you? Do you want to see the record broke in the coming years? Let\u2019s have a chat! <\/span><\/p>\n

Thank you for reading & we\u2019ll speak again soon x\"\"<\/span><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Of course, The Smilers fundamental selling point is the fact it has the most inversions worldwide. That record still hasn\u2019t been beaten and honestly will it ever? But I thought let\u2019s discuss the characteristics of the ride. This blog is about my preferences and opinions. Please know I do understand not everyone will agree & I truly respect that. The Smiler is a good rollercoaster let me begin with saying that. As I don\u2019t \u201chate\u201d the ride at all I just solely struggle to re-ride it and some days even ride it once. There are a few elements that come into account when I weigh up whether I can be bothered to re-ride or not. One of which is the probability of the row we will be put on, which you don\u2019t know until the station. I am a sucker for the front row as I feel you get the whole desirable experience whereas the back can be sometimes a little too rough. By all means not the most uncomfortable of coasters we\u2019ve ridden for sure. Another thing that enters my mind is the queue. I like The Smiler but definitely wouldn\u2019t queue over 20 minutes for it. But I feel that comes from the reality of having so many rides over the years I don\u2019t feel it\u2019s needed to wait all that long to experience again. As nothing would have fluctuated from the last 20 or so times we\u2019ve done it. I have to admit another reason why sometimes I don\u2019t tend to ride this coaster. It\u2019s that \u201cdeath hill\u201d as I call it getting from the shop to the entrance of X Sector. I\u2019m far too unfit to be doing that level of exercise and I genuinely dread that climb so much. (Please don\u2019t judge lol) Of course, the reason why you probably clicked on this blog. The 14 inversions. Is that too many? My answer is yes if we ride it more than twice in a day. I find it becomes very sickly & fast when you re-ride often enough. But since I\u2019ve begun to struggle with my hearing I\u2019ve found inversions tend to make me quite dizzy in comparison to how they used to make me feel. So perhaps this is more on a personal level rather than an enthusiast point of view. But I can merrily take one ride on The Smiler each visit and feel entirely fine of course row depending. It\u2019s a fun coaster for sure and if your someone who hasn\u2019t ridden it yet you’re bound to want to simply due to this record it holds. It\u2019s a biggie. Do I think this record will ever be beaten? Yes, but not in the UK for sure or anytime soon. I can see in a few years more or less an American park will top this record. Potentially by 2 or more extra inversions. But then part of me feels as if 14 is the maximum for any enjoyment and anymore simply is been sold as a gimmick. But that\u2019s my personal opinion. \u2014\u2014 Are 14 inversions enough for you? Do you want to see the record broke in the coming years? Let\u2019s have a chat! Thank you for reading & we\u2019ll speak again soon x<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9605,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[5053,5054],"tags":[2372,39,700,3721,2358,1803,256,1799,683,1812,3719,1331,3720],"class_list":["post-9604","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-theme-parks","category-themed-attractions","tag-14-inversions","tag-alton-towers","tag-gerstlauer","tag-ground-breaking","tag-iconic","tag-inversions","tag-merlin-annual-pass","tag-record-breaking","tag-rollercoaster","tag-the-smiler","tag-the-smiler-alton-towers","tag-uk-rollercoaster","tag-world-record"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.coastersonthecoast.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/01\/C03E7AD4-501E-477F-AE94-4684BE6CA51E-scaled.jpeg?fit=2560%2C1920&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pb4qDv-2uU","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.coastersonthecoast.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9604","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.coastersonthecoast.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.coastersonthecoast.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.coastersonthecoast.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.coastersonthecoast.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9604"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.coastersonthecoast.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9604\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9609,"href":"https:\/\/www.coastersonthecoast.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9604\/revisions\/9609"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.coastersonthecoast.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/9605"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.coastersonthecoast.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9604"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.coastersonthecoast.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9604"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.coastersonthecoast.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9604"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}