Since starting this blog we’ve not had many new rollercoasters open, let alone many new thrill rides. When it was first announced and given the placeholder name of Inversion, I quietly looked forward to being part of the community riding something brand new for the first time together.
The name
Firstly I’ll get the elephant out of the room and address the name. I don’t really like it.
It was named as such because the owner of Flamingo Land, Gordon Gibb, is good friends with the owners of a local fashion brand called Siksilk. This friendship has brought about a partnership between the park and the brand and with it the name for Flamingo Lands newest attraction.
I understand that it’s an advertisement for the brand, fitting with attractions sometimes making people sick, as well as it being trendy to refer to something that is good as ‘sick’, but it’s really not for me. Inversion was a terrible name but I think I’d have preferred that to Sik. Maybe it’ll grow on me?
Onto the good bits
The ride is an Intamin second generation multi inversion roller coaster, featuring a cable lift hill, 10 inversions and new trains with lap bar restraints. It doesn’t really have much of a theme as the trains are very monochrome in colour, featuring a union flag design on them, as does the station.
From the front of the queue line, until entering the station, there is no theming at all. Interestingly though the start of the queue line takes you through a shop selling Sik branded merchandise and Siksilk clothing. You also leave the attraction through the same building too so in that regard it does feel all encompassing.
One thing I did notice is that the cable lift hills cable returns to the station underneath the queue line, unlike traditional chains that usually loop under themselves. I only mention this as it is quite exposed and I hope that should the cable fail that it doesn’t whip into the queue line at all!
I know Rita and Stealth have very high tension cables that run over the queue lines too and they’ve never had an incident, so it’s probably perfectly safe, I just felt it was quite exposed!
The station continues the minimalist theme, with lots of banners flying above with the Sik logo on them and little else in terms of theming. I’ve seen it described as a bit of a nightclub in the station building, which I can see why as there are event lights and loud pop music being played over the speakers. This ride really does need a theme tune in my opinion!
Kumali and Mumbu Jumbo have music in their stations that fit their theme, even if they’re not the most recognisable, at least compared to Nemesis, Big One or Helix’s soundtracks. Hopefully Sik will get one one day!
The trains are quite roomy and the lap bars offer excellent upper body freedom whilst still feeling safe. Boarding is much easier because of the lap bars as they don’t stick out quite a much as the restraints on Stealth or Colossus where crossing the train on those is quite difficult!
The ride experience
Once you’re strapped in and dispatched, the train rockets up the first hill thanks to that cable. There is quite a lot of noise as the latter part of the train leaves the station though.
Once you crest the top, you fall into a nice smooth steep curve to the left turning 180 degrees as the train enters the first inversion, a vertical loop. The train then flies into an airtime hill, into a mist filled tunnel and into the second and third inversions, a cobra roll.
Next is another misty tunnel, an airtime hill, and then into back to back corkscrews before turning to the left again to enter into a series of 4 back to back heartline rolls, then a long sweeping turn to the left and into one more heartline roll before the final brakes and back into the station.
Thanks to the cable lift, the train carries much more speed around the track than it would have on a first generation coaster. The heartline rolls are still uncomfortable though, but much less so as the lap bar helps and the train navigates them quicker.
Of all the elements on the ride, I think I enjoyed the vertical loop the most, as it gives great force and feels big.
Let me explain.
Nemesis’ loop is quite large in comparison, but it feels smaller, probably due to the proximity to the ground, as the loop is sunk into the terrain. Speed: No limits has a full size loop, but that doesn’t give the same feeling of scale either, I’m not sure why Sik’s loop feels bigger than it actually is. The speed it takes the element maybe?
I still don’t like the heartline rolls at the end though. They feel tacked on purely to get the design up to 10 inversions with minimal effort, but that’s Intamins fault, not Siks.
I’d have preferred to see a zero g stall, cutbacks or a sea serpent roll being added in someway to make up the numbers, rather than the 4 rolls back to back. Once again, I understand that this is Intamins design and not the fault of Flamingo Land or Sik, just passing comments!
It was also nice to see that the fountains at the end of the ride synchronise as the train moves past. If you didn’t notice it, you will now and I appreciate that little detail!
So how does it compare to Colossus?
I wasn’t going to compare the two here, since everyone else is. However the difference is night and day between the two, at least thus far. Colossus is a 20 year old coaster that has seen better days and I feel is in desperate need of refurbishment as it batters you about far too much now.
Sik on the other hand rides incredibly smoothly and just feels better all around. It’s faster, smoother and much, much more comfortable than Colossus is. I do wonder what would happen if Siks train was put on Colossus for a few runs. Would that sort out the issues, or is the second generation coaster just that much better as a whole package?
Colossus still has some redeeming features though, even if they are minor! It’s name and theme are much better, and its queue line is prettier (though I know that wasn’t necessarily the case upon opening). It also runs two trains too, and makes a great sound when it d2isengages the chain at the top of the hill. Sik doesn’t make any noise at all, besides the metallic clunking as it leaves the station.
To summarise then, is Sik any good?
I’d certainly say so. I might have sounded quite negative with a lot of my comments, but besides the name, I do quite like everything else about the coaster. Maybe it needs a theme, or maybe it’s current look with come to mature over time? Maybe it’s lack of soundtrack will give it some identity on its own?
All I can say for certain is it topped Mumbo Jumbo as my favourite ride at Flamingo Land, and found its way to number 6 on my list of favourite coaster that I’ve ridden, so that should say more than enough about my true feelings for this attraction than any paragraph could!
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