The Golden Cog Awards are back, this time better than ever!
In September of 2017 we created a fun community poll to accurately find the UK’s best thrill
coaster.
A year later we’ve improved our voting process, expanding the collection of rides, and the
accuracy of the poll itself.
Because of this, for 2018, we asked you to help us find Europe’s top 25 roller coasters.
To start with, the Coaster Bot team compiled a list of 30 roller coasters within Europe,
in no particular order, which could be considered the best.
With your feedback we tweaked the list, settling on the 30 attractions seen on screen now.
At this point, voting began.
Many of you ranked the roller coasters you had ridden from the list in best to worse
order.
In the end, 2.5 thousands roller coasters were mentioned by people from over 20 different
countries.
Once the voting had ended we began to calculate the results.
Instead of using a point based scoring system, as seen within other controversial and often
bias polls, we followed a similar approach to the highly regarded polls run by Mitch
Hawker.
The poll works by directly comparing the placement of two roller coasters within the same list,
for all lists.
If 5 lists had Nemesis ranked above Lost Gravity, while only 1 list had Lost Gravity above Nemesis,
Nemesis would win that round.
Every roller coaster is battled against every other roller coaster, resulting in the creation
of a percentage win score.
Rides with a score of 100% won all battles, while attractions with 0% lost all battles.
That being said, let’s see the results, starting with a countdown of the Europe’s top 10:
Mirabilandia’s, and Italy’s, first Intamin LSM launch coaster.
Europe’s highly rated B&M hyper coaster, located at PortAventura, Spain
Vekoma’s fantastic new Bermuda Blitz model situated in Legendia, Poland.
Taron - Phantasialand’s LSM Intamin multi-launch coaster
quickly became one of Germany’s best themed rides.
Denmark’s own Intamin Mega-Lite, located Djurs Sommerland.
Liseberg’s hillside MACK Rides multi-launch coaster situated in Sweden.
Energylandia, and Poland’s, only Intamin Mega Coaster.
Gerstlauer’s biggest and best Infinity coaster, located at Hansa-Park in Germany.
Holiday Park’s highly regarded Intamin Mega Coaster, situated in Germany.
And finally, taking the number one spot...
Europe’s first Rocky Mountain Construction roller coaster.
Wildfire quickly rose to the top, due to its unique layout, and incredible setting within
the Swedish countryside.
Despite being the only wooden roller coaster within the top 10, Wildfire is number 1.
The full ranking, from 1 to 25, can be seen on screen now.
Notable positions include Nemesis, the polls oldest roller coaster taking the number 11
spot; Silver Star winning the battle to become Europa Park’s best coaster; and The Swarm
fighting for the 25th position, arguably becoming Europe’s best wing coaster.
If you’d like to learn more about the entire poll, as well as see the full list in a non-video
format, head to our Blog post, the link to which is in the description below.
That’s been it from the 2nd year of the Golden Cog Awards.
Be sure to share the poll with friends to see who has the most accurate list, and also
let us know your thoughts of the results, as well as your own rankings, within the comments down below.
Thank you watching, and I’ll see you all next time.