The Smiler is a Gerstlauer Infinity roller coaster located at Alton Towers in Staffordshire,
United Kingdom.
With 14 inversions, The Smiler holds the world record for most inversions on a roller coaster.
The roller coaster suffered a series of setbacks and ride incidents – including one that
occurred during its preview event – that delayed its official opening and resulted
in high number of temporary closures.
The Smiler eventually opened to the public on 31 May 2013, two months after the ride's
originally planned debut.
History Plans to build The Smiler were submitted to
local authorities in December 2011.
Permission was granted on 15 March 2012 following a Staffordshire Moorlands Council meeting,
despite some local opposition to its construction.
Gerstlauer, a German manufacturing company, was hired to build the roller coaster.
Less than a month after obtaining permission, Alton Towers launched a website announcing
a new ride – codenamed Secret Weapon 7 – for the 2013 season.
Its codename followed a similar format used for other roller coasters during their teaser
campaigns, such as SW4 for Oblivion and SW6 for Thirteen.
In June 2012, a trademark filed by Merlin Entertainments hinted that the new ride would
be named The Smiler.
On 17 October 2012, a number of facts about the coaster were revealed to the public including
its maximum speed, track length, ride time, passengers per train and ride cost.
Despite the release, Alton Towers did not announce or confirm the name for the ride.
Construction The site for the new ride was determined to
be an area in the park being occupied by the Black Hole, an attraction that had been standing
but not operating since 2005.
The park began dismantling the Black Hole on 12 April 2012.
The first pieces of track arrived at the park in late October 2012.
Sections of track were later moved to the construction site on 6 December 2012.
In January 2013, Alton Towers officially confirmed that the ride would be called The Smiler.
In February 2013, the park revealed some of the ride's elements.
The trains arrived in March 2013, as Alton Towers began posting images on both Twitter
and their official Smiler website.
Vertical construction was completed approximately one month later, as the final piece of track
was installed at the top of the first lift hill.
Opening Initially, The Smiler was expected to make
its public debut in March 2013 for the park's opening day, but due to construction delays,
the date was pushed back to 23 May 2013.
The date had to be pushed back further after technical issues were encountered during testing
and a ride incident occurred during its preview event that stranded riders on the lift hill.
Following the incident on 22 May 2013, Alton Towers explained on their website that The
Smiler would not open on the originally scheduled date due to "unforeseen teething problems."
The ride's delayed opening initially caused controversy as many had booked advance tickets
and stays at the Alton Towers Hotel in order to be among the first to ride the coaster.
However, Alton Towers later announced it would allow those who had made advanced bookings
to change their tickets and hotel reservations free of charge.
The Smiler eventually opened on 31 May 2013.
Ride A key feature of the ride is the large spider-like
structure that serves as a centrepoint for the coaster track.
Called ‘The Marmaliser,’ it has 5 legs, each with a distinct function to manipulate
riders into "smiling".
It is also equipped with a wraparound screen, which displays graphics and video relating
to the theme of the ride.
The roller coaster intertwines within the structure causing greater interaction with
riders to enhance the experience.
Elements Ride experience
The train dispatches from the station and immediately enters into a sweeping drop 180-degrees
to the left.
Partway through this drop, riders encounter a heartline roll, the ride's first inversion.
The train then comes to a stop on block brakes, before ascending the first lift hill.
Upon reaching the top, the train drops into another 180-degree right turn before banking
into the second inversion, a downward corkscrew.
The train drops straight down into the next two inversions – two consecutive dive loops
– before travelling over an airtime hill into a batwing element.
Upon exiting the batwing, the train traverses another corkscrew before reaching the second
set of block brakes.
After a brief pause, the train ascends the second lift hill known as a vertical lift
hill.
The train then enters another drop, 180-degrees to the left, banking into a downward corkscrew.
Riders next encounter a sea serpent roll, followed by a second airtime hill.
Riders here experience a large amount of ejector airtime before the train reaches a cobra roll
element.
Upon exiting the cobra roll, the train hits two consecutive corkscrews before a 180-degree
left turn into the final brake run.
Problems The ride has suffered a series of technical
issues and breakdowns.
Marketing Marketing for The Smiler started around the
same time as construction when, on 11 April 2012, a minisite was launched allowing visitors
to register for updates on the ride's progress.
A competition to be the first to ride the rollercoaster, at this time codnamed "SW7",
started in July.
To enter guests were invited to scan a QR Code with their smartphone, which subsequently
redirected to Alton Towers Official The Smiler Minisite where guests entered their details.
In September 2012, the park began the second stage of advertisement through the overnight
spray painting of a stencil logo all over the park.
This was followed in October with new boards around the park, new 'subliminal' advertising
on different sections of the main Alton Towers website, and a countdown timer on the Alton
Towers mini-site.
The countdown timer initially gave a scheduled opening date of 16 March 2013, but was removed
however on 4 January 2013, as the ride hit delays.
More overt advertising started in January 2013, when the "Smile" logo was used in various
forms across the country.
Including billboards in London; ticket barriers at Leeds railway station; projected onto various
buildings including Big Ben; and sprayed onto flocks of sheep in areas including Leicestershire,
Devon and Perthshire.
The name of the roller coaster, The Smiler, was revealed on 21 January 2013, the Metro
newspaper, and the opening date was set as May.
In February 2013 a free game app was released containing a full 3D recreation of the actual
ride, and a preview of the rides merchandise was published online.
Track designer, John Wardley, confirmed in a radio interview, on 19 April 2013, that
The Smiler would feature more inversions than any other rollercoaster in the world.
Despite construction proving this fact long beforehand, this was the first official confirmation
that The Smiler will hold the inversion record when it opens.
In an earlier interview Wardley had said that The Smiler would have "...5 mind manipulating
elements that play around with you on the ride, so it’s more than just a physical
rollercoaster."
From early April and throughout May, Alton Towers published videos online giving snippets
of the ride's fictional backstory.
This was followed by footage of Daybreak's Laura Tobin riding The Smiler and an advertising
campaign on boxes of Krave cereal.
The first national television advertisement premiered on 20 May 2013.
In 2014, Goodfella's began cross-promoting with Alton Towers by a limited edition "Smiler
Pizza" with spicy sausage, pan-fried onions and jalapenos.
Reception The Smiler received a mass of very positive
reviews in its first season.
Many calling it, the only ride to have come close to topping the park's own Nemesis, which
has been among the top ten rollercoasters in the world since opening.
The Smiler attracted wait times in excess of four hours and received excellent reviews
from guests.
Despite the higher investment costs The Smiler didn't manage to get the same attendance levels
of TH13TEEN.
However, it did still manage to increase the gate figures, but only by 100,000 to 2,500,000
people.
A number lower than that of the 2011 season when no new attraction was added.
It is expected that the ride's late opening at the end of May may have cause the smaller
attendance.
References
External links Official Alton Towers mini-site