Amazing ride opps!

I was at the park with my friend on 8-12-08, and we went on Mean Streak seven times in a row. While waiting in line for the front line each time, we noticed this ride opp named Brad. He was honestly the best worker I have ever seen at Cedar Point in all my years goin' there. He was working there from like 6PMish until closing. Anyways, I just wanted to say that he was really good at his job! My favorite thing he said was, and I quote "Enjoy your ride on Mean Streak. It's so mean it'll rip the heads off your Barbie Dolls. That's right, no more 'style my hair' Barbie!" Haha, I was just wondering if anyone else saw him or not or if there's anyone else who has any good stories.

I'm not sure about him, but one op on Maverick named Terris was so cool when I went on the 7th! He was making jokes about everything and kept saying something about Shake n Bake. He even tried to get a date for some teenager who's 15th birthday was that day. He honestly was the best op I have every seen at CP in my 13 years of going there.

^^ I have seem him on mean streak 7 of 8 times i have been to the park this summer. I am not sure of his name, but he was wearing blue sunglasses every time. He really does a great job keeping everyone entertained and is very quick. I can't tell for sure, but i think he is the ATL of the ride. He is one of the top 3 best ride hosts i have ever seen at any park. It is too bad that the rest of the operators on mean streak don't care.

Yeah, he had some pretty cool blue sunglasses. And everyone else on Mean Streak was so boring and they basically could care less. Good thing there was Brad to make everything better! There was also this one worker on Gemini who was pretty good too. She was singing Spongebob, ha.

Was her name Dani? If it was she is very crazy in that station. The Gemini crew is pretty cool this year if it is the right combination.

^^Well, if you're a ride op on Mean Streak, you've got to be funny. It's not like you have riders to keep you busy and entertained... ;)

I was at the park the past few days and I saw the shake n bake guy at maverick each night. He did a really good job. In general though all the ride ops I saw were really good. They were always trash talking the other rides and getting everyone real excited for their ride. At Maverick we had a ride op say "No shirt, no shoes, no Maverick. We're not like those unclassy guys over at Raptor." I thought that was really funny. Overall they were all great though.

MICOOL27 said:
I was at the park with my friend on 8-12-08, and we went on Mean Streak seven times in a row. While waiting in line for the front line each time, we noticed this ride opp named Brad. He was honestly the best worker I have ever seen at Cedar Point in all my years goin' there.

Yep, Brad's a great guy -- truly dedicated to the craft of entertaining people as part of the overall CP experience. Makes the ride more fun that it has a right to be! His talents would be better utilized over at Maverick, though... just sayin'...

I was there on Saturday and Sunday. I loved Terris on maverick. I also was surprised when I rode the train. There was this one black guy who was saying funny stuff like oh its so fast he had the whole line laughing. And at the other station this guy was asking trivia about oldest tallest rides etc. He also did the arms down head back hold on thing. They called it the Top Thrill Choo Choo I loved it. Me and my daughter loved how friendly the employees are this year. I also liked how clean the park is. I noticed full time managers sweeping.

Brad is a great guy and by far deserves some props. My favorite quote from him "This ride is so mean it will break up with you via text message"

I love it when the ride ops try to make the wait more fun like that. It's so much more interesting than hearing a pre-recorded spiel. Having never worked at the park, I've always wondered what management's attitude is toward this sort of clever ad-libbing or riffing. I'd like to think they take a benign view of it.

Ensign Smith said:
It's so much more interesting than hearing a pre-recorded spiel.

I agree! I went to Hersheypark this past weekend, and on all the rides they play a recording, which never changes and it gets really boring hearing the same thing over and over when you're waiting in line. They also didn't talk or do anything when the ride was going. It's nice at Cedar Point that they have real people doin' it.

If anyone wants to hear the most annoying pre-recorded spiel go to Soak City and ride one of the slides!

Ensign Smith said:
I've always wondered what management's attitude is toward this sort of clever ad-libbing or riffing. I'd like to think they take a benign view of it.

At least back in 2004 when I was working on MF, we could get written up for deviating from the pre-written formal spiel...

Wish I could say I was totally surprised . . .

^no doubt. I can understand why they would want a pre-recorded spiel. They probably want their message to be clear every single time, and a word-for-word spiel guarantees no errors (assuming the ride op doesn't mess it up).

But it seems like they can give some leeway, as long as the op says certain things. The ops on maverick were fantastic during my last visit, so based on that, and the rest of this topic, it looks like they're easing up on the rules. Can't say I'm complaining :)

I agree that the ride opps at Maverick are great, they actually put some fun into something that people should pay attenction to.

On another note I noticed on my last visit that they were doing a better job watching for guest taking out loose articles on lift hills. One time someone took out their sunglasses on Maverick and brought the train that was halfway up the lift back down to talk to the person. The other time on Magnum. I'm not sure if security was called but I bet it was. Great job!

I'm surprised no one mentioned the Raptor crew.

I didn't catch any names, but the crew did a great job towards the end of the night on the 13th. They got the trains loaded very quickly, and the worker with the mic was pretty funny and efficient, telling everyone to move quickly and hurry up. It was funny to watch the guests scurry around one another lol He was also telling people to just sit on their sandals if they were taking them off.

Good job.

Ensign Smith said:
Having never worked at the park, I've always wondered what management's attitude is toward this sort of clever ad-libbing or riffing. I'd like to think they take a benign view of it.

It depends on which person in management and supervision we're talking about when it comes to their attitude with changing around the spiel. As long as you get the safety and liability stuff across, you can generally have fun with the spiel as long as you aren't making any racial, sexual, or otherwise improper jokes or references.

lukejeff13 said:
I'm surprised no one mentioned the Raptor crew.

I didn't catch any names, but the crew did a great job towards the end of the night on the 13th. They got the trains loaded very quickly, and the worker with the mic was pretty funny and efficient, telling everyone to move quickly and hurry up. It was funny to watch the guests scurry around one another lol He was also telling people to just sit on their sandals if they were taking them off.

Good job.

Saying "Here goes the floor, you're out the door" stopped being clever 14 years ago. Thats why nobody is talking about Raptor anymore.