Top Thrill Dragster

Top Thrill Dragster is a steel accelerator roller coaster built by Intamin at Cedar Point in Sandusky, Ohio, United States. It was the sixteenth roller coaster built at the park since the Blue Streak in 1964. When built in 2003, it was the first full circuit roller coaster to exceed 400 feet (120 m) in height, and was the tallest roller coaster in the world, before being surpassed by Kingda Ka at Six Flags Great Adventure in May 2005. Top Thrill Dragster, along with Kingda Ka, are the only strata coasters in existence. It was the second hydraulically launched roller coaster built by Intamin, following Xcelerator at Knott's Berry Farm. The tagline for Top Thrill Dragster is "Race for the Sky".

History
Planning for Top Thrill Dragster started around 2000 when Millennium Force opened. Footers started being poured during the winter of 2001/2002 then were covered up during the 2002 operating season. To construct the roller coaster, the park had to use a 480 feet (150 m) crane, one of only four in the United States. Vertical construction by Martin & Vleminckx started in fall 2002, months before the announcement. By October 2002, the roller coaster had reached 200 feet (61 m). The ride was announced on January 9, 2003 and the structure, built by Intamin's subcontractor Stakotra, was finished shortly after. It is tied with Millennium Force for being the two largest investments in Cedar Point history. The announcement revealed the park's goal to build "the tallest and fastest roller coaster on earth", reaching 420 feet (130 m) and accelerating up to 120 miles per hour (193 km/h) in 3.8 seconds. On March 10, 2003, Cedar Fair Entertainment Company filed a trademark for the name Top Thrill Dragster.

Top Thrill Dragster's media day was held on May 1, 2003 and the roller coaster officially opened to the public on May 4. It became the "tallest" and "fastest" roller coaster in the world overtaking both world records from Steel Dragon 2000 at Nagashima Spa Land that was just built three years earlier. It lost the title of being the world's tallest and fastest roller coaster when Kingda Ka at Six Flags Great Adventure opened in May 2005. Intamin designed both Kingda Ka and Top Thrill Dragster, and the two share a similar design and layout that differs primarily by the theme and the additional hill featured on Kingda Ka.