Lightning Rod

The first drop is great, the airtimes are great, and the quad down finale is one of my favorite finales, it can be intense for some people.

Lorenzo Perez

The quadruple down is super forceful, more like ejector airtime than floater airtime, so expect to leave your seat.

Coaster Critic

The best things about it are the ejector airtime’s.

Alfie Bullen

While it doesn’t crest at 45 mph, you’ll be treated to the first of many glorious pops of air as you pass underneath the pointed roof structure

Coaster101

When your in the front you get pushed over these hills which results in some weak ejector, as opposed to the back where the first moment gives some decent floater.

Ben Lilly

The ride itself is still fun and has plenty of airtime, but it doesn’t pack the same punch it used to.

Limitless Park

I will say that generally the ride is very smooth, also some of the wooden sections can be slightly bumpy, it’s still perfectly tolerable.

Anthony Ricciuti

Aside from the back row, every other seat provided a glass-smooth ride, typical of RMC coasters.

Coaster101

This coaster is indeed perfect, and with a night ride marathon on this thing, I came of in pain from the airtime, but it was pure joy.

Slovis Cellery

since they removed the launch, the ride is slower and therefore much rougher.

Rowan L.

After this, the coaster never lets up as it throws you side to side, chucks you out of your seat, and plunges you through many other intense elements.

roller rider

The next few hills are smaller, but equally surprising and more forceful.

Coaster Critic

But it is forceful, and it sure beats your run-of-the-mill lift hill.

Coaster101

Each subsequent hill on this journey down the hill gets more intense except for the final hill which focuses more on laterals.

Luca Boucher

It’s by far the most intense ride I’ve ever been on and it never ceases to excite me and leave me smiling every ride.

Jason Osborne

The bank turns are tight and forceful as you wind through the smokies in a ride full of incredible airtime moments.

Jay Van Linden

The ride isn’t really short, it just feels that way because of how fast you fly through the entire layout and how you don’t want it to end.

Jackson Sparrow

Thankfully, Lightning Rod’s incredible speed and dynamic maneuvers are handled gracefully.

Coaster Critic

This ride is honestly pretty smooth and just the terrain factor and being a wooden coaster made the sense of speed feel dangerous on this.

Cooper Zimmerman

A truly amazing ride, even without the launch up the hill the ride still hauls through the whole layout and has an amazing drop.

HockeyNinja

the entire ride is great, but most has already been said, amazing ride with good elements with poor reliability and a trimmed launch.

Evosioa

I also got very lucky in that I went to Dollywood on a day when it was raining, so this was a walkup all day long and the cooler temperatures kept the launch from failing so I was able to ride this...

Evan Scussel

The dispatches rarely hit 3 minutes.

Ben Lilly

But after a ride on Tennessee Tornado (I forgot the park had other coasters), I returned to a long line leading from Lightning Rod’s closed entrance.

Coaster101

My main complaint is that while it ran consistently all day without breaking down, it operated with one train while it had a 145 minute wait.

Hen Hen