Whizzer

Whizzer (originally known as Willard's Whizzer) is a Schwarzkopf Speedracer roller coaster which is an opening day attraction at both Great America parks. Originally named after the founder of Marriott, J. Willard Marriott, Whizzer is one of the last Speedracer roller coasters in existence.

History
Willard's Whizzer debuted as one of three opening day roller coasters, along with Turn of the Century in County Fair and Gulf Coaster in Orleans Place. Whizzer was named after J. Willard Marriott, founder of the Marriott corporation and father of the then CEO of Marriott, J. Willard "Bill" Marriott. Whizzer was designed to operate as many as five trains at a time and operated at a measly 42mph.

On March 29, 1980, two trains collided in the station in Santa Clara's Whizzer. A 14-year-old boy was ejected from his seat and fell onto the tracks; the runaway train crushed him and he died. Following this incident, it was discovered that Whizzer had known braking issues with the earliest incident of a collision in the station being recorded in Gurnee's Whizzer on July 24, 1976, a little over two months after the Gurnee park opened. Prior to that, Whizzer had collided at least 11 times in Santa Clara and twice in Gurnee (the latter resulting in 31 injuries, it is unknown how many were injured in Santa Clara). Following this incident, major changes were made to the breaking system, the number of trains which operated simultaneously dropped from 5 to 3, and seatbelts were added to Whizzer (due to it's original speed of 40mph, seatbelts weren't initially installed on Whizzer). Whizzer was also renamed from Willard's Whizzer to simply Whizzer. By August of 1980, Whizzer had completed all upgrades needed.

In 1988, Santa Clara's Great America announced the removal of Whizzer after only 12 years of operation. It is believed stigma from these incidents were the motive as Whizzer was removed without replacement (in fact, the only ride to occupy Whizzers space was opened in 2013, over 20 years after the removal of Whizzer).

In 2002, Gurnee's Great America announced the closure of Whizzer to make way for Superman: Ultimate Flight. Citing high maintenance costs, Gurnee sought to replace the roller coaster with a new coaster and signaled that August 11 would be the last day to ride Whizzer. Following massive backlash and public outcry, park officials reversed this decision and instead replaced the newer and bigger Shockwave instead.