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Texas Trip/ Meeting My Role Model


Kyle Kruthoffer
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In case anyone’s interested and likes watching quality vlogs (with POVs!), I had the trip of a lifetime with my best friend Sean Flaharty. Mr. Jeffery Siebert is SFFTs Park president, and you may remember him from all his awesome public relations work he did for Paramount’s Kings Island from mid-1999 to pre-CF era (SoB Blair Witch spoof and National Geographic Tomb Raider may ring a bell) 

WATCH HERE

Jeff was kind enough to invest in me on my career journey in this industry, and invited me to come down to see how he did things and check out the park. I loved picking his brain on how he thinks creatively and what it takes to lead and “make it” in this industry. (I’m more infatuated with the business side rather than just being an enthusiast. I’ve always wanted to take it a step further). Jeff is an enthusiast at heart and his leadership skills and care for others is unmatched. I do hope to someday be like him, as he is just one more person that inspires me. 
 

We also were able to hit up Six Flags Over Texas, Sea World San Antonio, and ZDT’s Amusement for some fun as well.

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58EF98DB-52BB-4871-B32D-86BA4386B841.jpeg

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3 hours ago, IndyGuy4KI said:

Awesome PTR. I have never meet Jeff, but he seems like a great guy. He did a lot for KIC back in the days. 

How do you rank their RMC?

Iron Rattler was very nice. I don’t really rank coasters, I try to gain appreciation for each of them in their own way and what makes them unique (sometimes even if they’re a clone). I really admired it a lot before riding as Jeff told me he likes to see it as the park’s comparison to “The Beast”. He made a couple changes to it such as removing the slowdown at the top to achieve a new maximum speed down the first drop, and took out the flashing lights in the tunnel to create a more unique night ride. 
 

The first drop is probably my favorite on any coaster (now that Vortex is gone), it has a lot of character. Airtime is quite nice as well. Kinda like Storm Chaser in the sense that it may be short, but definitely packs a punch. 

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 1/5/2021 at 10:23 PM, Kyle Kruthoffer said:

In case anyone’s interested and likes watching quality vlogs (with POVs!), I had the trip of a lifetime with my best friend Sean Flaharty. Mr. Jeffery Siebert is SFFTs Park president, and you may remember him from all his awesome public relations work he did for Paramount’s Kings Island from mid-1999 to pre-CF era (SoB Blair Witch spoof and National Geographic Tomb Raider may ring a bell) 

WATCH HERE

Jeff was kind enough to invest in me on my career journey in this industry, and invited me to come down to see how he did things and check out the park. I loved picking his brain on how he thinks creatively and what it takes to lead and “make it” in this industry. (I’m more infatuated with the business side rather than just being an enthusiast. I’ve always wanted to take it a step further). Jeff is an enthusiast at heart and his leadership skills and care for others is unmatched. I do hope to someday be like him, as he is just one more person that inspires me. 
 

We also were able to hit up Six Flags Over Texas, Sea World San Antonio, and ZDT’s Amusement for some fun as well.

171AFF79-593A-4985-B0F4-AC3C730A779F.jpeg

E1EF294A-FC42-4CCA-A02A-B25D4F2F42A9.jpeg

58EF98DB-52BB-4871-B32D-86BA4386B841.jpeg

How was the park/KIC relationship when Jeff was there?  I remember him and Maureen having enthusiasts out at construction tours of IJST.

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2 hours ago, coaster sally said:

How was the park/KIC relationship when Jeff was there?  I remember him and Maureen having enthusiasts out at construction tours of IJST.

I'd like to start that this post is in no way any sort of comparison to current corperate positions. Just my memory of the early 2000s with Jeff and Maureen.

The relationship was a fantastic bond of Corporate from the park and its Fans. You can look back at older youtube videos of old tours and events and even the spoof videos for IJST, Son of Beast, and my all time favorite Tomb Raider The Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiide!

Jeff and Maureen were quite the power house together and down to earth people that just loved their job. Just listening to Maureen at a winter tour make fun of Jeff for losing his "flipping keys" on Tomb Raider is the true embodiment of their work relationship. They were fun, full of charism, and loved us!

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On 1/15/2021 at 2:25 PM, coaster sally said:

How was the park/KIC relationship when Jeff was there?  I remember him and Maureen having enthusiasts out at construction tours of IJST.

The bond was quite strong between the park and enthusiasts. We have been so blessed to have great park leadership throughout the years, even going back to the late great Ruth Voss. She, in a way, kinda started the trend of ERT.
 

I will say that Jeff is very similar to our own Mr. Don Helbig in the way that he is an enthusiast at heart and wants to do awesome things for enthusiasts. Tours, events, etc. CoasterStock was completely Don’s idea and he puts a lot of work into every year organizing it, something that I think most of us can glance over. Jeff is very active as well as he loves his fellow ACE members and puts on events for all organizations. In a matter of fact, SFFT just announced that they are doing a private THREE day event just for enthusiasts, Roller Coaster Rodeo!, something to which I’m not sure has ever been done before on a level such as this. I’m sure that that was completely Siebert’s idea.

Sometimes it may seem like enthusiasts got to do a lot more things like construction tours and such under Paramount/Jeff, but a lot have things have changed over the years such as safety concerns, and not to mention certain enthusiasts can ruin the fun for all by breaking those rules.

 

Yes, Kings Island may not “cater” to enthusiasts (as no park really should if we’re being honest, because we make up such a small number), but we are blessed that they do recognize us and want to do awesome things for us. If I am able to “move up in the ranks” someday, whether at Kings Island, Cedar Fair, Six Flags, Busch, wherever... I hope to help strengthen the bond/relationship between enthusiasts and parks.

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On 1/15/2021 at 2:25 PM, coaster sally said:

How was the park/KIC relationship when Jeff was there?  I remember him and Maureen having enthusiasts out at construction tours of IJST.

Perhaps I can answer this better than most since I worked directly with the park under the Mandt/Mefford/Siebert/Kaiser/Helbig administrations.  The only one I haven't worked with is the new guy, who I have only actually met once briefly.  

The relationship was dynamic between 2003-2017, when I left.  If you could be a little more distinct about your parameters for how the relationship was then I might be able to make a more fair comparison.  Of course, this opinion would be from an outsider's perspective looking in at this point, but I think I could help you more than anyone else. 

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1 hour ago, BoddaH1994 said:

Perhaps I can answer this better than most since I worked directly with the park under the Mandt/Mefford/Siebert/Kaiser/Helbig administrations.  The only one I haven't worked with is the new guy, who I have only actually met once briefly.  

The relationship was dynamic between 2003-2017, when I left.  If you could be a little more distinct about your parameters for how the relationship was then I might be able to make a more fair comparison.  Of course, this opinion would be from an outsider's perspective looking in at this point, but I think I could help you more than anyone else. 

Did the Paramount era police KICentral.com?

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16 hours ago, BoddaH1994 said:

The Paramount Parks folks had very little involvement with us. 
 

Except when they tried to create their own competing forum. 
 

...which we crushed. 

 

4 hours ago, IndyGuy4KI said:

I thought Cedar Fair had created one as well?

Wait! Wait! I need stories!

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3 hours ago, Outdoor Man said:

 

Let's not forget the server you were responsible for crashing, circa 2012.

That was a coordinated attack! :D

3 hours ago, IndyGuy4KI said:

So @TombraiderTy just posted this pic in the random photo thread. Didn't that site have a forum? That is what I was thinking about.

IMG_4851.jpg

Now that I see that, I remember something. Someone should ask Don about it. I remember the Paramount forum most, I want to call it the Paramount Network (but I could be thinking of UPN for the name?)  Anyway, they intentionally mocked up our forums, layout, sub forums, etc and called themselves the “official” site of PKI fans. This was right when (P)KIC was really starting to get clout, so all it did was create awareness for us. 

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