A G-force to be reckoned with: First-year Michael Karash discusses life as a roller coaster enthusiast

At 11 years old McCormick and Bienen first-year Michael Karash pulled the restraint bar over his shoulders on the Incredible Hulk roller coaster at the Universal Orlando Resort in Florida. The 112-foot-tall green structure terrified him. The ride began, and Karash flipped upside down seven times, reaching speeds up to 67 miles per hour. 

By the end of the ride, his fears melted away, and he chased that thrilling feeling again and again.

“But, I also didn’t just want to ride it again,” Karash said. “I wanted to analyze what made it so good, what made it so iconic.” 

Karash pored over YouTube videos, specifically “coaster channels,” to build upon his knowledge of roller coasters. He credits the channel Coaster Studios and its creator Taylor Bybee for laying the groundwork and becoming his “professor.”  

He said Bybee inspired him to keep track of his trips and credits, which is the official term in the coaster enthusiast community for the number of unique roller coasters a person has ridden on.

Now, at 18 years old, Karash has 36 credits and counting. 

His favorite? The Jurassic World VelociCoaster at Universal Orlando Resort. Karash has ridden the 154-foot-tall roller coaster “too many times to count.”

“The elements on [VelociCoaster] are so unique and incredible,” Karash said. “At the very end, it has what’s called a Mosasaurus roll. They invert you in a unique way where you are over the water, and you feel like when you are inverting; you will be thrown out of your seat.”

At every amusement park, Karash practices the same routine. He wears a shirt printed with the cover of the Beatles’ “Abbey Road” album. He takes Advil to prevent nausea and drinks plenty of water. During the ride, Karash keeps his eyes open and his arms raised, especially during drops and launches.

But the most important preparation for every coaster enthusiast is, of course, research.

“I would never go into a coaster blind,” he said. “I want to know what makes coasters good and iconic, and the only way to do that is to do the research. That’s what I love about being an enthusiast.”

As a result, Karash is brimming with information about everything related to coasters. His favorite manufacturer is Rocky Mountain Construction, a company with an innovative mission to transform classic wooden rollercoasters into modern hybrids by adding a steel track for a smoother ride. 

His dream rollercoaster would be manufactured by RMC, featuring elements such as a launch coaster and lots of ejector airtime, he said. Ejector airtime is when a rider is aggressively thrown out of their seat at a moment’s notice. Launch coasters are known to have some of the fastest accelerations in the world, and there are only two that remain in the world currently. 

Karash has even made friends who share his love for amusement parks. He met McCormick first-year Nathaniel Allen at a Northwestern student gathering in Houston. Allen said he learned that Karash loved roller coasters after he mentioned Universal Epic Universe when they met.

“I was like, ‘Here’s someone who knows ball and the awesomeness of amusement parks,’” Allen said. “We mainly talked about the incorporation of theming into rides at the time.”

While Karash and Allen share interests beyond roller coasters, they attended a Theme Park Engineering & Design Club meeting and planned a trip to Six Flags Great America in Gurnee, Illinois.

Looking back on what made him interested in roller coasters, Karash said his father, Ilya Karash, inspired him to ride his first “big boy” coaster when he was 9 years old. Ilya Karash said his son’s blooming interest was “not something [he] had in [his] bingo cards.”

“Michael likes to really dive into a topic and just learn everything about it,” Karash said. “But it seems like with roller coasters, he went further than with most others.”

Being a coaster enthusiast occupies only a small part of Michael Karash’s burgeoning list of interests. He is pursuing a dual degree in voice and opera performance and biomedical engineering. He has his own IMDb page and can tap dance – to name a few. 

“In all of his passions, and he has many, we’ve always just encouraged him and pushed him along and helped him whenever needed to discover as much as possible,” his father said. “We never wanted to kind of limit him.”

But Karash said it was his interest in roller coasters that made him a more analytical person. He attributes rollercoasters to sparking his intellectual curiosity, which later built his love for engineering. 

When asked if he might consider a career designing roller coasters in the future, Karash said he has a feeling that perhaps he’ll change his mind. Ultimately, he “doesn’t know yet, but it would be really fun.”

“But for now, I mean, what can I say? I’m a coaster enthusiast,” he said. “It’s a great life.”