A version of the following article appeared in the Monday, July 13, 2026, edition of The Charlotte Ledger, an e-newsletter with local business-y news and insights for Charlotte, N.C.
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For ‘Fury Guy’ McLain Waddell, riding Carowinds’ tallest and fastest roller coaster has become a key part of his lifestyle
McLain Waddell, 41, started riding Fury 325 at Carowinds in 2015 and found it to be a calming influence. He rides it up to 40 times a day and logged his 14,000th ride earlier this month. (Photo courtesy of McLain Waddell)
by Cooper Hall
The first time McLain Waddell rode Fury 325, he lost his car keys.
Waddell wasn’t an avid roller coaster enthusiast — in fact, they usually just made him sick. But in March 2015, he made the 25-minute drive to Carowinds from his home in Indian Trail to try the park’s new record-breaking coaster, featuring a 325-foot drop and speeds up to 95 mph.
As soon as he realized his keys were missing after his first ride, familiar feelings of anxiety began to build. Stuck at Carowinds, waiting to get his backup car keys, he decided he might as well ride again.
He ended up riding 10 times that day, and with each time, he had a stronger feeling of something unexpected.
“I just felt amazingly calm and clear,” Waddell said.
Fast-forward to the Fourth of July weekend of this year, when Waddell completed his 14,000th ride on Fury. Buckling into the coaster is now part of his routine.
Now 41, Waddell has struggled with anxiety and Bipolar II disorder since he was in high school. These conditions, and treating them, were further complicated by a traumatic brain injury from a car accident later in high school. Mental health became an ongoing challenge in Waddell’s life.
He tried various medicines and therapies. Some were effective, but many left him frustrated and unsatisfied.
Nothing Waddell had tried prior to March 2015 had given him the feeling he got after riding Fury that first day. He wasn’t sure why Fury helped, but he knew it was a feeling he wanted to explore. So, he bought a season pass to Carowinds and kept riding.
In fact, riding Fury became part of Waddell’s daily routine. He’d go in the morning to wake himself up — when the park was serene, crowds were quieter and the heat wasn’t so bad — or he’d end his days there to wind down.
“After you hit 20 laps, I tell people, you get high on Fury,” he said, adding that he often feels residual effects of the ride for a few days after.
He’d ride anywhere from 15 to 40 times each trip, usually beginning to feel a wave of calmness after five to six go-arounds. The more he rode, the better he felt.
“This truly is the best therapy I've had ever since my accident,” Waddell said.
Music has also been helpful therapy for Waddell. So, he began to pair electronic dance music songs with his laps on the coaster. He has a playlist of 352 songs that match the big drop of the ride, featuring artists like Marshmello, Fall Out Boy and Galantis.
The playlist and riding Fury have become intertwined.
“If I'm at home or I'm on the road, and I need a little bit of meditation, I crank up the music I ride Fury on, my brain fires and does some of the same things that it does when I ride,” Waddell said.
At the beginning of this journey, after seeing Waddell every day for months, Carowinds’ staff and Pat Jones, the park’s former vice president and general manager, took to calling him “Fury Guy.”
The name stuck, finding its way to Waddell’s social media, and even onto his car’s license plate. Waddell’s Facebook page is a digital diary of his Fury 325 journey, showcasing almost every snapshot of his rides, hands often positioned in finger guns, hair blown back by the rocketing drop.
In this time at the park, Waddell has met other dedicated Fury riders. AJ Logan and Darryl Thompson, who are each often referred to as “Fury Man,” have both logged thousands of rides, or “laps.”
Self-proclaimed roller coaster junkie Yong Park and his son, Jayden, are also frequent Fury visitors and, much like Waddell, ride it as a calming, therapeutic practice.
Jayden Park, 26, has severe autism. Yong Park has been taking his son on rides since he was 4 years old. Fury is the closest roller coaster to the Parks’ home in the Spartanburg, S.C., area, and is the duo’s favorite ride at Carowinds. The Parks have completed thousands of rides on Fury.
After coaster laps, Yong Park notices that his son is calmer, has more regulated sleep and, although nonverbal, is more motivated to engage in different forms of communication.
Neither Waddell nor Park have had formal testing done on this unconventional therapeutic practice.
Allan Howe, a Charlotte-based therapist, said he sometimes encourages his patients, particularly children, to visit Carowinds to face their fears.
“They can feel the adrenaline start to increase as they're going up the hill, and then it releases, and it's like, ‘Oh, that actually was really fun,’” Howe said. “And so it's just this way of really fighting back the anxiety of whatever that situation is, like, yeah, OK, it's OK to face it, and also know and prove to yourself that you're going to be OK.”
He noted that adrenaline and anxiety can feel very similar — sweaty palms, a racing heart — so the release of adrenaline after a roller coaster may leave a person feeling calmer.
Howe said that roller coasters may act as a distracting stimulus but can only be a healthy coping mechanism when used with other forms of therapy.
While Fury 325 is a favorite for Waddell, other rides offer similar feelings of clarity. He ranks Millennium Force at Cedar Point and Lightning Rod at Dollywood as close seconds to Fury 325.
Waddell still tries to buckle into Fury as often as he can. However, his job as a regional manager with Allstate Protection Plans comes with frequent travel, so his visits are more sporadic than they used to be. So far this season, he has visited Carowinds 36 times, averaging 13 to 14 rides a trip and using a fast pass to cut down his wait times.
On July 5, Waddell recorded his 14,000th lap. With that achievement he has spent approximately 800 hours, or 33 days of his life, riding Fury 325.
Waddell said that, with less energy needed to keep himself calm, he has been able to spend the past 10 years working on other aspects of his mental health and to improve his relationship with loved ones, something he calls “priceless.”
“I don't think I'm going to stop anytime soon, because it's given me so much,” he said. “I’m truly fortunate for it.”
Cooper Hall is a summer reporting intern for The Charlotte Ledger. She is a rising junior at UNC Chapel Hill, double-majoring in media and journalism and exercise and sport science. She can be reached at [email protected].