A Note from Fatty: Today's excellent story comes to you from frequent commenter Born4Lycra. I have to say, I am really enjoying all the stories you readers are sending in. Thanks for covering for me! I believe I will make "Readers' Stories" a regular part of Fat Cyclist once I come back.

I'm wondering if anyone can offer any insight into what happened to me today...and help me avoid what might happen later today.

The Dilemma
I innocently accompanied Dave, a good mate and work colleague to a nearby bike shop (Mike Turtur Cycles Main North Rd Prospect SAust), merely to window shop while he inquired about various bikes across the Pinnarello, Orbea and Olmo range. He went to get prices and possibly buy, while I went for something to do and to spend my lunchtime surrounded by bikes, as well as maybe pick up a few tips, ideas, prices, and so forth for future reference.

My friend's single, well paid, and loaded. I'm married (happily) and am a proud dad with limited resources.

So why did I leave the proud owner of a new Orbea Venta limited edition 2007 model, while he is still trying to make up his mind between studying, athletics, cycling, golf and soccer?

Love at First Sight
It's true: I have always hankered after an Orbea -- preferably bright orange. You know, the kind of bike that looks fast even when leaning against the wall at the coffee shop. Of course it will look slower if I am in the picture, but I'm willing to live with that.

It's true: my own bike is close to the bottom of the range of Avanti's and probably needed updating. However, it was not in my plans to happen this year let alone this day.

Dave and I walked into the shop and Greg Turtur made his way straight for me. So how did Greg know I was vulnerable? Was it the drool? The audible sighs? Or was it just that I looked like a buyer? Regardless, Dave faded into the background -- gathering information quietly -- while I am directed straight to my fantasy on wheels (which has only been on display for 3 hours).

There were tell tale signs that the purchase was going to happen.

• I went through the bike fitting process. Only for future reference, of course. 
• They through me a brand new pair of Euskatel knix to wear during the fitting. Once they were open and used, I may as well keep them. Wow. Thanks!
• The whole setup was my size. Just lower the seat 15mm and it's done. Surprise, surprise. 
• True love. There were heaps of bikes, yet I only had eyes for this one.
• I bought my wallet with me. Inexplicable really because I usually don't take it anywhere. No cash in it, just ID.
• Yes the bike was obviously available for immediate delivery. I could be riding it tonight.

Token Objections
Sure, I tried to resist. Here's how it went:

Me: "I really like it but I obviously don't carry that sort of cash around."

Greg: "No problem, your word is enough for us."

So now, suddenly, I have an Orbea Bike. Somehow, the fact that it's not orange doesn't matter.

So back to my original problem: how did this happen? And more importantly, how I can tell my wife this tale I have just told you?

Salt Lake City, UT (Fat Cyclist Fake News Service) – The Utah House of Representatives met in special session today and overwhelmingly approved a measure that will rename a popular mountain biking trail in the Alpine Area.

Currently known as “Hog Hollow” the trail is to be renamed “The Hollow” when the bill becomes law. The measure is expected to pass the Senate and be signed by Governor Jon Huntsman no later than November 15.

The measure is an attempt by the Utah Legislature to end what has become one of the more bizarre chapters in recent Utah history. Once virtually unknown outside of northern Utah County, the site began attracting attention worldwide when internet savvy cycling enthusiasts wrote about it in their web logs. Some of these authors (known as ‘bloggers’) referred to the area as “Hog’s Hollow” which touched off a firestorm of debate and bickering among cycling aficionados, area educators and members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

“Most of the bloggers were just making an innocent mistake.” stated Rep. Elden C. Nelson (R-Alpine), who authored the bill. “The real trouble began when people who knew better would deliberately goad those who are a little too uptight about spelling and punctuation marks. That’s when things got out of hand.”

The contention reached crisis proportions when a Draper resident—known only as Doug—was arrested at the Hog Hollow trailhead for brandishing what appeared to be a giant metal apostrophe and threatening bodily harm to any cyclist who dared to say “Hog’s Hollow” in his presence. “We knew we had to take action,” Nelson said, “or somebody was bound to get hurt.” Doug is also suspected of releasing several dozen wild boars into residential areas in Alpine and Draper.  He could not be reached for comment.

Ironically, this is not the first time the area has been embroiled in a struggle for its name. Early Mormon Pioneer and polygamist LaVerle Willey Hoaglund originally owned most of what is now Hog Hollow. Hoaglund, who settled in Alpine in 1849 under the direction of Brigham Young, was affectionately nicknamed ‘Hogg’ by his seventeen wives.  Personal journals of Alpine residents and most Utah County newspapers referred to the area as “Hogg Hollow” until the early twentieth century.

In 1906 Lehi schoolteacher Thelma Thistlebloom successfully mounted a campaign to rename the area Hog Hollow “as to quell the rampant ignorance and lack of refinement in the community, especially among the children who cannot spell even the simplest of words.” Three of the four representatives who voted against the present bill—LaWanna Lou Shirtlift (D-Ogden); LaVar Christiansen (R-Sandy) and DeMar Bud Bahmann (R-Cedar City)—are descendants of Hoaglund.

In an effort to end the current controversy, legislators first considered “Swine Hollow” but faced considerable resistance from Alpine residents. “Piggy Hollow” was also considered but lawmakers feared it would raise the ire of the Jim Henson Company. Though “Pig Hollow” had popular appeal and ample legislative support, it did not resolve the apostrophizing issue. “But nobody is going to muck up ‘The Hollow’ with an apostrophe,” said Nelson. “Only an idiot who’d spell ‘moron’ with an ‘a’ or write ‘loose’ when he means ‘lose’ would be stupid enough to that.”

Jeff Alexandre (R-Provo), the other lawmaker who voted against the measure, isn’t so sure. “The bill makes it clear,” said Alexandre, “that the area shall be named ‘The Hollow’ and shall be manifest in all printed form as such and without deviation. It won’t be long until a renegade blogger types The Hollow or THE HOLLOW and that whole pack of rascals will be at it again.”

PS from Fatty: Today's fake news comes to you from "KeepYerBag." Good stuff, KYB! By the way, I'm now very glad I'm taking this break from writing; I'm finding these entries are a breath of fresh air here. If you'd like to submit something to be posted here, send it to fatty@fatcyclist.com.

PPS from Fatty: If you want to read something I wrote today, I've posted a new review at RandomReviewer.

In a couple hours, I'll post a funny fake news piece a reader submitted, but first: the good folks at Granny Gear Productions have acknowledged that the Jack Mormon Militia is in fact the overall winner of the 24 Hours of Moab.

Nice work, Kenny, Chucky, Josh, and Kevin!

The Granny Gear people have a great explanation and apology posted on their site; read it here. I applaud them for owning their error and committing to not have it happen again.

A Note from Fatty: For a couple weeks, Fat Cyclist stories will be coming from you, the readers. If you've got something you'd like published in this blog, send it to fatty@fatcyclist.com. Today's story --an excellent writeup of last weekend's 24 Hours of Moab race, comes to you courtesy of my good friend Kenny, owner of Kenny's One Hour Photo.

My team (four men, all on rigid singlespeeds), the Jack Mormon Militia, went to Moab with one goal: to see how high we could place in the overall. Last year we placed seventh. We hoped that we could improve on this, with the right conditions.  

Run, Josh, Run
The race started out great.  We had the newbie, Josh Wolfe, do the Le Mans start. It was a good way to break him into the race. It's a crowded run in a rutted, rocky field about 500 yards around a bush and back to your bike.   You end up starting your lap out of breath with a nose full of dust.

It turned out to be a good call, because Josh did well in the run and was on his bike fifth out the gate.  He passed everyone but Nat Ross on the climb and kept his lead until the slight downhill section, where he got passed back, because of the singlespeed, by a lot of the faster solo riders and duo pros. He turned out a 1:12 and we were in tenth place.  

Get My Name Right
Chuck, the second to go, went out with a mission to do the fastest lap for our team and set the tone for the rest of the race. 

The announcer was making a big deal about Nat Ross leading the race and the solo category.  He was talking about the fact that Nat likes to lead the race for the first couple of laps and then settle into a 24 hour pace.  I knew the first guy to come in would be in Gary Fisher gear, but it wasn’t going to be the factory guy. Here's how events unrolled:

Announcer: “And here he is Nat Ross coming thru on his second lap in the lead.

Chucky: middle finger. 

Announcer:  “Wait, Wait….that’s not Nat Ross..that’s Cameron Chambers”  (who wasn’t even at this race). 

Chucky: another middle finger. 

Announcer: “Hold on a sec.  278...that’s the Jack Mormon Militia, Charles Gibson on a rigid single speed, tearing it up with a 1:10 lap time.  That, my friends, is a superior athlete!”   

Not Bad for a First Try (Ha)
Kevin Day from Ogden was the third to go out.  He rode a 1:15.  He later admitted to me that this was his first ride on a rigid single speed bike. His chain fell off 5 times, because he was riding with a cog that he took off of an old cassette.  (Those of us who ride singles know that doesn’t work.)

What was amazing to me was that this was his first ride on a single speed bike, his chain fell off 5 times and he still did a 1:15 lap.  He got passed by one kid from a junior team from Boulder, sponsored by their channel Four news.  This team was amazing. They were kids, 16-18, and super fast. 

Kenny the Boat Anchor
Being the slowest guy on my team (Editor's note: ??!??!), I elected to go last.  Secretly, I had done the math, and if all went well that would give me 3 day laps and 2 night laps.  In my old age, my night vision isn’t what it used to be. 

I felt great on my first lap.  The course was fast, not too sandy and I came into the tent in first place with a couple of minutes to spare. I did a 1:12. 

At this point the announcer was throwing out all sorts of crap. I think I heard him say that my 1:12 lap on a single was the equivalent of a 50 minute lap on a geared bike. I wish.   

All Hell Breaks Loose
Josh had another 1:12 lap and all of a sudden we had a gap of about 7 minutes on the channel four team, in second. 

That’s when all hell broke loose. 

It started to rain.  Then, it started to pour. Then, it started to flood.  I’ve heard of the desert flash floods, but I’ve never witnessed one first hand.  There was seriously 2 feet of water on the dirt road in front of our tents.  Chucky was out on his lap, the first night lap, when all this started. He said he saw a guy ride into a puddle and then just disappear into a giant rut. 

At an hour thirty, Chuck rode into the transition area, holding his light in one hand, because the bracket had broke off.  By the time he made it up to the road in front of our tents, the two foot river had subsided to only a foot.  

Kevin did another 1:30 lap in the harshest of conditions. That’s when they called the race.  They let everyone finish their lap and they said that they would start again at 7 in the morning.

Yes, that's right: We were leading the race by 11 minutes over second place and they stopped the race.  I’ve done so many endurance races in harsh conditions and never have they even considered stopping the race.  I’ve always felt that an endurance event, is just that, enduring. Enduring weather.  Enduring harsh conditions.  Enduring your fitness.  Enduring bike issues. It’s never too wet or too cold if you are prepared with the right clothes and the right gear. 

Everyone signs the waiver. Let everyone make the decision whether they are prepared to endure. 

So after they got everybody off the course, for the next 12 hours, the powers that be tried to figure out a way to restart the race. 

The rain went away. 

The rivers went away.

The course was prime, but no one was on it.  

They said it was taking so long, because they were trying to figure out the fairest way to get everybody back riding. 

Genius Restart
What they actually did, I can’t understand how they felt like it was fair and why it took so long to make the decision.  They subtracted every team's last lap added 14 hours and somehow came up with a start time for each team.  There were 4 teams with 7 laps.  We were one of them.  The faster teams spent one and a half to two laps in the bad conditions. 

They let the slower teams go out first.  Our start time was 11:33 am, only 27 minutes before the end of the race.  They were starting riders at 9:00, and the first place team, my team, they had decided in the fairest way possible to send out at 11:33. 

To be perfectly clear: They let the fifth, sixth and seventh place teams start out more than an hour and a half before we could even start riding. Which meant that they could catch up to us and pass us before we could even get back on the course. 

And that’s what happened. 

Statement
As a team, we decided to make a statement with our fastest lap.  I knew I could only do this with my team's help.  We’d all just been sitting around for 14 hours waiting to ride, so we decided we would do the lap together as a team. 

I went for it.  It was all or nothing. 

I had only done one lap so far and it was the day before. My team rallied behind me, literally giving me pushes on the hills and drafts on the flats and descents. On the big sandy hill that everyone walks up Kevin and Josh took turns carrying my bike to the top. I tried to jog up, but I was feeling pretty hammered. 

I started to recover a bit on the top rolling section and was spinning hard on the flats.  We must have been some what of a spectacle, four guys in blue, riding single file on single speed rigid bikes, hammering thru the rocky sand stone drops and ledges. Josh was yelling out occasionally, “YEAH ….Jack Mormon Militia!” 

I was starting to feel really sluggish as we came to the last climb out. My team mates would yell out encouragement as they saw me starting to fade.   I was pegged, but finished hard thru the camp and into the timing tent.  I jerked down my jersey zipper and ran my time card across the sensor.  1:09:17

I’ve probably done close to 50 laps around that behind the rocks 24 hours of Moab course.  That was and always will be the most memorable. 

I’m not sure how the standings are going to work out.  At this point we’re sitting fourth.  I heard they’re planning on giving us the win and calling the race as of 8 o'clock, when they shut it down.  If they do, it will be the first time a single speed team has won the overall. 

That would be cool.

(left to right: Kevin, Chuck, Kenny, Josh)

PS from Fatty: If you'd like to let Granny Gear Productions (the promoter of 24 Hours of Moab) know your views on who won this race, you can reach them via email: heygranny@grannygear.com. Be clear, be polite, and tell 'em Fatty sent you.

Maybe it's the gloomy weather. Maybe it's the unusually high number of snide comments lately (probably also brought on by the gloomy weather). Maybe it's that I've hit some sort of mental plateau, where I don't feel like I have anything new to say.

Regardless, I'm not having fun writing this blog right now, and want to take a break from writing for a couple weeks.

But I don't want this blog to die while I recharge my batteries. I know a lot of you have interesting stories to tell, and I'd like to read and publish them.

So here's your chance to be the Fat Cyclist (a real dream come true, right?). Write something you think would go well in this blog -- an epic ride story, a fake news piece, an observation about biking in general, or whatever else you like -- and email it to me: fatty@fatcyclist.com. If I like it, I'll publish it. It's that simple.

A few things to keep in mind:

• Watch the length: Remember, most people are reading this blog during a work break. I'm not putting length restrictions on this because if I find something really long that I otherwise absolutely love, I'll break it into a multi-part entry and post it. More likely, though, really long is going to hurt your chances.
• Keep it clean. My kids read this blog; I'm not going to publish anything I wouldn't want them to read.
• Keep it topical. If it's not at least tangentially related to biking, you might want to send your story elsewhere.
• Keep it fun.

Don't put your story in an attachment; put it right in the email body. You can attach pictures if you like, though.

While I'm Away
While I'm taking a break from writing, I'll still be working on this blog. In fact, I plan to be adding some new stuff that should make Fat Cyclist a more interesting place to visit.

If that's even possible.

Ha.

Something's changed. It's the same something that changes every year around this time. And that something is my motivation level. Sometime in late September, I stop thinking about how strong or fast or light or heavy I am, and start thinking about mashed potatoes.

Oh, how I love mashed potatoes.

I should be more specific: I love my mashed potatoes. Everybody loves my mashed potatoes. If there were a mashed potato contest, I'd enter it with confidence. And if I didn't win, I'd feel robbed.

My kids love my mashed potatoes more than any other food in the world. They'd rather eat my mashed potatoes than dessert. And so would I, for that matter.

Friends and relations call early in the year to invite me to Thanksgiving dinner -- even though they don't care for me personally -- because my mashed potatoes are so good.

Nobody puts gravy on my mashed potatoes. This is because people intuit that while other mashed potatoes need gravy, my mashed potatoes do not need such a crutch.

How to Make Great Mashed Potatoes
People always ask me, "Fatty, how do you make such incredible mashed potatoes?"

I do not tell them.

It's not that there's a secret. There's not. And it's not that these are difficult to make. They're not.

It's that if I tell people how bad these mashed potatoes are for them, they'll never eat them again, and that would be a shame.

The thing is, though, most of you won't ever be eating Thanksgiving with me anyway. So I don't mind telling you about my mashed potatoes. And then you can make them, call them your own, and be famous within your own circle of friends for the best mashed potatoes in the world.

Start by peeling a 10lb bag of potatoes. Cut each potato into six or eight pieces. Put the potatoes into heavily salted water and boil until the potatoes reach "ready to mash" consistency.

No, I don't know how long that is, and I can't explain what that consistency is. If you can't tell, perhaps you don't have any business making my mashed potatoes.

Drain the water out. If someone else is making gravy, you can offer your water to them, because salty boiled potato water makes great gravy. Not, mind you, that you'll need gravy.

It's important you do this next part while the potatoes are very hot.

Toss in 2 sticks of butter. Do not use margarine, no matter what. Toss in a fistful of grated mozzarella cheese, and a much smaller fistful of grated Jack.

Now start mashing. Use a masher, not a mixmaster or other appliance. You don't want these to be smooth and fluffy. (That's what mashed potatoes from flakes are.) You want these to be recognizable as potatoes.

Continue until the potatoes are mashed and the butter and cheese are melted in.

Now, put in a big double wooden-spoonful of sour cream. And mash some more.

Taste.

If you don't weep with joy, you did it wrong.

PS: I wonder why I always gain weight during the Autumn?

Yesterday, after posting about how I had finished the base of my teeter, I had a little IM conversation with Brad:

Brad: When do I get to come try it out?"

Fatty: Oh, I think we'll finish it tonight or tomorrow.

Brad: Cool, I'll send out an email to everyone to meet at your house tomorrow at 7am.

Fatty: No, I said I MIGHT finish it tonight.

Brad: Well, if everyone's going to be at your house tomorrow at 7, you'll be highly motivated to finish it before then.

Brad was right. Knowing that people would be coming over to put the teeter through its paces the next morning, I got to work as soon as I got home. Luckily, the challenging part of the teeter -- the base -- was done; building the ramp was just a matter of cutting 2" x 4" boards into equal-length slats, beveling the ends of the 2" x 6" x  12' boards, and drilling a hole in the right place.

Finishing the Job
Here's are a few notes about this part of the job. This is mostly just boasting and meandering observations, so you can skip on to the next section if you want. It has pictures and video and descriptive text and stuff.

• Somewhere, I measured something wrong. According to the design I made, the ramp was supposed to be 15.5" wide. I'm glad that before I started cutting boards, though, I measured the distance between the uprights: 17". I didn't want 1.5" of play between the ramp and uprights, so made an executive decision: the ramp would be 16.5" wide. My guess is that extra inch is from the 2" x 4" boards not really being 2" x 4".
• My technique for placing the boards on the ramp worked perfectly. By the time I had cut all the 2" x 4" boards I had bought, I had 28 16.5" pieces, each 3.5" wide. The ramp is 144" long. So that means I had 46" of gap space (144 - (28*3.5)) I had to distribute. You have no idea how proud of myself I am for remembering there would be only 27 gaps to divide this space into, not 28. So individual gaps would be 1.7" (46 / 27) wide, meaning the total distance from the left edge of one board to the left edge of the next board would be 5.2". On my ruler, that's close enough to 5 1/4" to call good. I marked increments of 5 1/4" on one 12' board, clamped the two 12' boards together, then used a t-square to draw a line across both boards together, so any little errors I made in measuring would be represented on both boards, keeping things even.
• Things seem much bigger inside than outside. As I built this teeter, I kept asking myself if those 12' boards were too long. I'd look at the way I couldn't stand them upright in my garage because they hit the (high) ceiling. When I finally finished the teeter and assembled it in the backyard, suddenly that 12' ramp looked just right.
• Why the hole is offset 4" instead of 3". I had planned to offset the hole by three inches, but -- of course -- there was a big knot intersecting the point the hole would go. Knowing that I didn't want to bore a big hole overlapping a knot, I moved the hole location an inch to the left. In practical terms, that means it takes an inch longer before the teeter flips over, and you have an inch less rollout at the end.
• My wife has a good eye. As I was about 2/3 of the way done building the ramp, my wife came out into the garage, looked at the hole in the ramp, looked at the base, and said, "Hm." I hate it when she says that. She then pointed out that the lateral bracing I had put at the top of the diagonal bracing would get in the way of the ramp -- it would be impossible to put the ramp on the low setting the way I had it. It only took about ten minutes for me to shift that bracing down about three inches, but I'm glad she pointed this problem out while I still had everything in the garage, not once I had it out in the yard.

Take a Look
Just before dark, it was done. It takes two adults to lift and move each part, but my wife was game to help. Here's how it looks when I sit on the ground and take a picture so it looks as steep, long, and imposing as possible.

And here's what it looks like when you're approaching it:

And, to give you an idea of how high the ramp goes, here's me standing by it this morning, with the ramp at the high setting. I'm 5'8", and the top of the ramp is higher than my head. Not that this end of the ramp is still going to be pointed up by the time you get to it, but you can't help but wonder as you're riding....

First Ride
A little bit nervous, I opted to put it on the low setting for the first few tries. Click here for a video (in YouTube) of my very first ride on the Teeter.

And here's a video from the front.

Nattering nabobs' predictions notwithstanding, it worked beautifully. Solid as a tank, too. I daresay Al Maviva and Big Mike could ride a tandem over this thing (which, by the way, I would pay $50 to see)without the teeter breaking. I would not vouch for the status of the tandem, however.

More Fun This Morning
As promised, some friends -- Brad, Gary, Botched -- showed up this morning to try out the teeter.  Starting with the low setting, we rode it a few times, getting a feel for it. I was a little nervous because -- not wanting to be shown up by my friends -- I was riding my singlespeed today, which is fully rigid. Things went great, though.

And then I got cocky.

Here's a bit of advice: no matter how many times you ride a teeter, don't ride it casually, and especially don't ride it casually at low speed. Here's me, suddenly realizing I'm not going fast enough. You can see I'm veering left:

And here's me, after rolling off the left edge before I hit the bottom of the ramp, causing me to stack up and endo from a pretty decent height:

Now Higher
So what's the proper response to a painful fall (though not too painful, thanks to nice soft grass)? Raise the fulcrum! Here's me rolling off the bottom of the ramp, now much steeper, demonstrating that I'm a "get back on the horse" kinda guy:

And here's a much better picture of Brad riding this steeper and higher ramp:

You want to know what's going through Brad's head in this picture? It's this: "I'm more than eight feet in the air and only three feet from the end of the ramp. Is this thing going to start going down sometime soon, or should I bail right now before this gets worse?"

And now video: Here's Brad, riding the Teeter set at the high level. Scary!

Botched showed up for the ride, um, ill-equipped. That is, he had no helmet, no bike shoes, and no bike. Kindly, I loaned him my bike and told him to give it a whirl anyway. Here's Botched, making a tentative roll up the ramp.

He then bailed out by riding the bike backward down the ramp.

Yes, really.

Here's my question: If you have the skill to ride a bike up a ramp, stall, and then ride it back down the ramp backward, why don't you just ride the whole stinkin' ramp?

I believe I posed this very question to Botched, though I may also inadvertently have called him a coward somewhere in there. Here's his reply:

So What's Next?
I don't really want to leave this in my backyard. It was fun to build and it's fun to ride, but I want to share it. What I'd really like to do is make this part of Lambert Park, a great little mountain bike park near where I live. If anyone in the Utah area knows the right people to make this happen, let me know. Or if you know of another good place this could go without getting destroyed or getting people into trouble, let me know.

As for me, I had a blast building this thing. I'm already thinking about what my next mountain bike stunt project will be.

Stuff gets in my head. And once stuff gets in my head, it tends to displace pretty much everything else. Which is my way of saying that once I decided I really would make a mountain bike teeter, that's been the focal point of my existence.

And I'm having a lot of fun building it.

Change In Plans
You know, nobody says they're a big fan of designing by committee, so how come so many things get designed by committee? In the case of my teeter, the committee started designing because I asked them to. So, uh, my mistake. I'm pretty much going with my design, in spite of the dire predictions handed down by Very Experienced and Knowledgeable People.

That said, I have made some changes to the design. Specifically:

• I made the base wider: At 48" wide, the base is now nearly square.
• I made the pillar shorter: I really liked the idea of having three levels for the teeter, but realized as I was looking down at my feet while riding: the lateral distance between the outsides of my feet may well be more than 15.5". So when set at the lowest level for beginners, beginners wouldn't ride it anyway, because the pillars in the center would be in the way. So I went with 36" pillars and two levels. This is still a plenty steep ramp, and when set at the lower level, the pillar will only be an inch or two above the level of the ramp -- lower than the pedals ever get.
• I beveled the ends of the ramp: Actually, I always planned to do this, but the plan reflects that now.

If you're interested in downloading and viewing this design in its 3D glory using Google's free "Sketchup" 3D design program, you can see it from any angle, zoom in, and so forth. Click on the picture below to go to the page where you can download this diagram.

Getting to Work
I generally have a strange reaction to building stuff: I get stressed out, nervous, and very, very snippy. This hasn't happened while building the teeter. I think it's because I had already designed and built it on paper, so wasn't as worried that when I started working on it, I'd discover there was a fundamental problem with my idea.

So planning before building has its benefits. Who'd have imagined?

Also, I'm not building this for anyone, and I don't have a deadline. It's just for me. So if it turns out to be a total disaster, I make kindling, and nobody's the wiser. (Except all of you Fat Cyclist readers, who are going to have fun at my expense whether this thing turns out perfectly or horribly, horribly wrong, so what's the difference?)

So yesterday I got Gary (everyone should have at least one friend with a truck) to give me a ride to Home Depot to pick up materials, and then my son and I got to work.

You know what happens if you use a table saw to cut out four different notches in the 4" x 4" posts you're using as the base a saw-blade-width at a time? Two things:

• Your forearms get tired from pushing the board over the blade hundreds of times.
• You finally get over that terror of the table saw you've had your whole life.

Cutting a 45-degree angle with a table saw isn't easy, either. My next tool purchase is definitely a miter saw.

You know what's mysterious? It's mysterious that a 3/4" pipe won't fit through a whole drilled by a 1" bit. Which means I made a trip to the hardware store for a 1 1/4" bit, through which the pipe fits kind of loosely. So I drilled a hole with the 1 1/4" bit through an extra piece of wood, which I'm going to take to Home Depot and see if a 1" pipe fits through. I figure a snugger fit is better.

Here are all the pieces, laid out and ready to assemble.

And now here's the completed base, 2/3 of a 5lb box of wood screws later:

And a view from a little higher above:

You can see that wherever it made sense, I used metal brackets to reinforce where the wood's joined. Also, I'm very pleased with my idea of using an elbow and short section of pipe at each end of the pivot. The short section of pipe is used as a handle, making it easy to twist the elbow section on and off for when you want to move the ramp up or down.

This sucker's heavy. I can move it myself, but not easily. And feels sturdy, too. Though I'm sure it'll collapse into splinters as soon as I take it outside.

What's Next?
Now my son and I need to build the ramp. That's going to be a lot of work: Measure, cut, and drill ~30 slats, then glue and screw them onto the top of the 2"x6"x12' boards. We might finish tonight, but will more likely finish tomorrow.

And then it's teeter riding time. Anyone want to come try it out?

PS: One more question for the committee: I want the ramp to always come down on one side, so it's resting firmly in place as you approach, then goes back down to its original position once you get off the ramp. I figure an easy way to do that is to have the pivot point of the ramp off-center. Right now, I'm figuring 4" off sounds about right, but that's arbitrary. Any thoughts on how far from the middle of the ramp the hole ought to go?

Here's what I saw during my mountain bike ride at Tibble Fork (10 minute drive from my house) this morning before work:

So, how was your morning?

You know what I miss about Seattle? I miss riding with Bob. Trying -- and often, succeeding -- those constructed stunts on Tapeworm, Mr. DNA, and Cropcircles with Bob was good stuff.

The stunt I liked best of all was the Teeter. Back before I moved out to Utah, I said that I was going to build one. And I've kind of kept building one the back of my mind for months. The thing is, I haven't been able to find any plans or diagrams that I really liked, because I have something really specific in mind for my Teeter:

• It's got to be long: I'm thinking 12'.
• It's got to be adjustable: I want it to be a simple matter for two guys to be able to move the pivot point up or down, so beginners won't get too intimidated by the incline, and experts won't be bored by it.
• It's got to be portable: I'm hoping to find a place to donate this once I'm finished, so I want to be able to move it. Also, I like the idea of people being able to move stunts around, chaining them together in different ways.
• It's got to be fun to build with my son: My 10-yr-old loves building stuff, and we have a great time working on projects like this together. I need this to be something he can be co-owner of.

So last night, frustrated with what's evidently a total absence of well-conceived Teeter plans on the Web, I started looking for some free software I could use to plan my own (my pencil-and-paper drawings were totally useless).

I suppose I shouldn't be surprised at this, but Google's got a nice little 3D drawing program called "Sketchup." And like everything else Google does, it's free. (Side Topic: I know that a lot of Google's business model is based on advertising, but has anyone ever actually clicked on one of those ads or made a purchase decision based on one? I mean, I love my free stuff, but free CAD software? Sheesh.)

So I downloaded it and started to play.

Four Hours Later...
OK, I won't say that this was the easiest thing to use. But hey, free's hard to argue with. And once I start on something, I tend to get a little obsessive. So, around 2:00am this morning, I finished my Teeter design:

I admit, I am not a professional draftsman, and this was in fact the first thing I've ever made with a CAD program. But I'm pretty pleased. Here are the essentials:

• Length: 12'
• Plank Width: 15.5"
• Maximum pivot height: 40"
• Minimum pivot height: 36"

If you've downloaded and installed Sketchup, you can download and open the 3D model I created here.

I'm excited to start building this thing. So excited, in fact, I've got my shopping list all ready to go.

Fatty's Teeter Shopping List

• 4 2" x 6" x 12' boards (2 for plank rails, 1 for diagonal column supports, 1, for columns)
• 4 2" x 4" x 12' boards (3 for riding planks, 1 for base and ad-hoc strengthening)
• 1 4" x 4" x 8' board (for base)
• Coarse sandpaper
• Wood screws
• 16 sets 4" x 3/8" Bolts, nuts, and washers
• 8 sets 6" x 3/8" Bolts, nuts, and washers
• Loc-tite
• Wood glue
• 1 1" x 2' pipe
• 2 elbow connectors for 1" pipe
• 2 short bars for 1" pipe
• 1 1" drill bit
• 1 3/8" drill bit
• 4 clamps

What's Left?
My son and I are going to get started on this thing tonight. I'd like to finish it by next Monday. I admit, I'm nervous. I don't even know how many times I've set out to build something and have it fail in a major way. And while I am not a anxious guy in most circumstances, when I'm woodworking, I can get pretty high-strung -- mistakes are hard to reverse, you know?

There are a couple things I plan to do that don't show up on my design here. I'm going to use my bandsaw to round out the corners at the ends of the totter, so it's not a hard corner digging into the ground (which will be my lawn, at least initially). I also plan to put a couple of braces laterally, joining opposing diagonal braces. I don't know if that's necessary -- probably overkill -- but I expect it can't hurt.

If you're a woodworking kind of guy and see serious problems with what I've designed here, let me know. But be quick (and nice) about it, K? I want to get going on this.

Oh, and if you happen to know of some really great teeter plans that are on the net or in your top-left drawer at the bikeshop you work at, please keep that information to yourself. Too late now. Thanks!

This post has been moved to fatcyclist.com.

You know, I'm a very fortunate person. I have a great family, a bunch of very good friends with similar interests as mine, an excellent job, good health, and -- believe me, I appreciate this -- a blog that a lot of people read and tell me they enjoy.

Also, I have all these things within easy driving distance of a ridiculous number of mountain bike Meccas:

• The Ridge Trail Network: Out my back door.
• Moab: 3-hour drive
• Fruita, CO: 4-hour drive
• Gooseberry Mesa: 4-hour drive

Yesterday, Kenny, Brad, Botched, Rick M, Dug, Gary and I got out our singlespeeds, and left Utah County at 6:00am for a one-day roadtrip to Gooseberry Mesa.

It was a perfect day. Really. And the fact that there were several flat tires, a (hilarious) mechanical, and a gasp-inducing fall only made it more perfect.

Here are some pictures and moments from the day.

Big Moves
I've only ridden my singlespeed a handful of times, so really didn't expect that it is even possible to do big ledge climbs, drops, or otherwise handle seriously technical trail. So I was astounded at what my friends are capable of doing.

Please note: all of us were on singlespeeds, so the photos you see here are -- without exception -- of guys doing stuff with just one gear.

 
Let's get started with what I consider my best photo of the day. Here's Dug, evidently defying gravity. His front tire is not touching rock, and he's behind his rear wheel. Certainly, he's about to tip over backward, right? Nope. He's actually mid-wheelie, has serious forward momentum, and will clean this move.

And here's Rick, just finishing a tough, long vertical move. This photo isn't fair to him; you'd have to see the eight feet below he just cleaned to get to where he is to really appreciate the insanity of what he's just done.

You wouldn't know it to look at him, but this is BotchedExperiment's first extended ride on a singlespeed, ever. That didn't stop him from consistently cleaning moves on the first try, usually before I had a chance to get my camera out. And in fact, this is the second time Botched did this drop (please note this is a fully rigid hardtail, folks). I made him do it again, so I could get a picture.

Botched routinely did drops off walls and ledges that nobody else would even consider. Once, very early in the day, he did a drop that I wouldn't have even thought possible. "That was kind of stupid," said Botched, and then he went and did it again. Meanwhile, I had poop in my pants.

 
OK, here's Kenny and Brad, each dropping down off a freaky scary wall. In each case, I was tracking them with my camera, trying to get a shot as they went down. Both times, sadly, I did not get a shot of how far down they had to go. (I have a lot to learn about action shots.) You can get an idea of how far they have to drop, though, by looking in the bottom-right corner of the photos. See the plant, there? That's the top of a tree.

Rick's Crash
One place we always spend a lot of time at in Gooseberry is a move we have dubbed, "The Toiletbowl." You drop about 15 feet on a steep slickrock incline into a sandy flat, where you then have to execute a sharp 160-degree turn and try to climb back up another way. So far, nobody has been able to complete this move on a singlespeed, though many of us have made it numerous times on geared bikes.

After you climb out of the toiletbowl, you've got to muster enough energy for a sprint up an 8-foot-tall ridge, with total vertical exposure on the right.

Rick made us all think he was a dead man when he fell off that part, bouncing his head on the rock below. Amazingly, though, he didn't break anything, with the only obvious results of the crash being a busted helmet and a scraped-up leg:

Dug Does an Imitation of the Exxon Valdez
A couple days before the trip, Dug turned his bike over to Brad to try to tweak his bike into being a little lighter (Dug's Surly is probably the heaviest singlespeed on the planet, close to 30 pounds). One of the things Brad -- a self-taught mechanic -- did was remove the V-brake bosses from dug's suspension fork. What good were they, after all? Dug has disc brakes.

Oh, well it turns out those bosses also hold the stanchions together. Here's Dug, unhappily realizing his fork is coming apart, midride.
 

We turned the bike upside down, hammered the stanchions back into place with a rock ("I wonder if this voids the warranty," quipped Dug), and then -- lamely -- tried to thread some extra brake cable through where the bolt would normally go, hoping that this would hold the fork together.

It didn't. At all.

Soon, the oil started bleeding out of Dug's fork, leaving a puddle everywhere he momentarily stopped (you can see the oil on his rim and tire in this photo). This oil did a fantastic job of keeping his front disc lubricated, rendering the front brake completely useless.

Within an hour or so, all the oil had bled out and the fork would move up and down freely, making the "clang" of a hammer on anvil whenever Dug wheelied up onto a ledge, which is pretty much constantly on this ride.

Also, a completely-compressed fork changes the geometry of a bike pretty significantly, giving Dug a leaning-forward, eager-to-endo look.

To his credit, Dug did not complain about this at all.

This Place is Beautiful
Looking at my pictures, you'd get the impression that Gooseberry is just another Slickrock trail. But it's not. Connecting up the slickrock playgrounds is a beautiful -- meaning not just that it rides well, but is genuinely eye-poppingly gorgeous -- desert singletrack network. The thing is, when you're on your bike and zooming along, you don't feel like stopping and snapping a photo. So I didn't. I wish I would have, though.

There are gorgeous vistas from the top of the mesa, where you can look out and see Zions National Park, the Vermillion Castles above the Virgin River, and an enormous valley that stretches on forever. If I were a good photographer, I'd be able to show you what I mean. But I'm not. I'm a guy with a point-and-shoot digital camera. Still, you get some sense of what we saw with this shot, which also features Gary eating lunch (salmon, for crying out loud) and trying to cool down a little in the shade -- it got into what felt like the low-to-mid-90's.

But What About Me?
I was pretty timid yesterday, not trying a lot of the moves that my friends were doing. I did, however, try and succeed at a couple, and I did ride the whole trail, which is pretty darned technical in its own right.

I had a great first long ride on my singlespeed, and think I'm beginning to see what my friends love about it so much.

And today, my arms are so tired.

As of Saturday, the Autumn weather has turned into what it's supposed to be. In the morning you need to ride in tights and long sleeves, but in the afternoon, it's just warm enough to ride in shorts and short sleeves, provided you keep up the pace. The sun's bright; the sky's clear. There are dozens of hang gliders and paragliders in the air off the point of the mountain (I've got to try that some day).

To cap it all off, Tuesday a group of us -- Kenny, Gary, Dug, Brad, Rocky, the three Richards, BotchedExperiment, and I are going to ride Gooseberry Mesa, a serious contender for one of the top 10 trails in Utah, and therefore one of the top 20 in the US.

In short, my mood is as good now as it was bad last Friday. Maybe that's why, as I rode to work Saturday (got a big project due Friday; if I'm going to take Tuesday off, I had to put in some weekend hours -- a reasonable trade), I noticed all kinds of things I love about riding my bike.

Little stuff. Stuff I normally don't even think about, but which I'm pretty confident anyone who rides knows what I'm talking about.

• Catching up with a car at successive lights. Off the green, you're the first person, until maybe just a few feet past the intersection. Then you get swept up and passed by traffic. But wait a second, there's the next light, and it's red. You ride past everyone who just passed you, back up to the front, getting there just long enough to trackstand for three seconds (which is about as long as I can hold a trackstand) and you are once again the first guy, in front of the same group of cars.
• Having someone wave from a car. For every jerk who honks or swerves, trying to unnerve me, I'll bet there are ten people in cars who wave, or -- once in a while -- yell some encouragement (I can never tell what they're saying). And you know, only about half of those cars have bike racks on them.
• Carving a fast left turn. A good supple road tire on a good road bike on a good road can lean at crazy angles at crazy speeds. I get every bit as much of an adrenaline rush from hitting a left turn at speed -- no brakes -- and coming out of the turn as fast as I went in as I do successfully cleaning a technical move on my mountain bike.
• Drip. Riding in a nice, straight line on a road bike, sometimes it's nice to just put your head down and focus on the effort. As I do this, the sweat runs down from my forehead to the tip of my nose, and then drips, regular as clockwork. I like watching that drop of water fall to the left of my top tube (I've never thought about it before, but for me it's always the left of the top tube), thinking about how cool it is that because the water's going the same speed as me, it looks like it's falling straight down. Then it hits the pavement and -- zing! -- seems to shoot backward as it stops and I keep going.
• Fresh, smooth pavement. I rarely think about the texture of the pavement I'm riding on unless it's especially bad. When Kenny and I rode the Nebo Loop a few weeks ago, though, we hit a five mile stretch of brand new pavement that was just elegant. It was so smooth your riding effort dropped perceptibly while riding it. I notched it up a gear and looked at my speedometer: 27mph. The speed and silence of a well-tuned road bike on perfect pavement is something to be savored. 
• Being 90% up a hard climb. I seek out rides with climbs, whether I'm on a road or mountain bike. I've often wondered, though, why I do this. These climbs hurt, after all. Last Saturday, though, as I came to the final stretch of the north side of the Suncrest climb, it hit me: I love the last 10% of a climb, where I know I'm going to finish, and feel like I can open it up and put my heart into the final push. It's strange how it both hurts like crazy and feels like victory, at the same time.
• Putting the bottle away perfectly. You're in a paceline -- or maybe you're by yourself, but thinking about the next time you're going to be in a paceline. You want a drink. You grab the bottle without looking -- while still pedaling. That's easy. Then, you put it away. Again, without looking, you push the bottle back toward its cage. Most times it kind of hits the rim of the cage and you've got to nudge it left or right a little bit to seat it. Once in a while, though, it just sinks right down the middle, as if it had been vacuumed in. Nothing but net.

There are more little things -- lots more -- to love about biking.

Tell me what they are.

I've mentioned before: Autumn is my favorite time of the year. I love when the weather cools off, so I can ride in the middle of the day without bursting into flames. I love being able to leverage the fitness I've earned during the season into fun, long rides in the mountains. I love the way the trees change color. I love the way most people don't realize that this is the best year to ride a bike -- whether mountain bike or road bike -- and have left the roads and trails empty, so that those of us who know this secret have it all to ourselves.

In short, I love Autumn.

Except this year. This year (so far, at least), there has been no Autumn. We went straight from Summer into Winter.

(Not) A Nice Day for a Ride
Take last Saturday, for example. Excited by the thought of beautiful colors in the canyon and the dusting of snow I saw on the peaks of the nearby mountains, I put on a pair of tights, a long-sleeved jersey, wool socks, and windproof gloves, and headed out on my roadbike. I figured it would be a great day to ride the Alpine Loop, and maybe touch snow for the first time in the year.

Yeah, I touched snow all right. About 2/3 of the way up, it started raining and blowing. And then, as I hit 7000 feet (yes, exactly 7000 feet, according to my GPS's altimeter; weird, huh?) the rain turned to snow. Within five minutes, the snow started sticking to the road. My mind's eye quickly conjured what it would be like to descend this road with rock-hard road tires when the road was covered with a thin layer of wet slush.

I stopped, made a tiny snowball, ate it, and turned around. I felt cheated, not getting to ride to the summit.

Luckily, the snow stopped (turning back to rain) as I dropped below 7000 feet. Unluckily, the rain soon turned to hail.

You know what hurts? Getting pelted in the face by hail when you're rolling along at 40mph.

I should point out: last Saturday, it was still technically Summer.

My Bikes are Warm and Dry
At least I got to ride my bike to work on Monday -- it was cold, but it's easy enough to dress against cold. And Tuesday, I got to go on a nice singlespeed mountain bike ride with Gary and Rick Sunderlage (not his real name).

Every other day, though, the weather's been crummy. Cold, wet, dark. Blech.

In short, it's Winter-like here. I haven't been on a bike in three days, counting today. Oh, sure, I could get out and ride if I wanted to be hardcore about it, but the point of Autumn is that it's the exact opposite of hardcore. I'm supposed to be having the fun, mellow, beautiful, mild, cool rides I've been dreaming about during the blast-furnace season we call Summer. Not this cold, wet, dark, snow, slush drizzle stuff where you can go out and ride if you're in the mood to be punished or tell other people how "not that bad" it was afterward.

I am not ready for this.

Can you tell that I'm getting a little grouchy? Someone, please get Ma Nature on the horn and let her know that if this isn't corrected soon, she's going to hear from my people.

I'm getting grouchy. I want to go ride. No, strike that. I need to go ride.

PS: Dug Goes Sledding
At 8am this morning, I drove (grrrrr) to work, crossing over the Suncrest climb at about 8:10. It was just starting to snow.

Around 9am, Dug left his home at Suncrest to head to work. Here's what he said happened:

We have several inches of snow here. As I descended the topmost hill at Suncrest, about a 15% grade, I slid downhill, off road, and drove down a drainage ditch for about 100 yards, trying to avoid the stalled cars coming up the hill. I had no control and bounced through the ditch like Bo and Luke Duke, knocking over about 4 reflector poles. I totally expected to roll, driving at 45 degree angle, in the ditch, bouncing off small trees, sewer grates, and big rocks. Finally, I got enough control to drive out of the ditch.

I decided to pack it in, and work from home. Welcome to Utah.

I have, in times past, talked about how I never ride with an iPod. How I intended to never ride with an iPod. How I simply did not comprehend why anyone would want to ride with an iPod.

This was before I got an iPod.

Since then, I have reversed myself. Hey, I'm willing to admit when I'm wrong. And -- luckily for you -- I have quickly become one of the world's foremost authorities on proper bike / iPod use and etiquette.

Hence, today I present a clear and simple set of rules and guidelines on the proper way to use your iPod whilst on a bicycle.

Where to Put Your iPod
To simply say you should put your iPod in your jersey pocket is to be both insipid and asinine (By the way, I was once called this very thing -- insipid and asinine -- on a call-in religious program on the radio. Considering that I had called in pretending to have a serious question and then started quoting Frank Zappa lyrics once I got on the air, I daresay it was a pretty accurate assessment. Hey, I was 15.). After all, you've got to consider which jersey pocket. And you've got to consider the possibility of a messenger bag or backpack.

Hence, these guidelines:

• If you're wearing a jersey and no pack: the iPod goes into the pocket of your "bad" hand. Ie, if you're right handed, the iPod goes in your left pocket. If you're left handed, the iPod goes in your right pocket. That way, when you go to adjust volume or skip songs, you've still got your better hand controlling the bike. It's a matter of priorities.
• If you're wearing a pack: the iPod goes in the pack. Find a playlist you can live with for the whole ride (or shuffle, or whatever), put the iPod on "hold" so it doesn't switch off or randomly skip and volume-adjust on you, and go. Stopping your bike to fish around in your pack so you can change songs or move to another playlist is strictly forbidden.
• If you're neither wearing a pack nor wearing a jersey: Start wearing a jersey, for crying out loud. You're a sweaty, stinky mess in that t-shirt, and you've got no viable place to put the iPod. And don't start telling me that the armband thingy works, because it just looks dumb. Stop it.

What Headphones to Use
There are two kinds of ears in this world: ears that work with the cheap, tinny cheesy earbuds that come with an iPod, and those that don't. I have seen people who seem to have custom-designed ear flanges into which the iPod earbuds nestle comfortably. My ears are of the latter sort, which means that the included earbuds fall out of my ears constantly. Indeed, I believe my ears actually repel the earbuds. It's as if the earbuds are magnetized to the positive pole, and my ears are, too.

For people whose ears do not work with the standard earbuds but who are loathe to get expensive surgery to make them do so, I recommend the Sennheiser MX75 Twist-To-Fit In-Ear Stereo Sport Headphones. Basically, these suckers cam into your earlobes, so that special machinery is required if you ever want to extract them again. But they don't pop out while you're riding. I really wish they weren't acid green, though. 

When to Sing Along With Your iPod
When Billy Idol's "White Wedding" comes on, you're going to want to sing along. Or at least you're going to want to sing along if you're me. Which I am.

And that's fine (to sing along, I mean, not to be me, although I further assert that it's OK for me to be me), provided you observe the following rules:

• There must be no buildings visible in any direction
• There must be no people visible in any direction
• There must be no easily-startled livestock in any direction
• If you are riding with another person (or worse, with multiple people), you must make it clear that you are either singing for comic effect or that you understand you are a goober.

Note that the above rules do not apply if you are going faster than 30mph. At that speed, the wind whips your voice away, effectively putting you in an isolated, soundproof chamber in which it is OK to sing your heart out. At speeds of 50mph or greater, it's in fact a good idea to sing, because it will lend you courage.

Exception 1: Males cannot sing along with any female vocalists, ever. And especially not in a falsetto. Show some dignity, man.

Exception 2: Nobody at all ever gets to sing along with Whitney Houston. Or with Celine Dion. You may, in fact, wish to have these artists removed from your playlist, because they suck very badly.

When to Leave Your iPod at Home
Is it always appropriate to bring your iPod on a ride? No.

• When You're Racing: If you need music to keep you entertained and engaged while racing, you're not racing hard enough. And you're not able to hear me yell "on your left!" as I rip by you at roughly twice your speed because you are twiddling with your volume control. Leave it at home, pal.
• When You're Riding with One Other Person: To bring an iPod when you're riding with one other person is just rude. I mean, I'm taking time out of my valuable day to ride with you, riding at roughly half my normal speed so you can keep up, and you're listening to music, making it impossible for you to hear the very interesting stories I have to tell. What, precisely, is the point of us riding together, might I ask?

The Two-Pause Rule
If you are wearing your iPod and someone you are riding with starts talking to you, you are obligated to press pause. As a courtesy, the person who is talking with you is obligated to start over so you can hear what s/he has to say.

If, two minutes later, someone (doesn't matter who) starts talking to you again, you should be aware that this is a chatty group of riders and it's time to turn off your iPod for the rest of the ride. The person who is talking to you has the obligation to start over so you can hear her/him, but s/he does have the right to roll her/his eyes.

If a rider has to start over while talking to you a third time on a ride, s/he has the right to yank the headphones out of your ears and throttle you with them.

The Oblivious Rider Rule
If you either cause a wreck or nearly cause a wreck in a group because you were wrapped in your own little world of audio and couldn't hear warnings or traffic, the only way you can hope to save face is to immediately crush your iPod as a sign of contrition, then never ever show up at a group ride with an iPod again.

Additional Rules
While I am the final authority on the rules of riding with an iPod, I am not an unreasonable despot. I therefore welcome your suggestions for additional iPod / cycling rules to be integrated -- at my discretion -- into the final draft of this document, which every cyclist shall be required to memorize, as well as carry a copy on a laminated card.

PS: What to Buy Me
You know, people often say to me, "Fatty, your blog has brought untold joy into my life. I really wish I could somehow give you a gift, as a token of my appreciation." Well, you can. I really want the new iPod Shuffle. I think it would clip onto the front zipper of a jersey beautifully.

Of course, I only need one of these. Well, OK, really I need two, because my wife wants one, too. But once a couple of you have bought me these, the rest of you are going to feel left out. Don't feel bad, though. You can always send me iTunes Gift Certificates (send them to eldennelson@hotmail.com, please).

I shall now go sit in front of my computer, watching as the gifts pour in, as I'm sure they most certainly will.

An interesting thing happened when Floyd Landis went from Ultra-Hero to SuperGoat after the 2006 Tour de France:

I stopped caring about pro cycling.

No, it wasn't an act of defiance, or a boycott, or a statement. I just really stopped caring. I stopped following the races, stopped wondering about who would be transferring to which team, stopped reading about all the doping scandals.

I just lost interest.

Why did I lose interest? I think it has to do with why I also don't follow pro baseball, football, basketball, or any other sport: I've got nothing in common with the players. They're living in such a different world, with such completely different motivation for doing what they do, that I just don't relate to them. Which is to say, I used to think that pro cyclists and I had a lot in common -- hey, we're just the same, except you're 20x faster than I -- but it turns out I was wrong.

The Vuelta Thus Far
And so, with my newfound apathy toward the pro side of cycling, I have completely failed to follow the Vuelta. I have a sneaking suspicion I'm not alone in this.

And you know what? That's just not fair. I shouldn't take my malaise out on what is, after all, a Grand Tour. Never mind that the most recent winners of all three of the Grand Tours have been implicated in doping scandals (Heras, Basso, Landis), making it so you never really know who won what anymore. It's still a great race.

So, as a public service to all my readers who have neglected the Vuelta, I have gone back and thoroughly researched this year's Vuelta. I hereby provide the following recap, so you can be more diligent in following this exciting race to its exciting conclusion:

• Carlos Sastre started out with the leader's jersey, then gave it to Thor.
• Thor held onto it for a couple days, until the race turned uphill. Then Danilo Di Luca got it. Then Thor got a stage win -- finally -- but didn't get the leader's jersey back. Sorry, Thor.
• Alejandro Valverde won a stage, and some kid from Slovakia who's evidently Discovery's great new Grand Tour hope -- now that everyone realizes George Hincapie isn't -- but who I have never heard of before now, took the leader jersey.
• The leader's jersey is a delightful golden color, which is also known as "yellow."
• Hey, Vino won stage 8. Awesome.
• Hey, Vino won stage 9, too. That's also awesome. You know, now I wish I'd have been paying more attention. I think I could get behind this Vino character. Until I find out he's doping, anyway.
• By stage 10, Valverde's in gold. Gold, baby. Gold. He might've been in it before stage 10, but I can't be sure. He stays in gold until stage 16. That's a long time in gold.
• On stage 14, David Millar won a stage, which either proves he can win clean. Or that he's better at cheating now.
• On stage 17, Tom Danielson -- Discovery's other Grand Tour hope -- won the stage and Vinokourov took the leader's jersey. Hey, nice work, Vino.
• On stage 18, Vinokourov extended his lead by a smidgen, and today, everyone stayed put.

So there, now you're up to speed. I don't know about you, but I can hardly wait to follow this race more closely for the next several days. Except for during the weekend, during which I won't have time to post. Apart from that, check back here often for your daily Vuelta update!

Oh, it ends this Sunday? Okay, never mind.

An almost ridiculously special note from Fatty: Since, last week, I made the last-minute decision to not do the Lotoja ride/race/doohickey, choosing instead to do a big mountain bike ride, it seemed appropriate that today I would post both Dug's writeup and mine, telling the tales of two distinctly different rides.

The problem is, I don't have much of a story to tell. Kenny, Brad, and I did 38 miles / 8000 feet of singletrack around the Alpine Loop. All of us were strong the whole day. Nobody bonked. Nobody crashed. The trail was in excellent condition. The weather was perfect and the changing colors of the mountain were beautiful.

The most amazing thing about this ride, actually, was that at two different places during the ride (once on the Ridge trail, and once on the Provo River trail) a couple of riders/Fat Cyclist readers recognized me, thanks to the fact that I was wearing my Reeses Peanut Butter Cup jersey. Which is, to tell the truth, too big for me nowadays, but it is bright orange, which is reassuring during hunting season around these parts.

The End. Of my story, anyway. But Dug's got himself a nice, long story, which has considerable drama in it. I planned to publish it, unmodified, for your reading pleasure, until I actually read it. Then it occurred to me: Dug likes to include obscure literary and pop-culture references. Dug likes to use subtext. Dug likes to use subtle literary devices.

In short, Dug's story needs some plain-English commentary, to make his meaning clear. Helpfully, I have done so, embedding my friendly and useful comments throughout his story.

You're welcome, Dug.

Dug's Lotoja Story
My story of Lotoja has two heroes, and I’m not one of them. [Note the dramatic tension immediately created in this story. Who are the heroes? Why doesn't Dug consider himself heroic? Did he do something contemptible? I must read more! -FC] Lemme esplain. No, there is too much, lemme sum up. [Surprisingly, Dug doesn't seem to realize that he could have simply backspaced over the "Lemme esplain" sentence, rather than retracting it. -FC]

It went like this:

1. I finished.
2. I finished faster than I expected to.
3. The weather was perfect.
4. If not for my brother in law, Rick S., I almost certainly would have quit half way.
5. Justin Jensen is the toughest cyclist I’ve ever met in my life. [Here, Dug employs a literary device known as "foreshadowing." Right now, we don't know who Justin Jensen is, nor why is the world's toughest cyclist, but we suspect that we will know by the end of the story. For now, we have to guess: will he demonstrate his ability to crush walnuts with his bare hands? Will he bench press 400 pounds at a rest stop? Will he wrestle a bear? Stay tuned and find out! -FC]

Lotoja is a road race, 206 miles and almost 8,000 feet of climbing, from Logan, UT, to Jackson Hole, WY. The first 50 miles or so are mostly flat, the next 50 or so cover three mountain passes, one after the other, and the last 100 miles are constantly rolling, with no passes or significant climbs. I don’t know if that adds up to 206 miles, and I don’t care. [Here, Dug is demonstrating that he is 1) not concerned with petty things like mileage; 2) world-weary and disaffected; 3) too lazy to go to the website to get his facts straight. -FC]

Of course, when I call Lotoja a race, that really only applies to about 10 guys. Just like at Leadville, or 24 Hours of Moab, the Boston Marathon, or whatever “race” you like to do, 90% of us are just riding to see what we can do. That goes double for Lotoja. As for me, I have a LifeList, a check list of things I want to do. Climbing Mt. Everest is NOT on the list. But Lotoja was. I have now crossed it off. [Am I the only one who wants to know what remains on that list? And why isn't Mt. Everest on it? What have you got against Mt. Everest, Dug? -FC]

I ride a lot with my brother in law Rick S., and with Elden. All of us signed up for Lotoja. Elden bowed out last week in favor of doing an epic mountain bike ride with Brad and Kenny, and, not least, in favor of not hanging out with me and Rick and our wives for 3 days while we got all cuddly. He chose wisely, I’m thinking. [Middle-aged people acting like newlyweds is gross. I wanted no part in this spectacle. And by "this spectacle," I am using a literary device called "foreshadowing." -FC]

Rick rides with a bunch of other guys who live nearby, some of whom have done Lotoja before. In fact, Rick, Adam, and Tony all finished last year when half the field dropped out due to a freak snowstorm. [Yes, it was actually snowing freaks. -FC] Justin drove support for them, and John rode Lotoja the year before. All of us started together at 6:54 am in Logan. All of these guys are younger than me, and faster than me. I fully expected to ride most of the day alone. [Hey, we all ride alone. Except if I'd have come along, you would have had me as company the whole day. "Make your choice," I said. "Me or your wife." Imagine my dismay when you chose her company to mine! -FC]

I don’t want to go on and on [Too late! -FC], so I’ll break this down into 3 easy parts.

Part One: This Is Fun! [Just in case anyone missed it, Dug is using that exclamation point ironically. -FC]
Lotoja starts a field of 1,000 racers, and we start in waves of 50 riders. The opening 35 miles run across table top flat farmland, shrouded in fog on back roads. Our group, the 5200s, started fast, and accelerated from there. On the other hand [What other hand? You haven't given me the first hand yet! -FC], when you’ve got 10 or 15 really antsy fast guys at the front of a 50 rider pack, sitting in is pleasant, and you feel invincible [More foreshadowing, this time at multiple levels. Is everyone in this pack truly invincible, or shall one or more fall? What shall be the cause of their presumed fall(s)? I am at the edge of my seat. Very nicely done. -FC]. We caught the wave ahead of us within half an hour, making our pack almost 100 strong, moving at a brisk ["Brisk?" There are around 25 million adjectives in the English language and you chose "brisk?" -FC] 25-30 mph.

So here’s the lesson for Part One: It’s really really (really really) hard to re-catch a large group moving fast when you stop to pee. I mean, REALLY hard [OK, I'll bite: How hard is it? -FC].

But we did. [Hey, I thought you were going to tell me how hard it is to catch a large group. I am disappointed. -FC]

We pulled into the first feed zone at 32 miles feeling fresh, spry, confident. My feelings of dread I had been experiencing all week began to fade. So go ahead and cue the creepy, ominous music already. [This is a variation of foreshadowing -- evidently the only literary device Dug's chosen to use today -- called "explicit foreshadowing," where the author doesn't just hint at what's to come, but actually comes out and says, "here's a hint that something's coming up." And about time, too. -FC]

Part Two: This Really (Really Really) Sucks
Somewhere around mile 40 the route began to roll, and roll up more than it rolled down. And sometime before the road really started pointing up, many of us stopped for another pee break. This time Justin and I got caught with a little too much liquid in us, and our proverbial, um, items in our proverbial hands, and the chase back was fairly intense. For a bit there, I thought I had seen the last of my friends. But Justin is a giant of a man (literally, he goes about 6’3’’ and easily over 200 lbs), and in the giant draft created by his slipstream, I managed to regain contact. Whew. [Say, that Justin guy is tough. I can hardly wait 'til he wrestles the bear! -FC]

Unfortunately, I regained contact just as we started the longest climb of the race.

Now, I’ll be the first to say, I’m half the man I used to be, and I’m old and under-prepared. But all I do is climb. I live at 6,000 feet, every ride I do has by definition at least 1500 feet of climbing, usually more like 4,000. [By "definition," Dug means "necessity," because he lives at the top of a mountain with a 1500-foot descent on one side and a 1700 foot descent on the other side. So every ride ends with one of those two climbs. Just thought I'd clear that up. -FC]

But as soon as the road tilted hard up (I first used my lowest gear, and not just any low gear, but a 27, at mile 53), I felt like I was dragging a loaded dogsled behind me. [This is a simile. Dug didn't really have a loaded dogsled behind him. He's just getting older and hasn't trained properly. Glad I could clear that up. -FC]

You would think during a race with a thousand participants in it, you could never be alone. Well, I climbed alone. [I think I've mentioned this before, but it bears repeating: we all ride alone. -FC] Long stretches of not seeing anybody. And once I headed down the backside, I descended alone, and even rode about 5-10 miles of valley alone before I got swept up in a very large group [OK, I'll bite, again: How large was it? -FC], where I could finally get some shelter. [Like a yurt? -FC]

As I rolled into the feed station between the first and second climbs, where Kim was waiting for me with chicken-and-stars-ready-to-eat soup and V-8 [Seriously, V8? Forget Justin. You're the toughest cyclist in the world if you could ride with V8 jostling around in your stomach. I'm getting queasy just considering the combination of soup and V8. -FC], I found Rick S. waiting for me. The S is for Saint. And Superman. [It occurs to me that if he was that great of a guy he would never have left you in the first place. -FC] I was grateful, and not for the last time [Hey, more foreshadowing! You've got a lot of foreshadows to live up to now, pal. -FC]. He had summited quite a ways ahead of the rest of the group, and let them roll on without him from the Montpelier feed station and waited for me. I’m getting all weepy just thinking about it.

Rick and I rode together over the second climb (not nearly as bad as the first, but still, kryptonite enough for me), and as we approached the third and final major climb, I realized that when Rick had described these climbs, he only talked about the final steep pitches. The climbs were really closer to 10-20 miles long, when you count the long, but relatively mild approaches. Telling me a 15-mile climb is really only 4 miles long, just because only the last 4 miles are over 8% is like that guy in Poltergeist who moves a cemetery, but only moves the headstones. Very bad things are bound to happen. [I'll bet you weren't thinking those "superman/saint" things about Rick Sunderlage (not his real name) at this point, were you? -FC]

I’m pretty sure I was passed by over 50 people on the climb to Salt Creek Pass. And I’m also pretty sure the only two reasons I reached the summit alive are:

First: When Kim and Rachelle (Rick S’s wife) drove by me on the way to the top, Kim was hanging out of the passenger side window screaming encouragement. Remember that scene from The Sure Thing, when Daphne Zuniga gets a citation for driving with the load not properly tied down? It was like that. Thanks babe. [So, does your wife know you wrote a story for my thousands of readers that includes a mention of her baring her breasts? -FC]

And second, yup, again, Rick S. was waiting for me at the top. Had he not been there, I am certain I would have ridden straight for the car and gotten in, leaving my bike in the road. I wanted out of the Tunnel of Pain. But how could I quit when Rick had let the group go ahead once again in order to shepherd me onward? [OK, I'm not going to poke fun here, because we're starting to get to some pretty darn good storytelling. -FC] (Not to mention Kim risking prosecution for her moving violation).

I was at mile 110 in a 206 mile race, completely cooked, and, coincidentally, already farther in one day than I had ever been on a road bike [Dug is using "coincidentally" ironically here, folks. He realizes there's no coincidence. -FC]. Ever.

But the next 94 miles were flat or rolling. And with Superman pacing me, anything was possible [I know that you were using Superman as a metaphor for Rick Sunderlage (not his real name), but it occurs to me: I wouldn't want to ride with the real Superman. His cape would always be snapping behind him, making it hard to draft. -FC] So, once more into the breach, dear friends, we few, we happy few, we band of brothers. [Readers: This is the second movie reference that I'm aware of, and we can assume that there are more to come. It's best to just pretend they aren't happening. Above all, don't encourage him, or he'll just do more. -FC]

Part Three: Gonna Make It
So we did about 50 miles of very fast flat and rolling terrain, until we were finally maybe a mile or so from the final feed zone in Alpine Junction. All I’m thinking is that I have one more chance to suck down some ready to eat soup, another V-8, and load up on another raft of Shot Blocks. And suddenly, everything changed. We came upon the other four guys we started with on the side of the road, Justin bleeding badly from his elbow, someone holding his bike, on which one side of the handlebar was dangling from the bar tape at the bend. [Holy crap. -FC]

Riding in a large fast group has its downside. The speed does not really remain constant, despite everyone’s best intentions, and so if you don’t pay attention, even for a second, and you touch wheels, um, well, that’s bad. [Yeah. Really bad. -FC]

Earlier in the race, before the big climbing, on a slight uphill, someone in the front dropped their chain, and the resulting “chain” reaction was felt all the way to the back. I remember seeing one guy toward the back swerve sharply to the right to avoid the massive slowdown, and careen down the embankment and over the bars into a ditch. Life in the peloton. [You're going to get back to Justin eventually, right? -FC]

Now it was our turn. The slowing in the front came just as Justin reached for a bottle, and he crossed wheels with Adam. Justin went down hard, breaking his collarbone and handlebar. [Again I say: Holy crap. -FC] Tony, riding on Justin’s wheel, ran right into Justin, and fell hard on him and his bike, but was miraculously uninjured. [Perhaps because he just landed on a 200-lb guy, instead of on the road? -FC]

Of course, Justin’s race was over, and he got in the car with his wife to meet us at the finish. [Naturally. -FC]

Oh, wait, nevermind, that’s not what happened. Justin put his bike in the small ring up front, hardest gear in back (since there was no way to shift while riding, what with the handlebar dangling by bar tape), mounted up, and away we went. Seriously. 45 miles to go. [Well, whaddaya know. You weren't kidding about him being the toughest cyclist in the world. -FC]

Justin got two flat tires in Snake River Canyon, and we had to change his flats for him since his arm was hanging uselessly at his side. I tell you we changed his flats for him, not because it was a chore, but to underscore that HIS COLLARBONE WAS BROKEN IN TWO PLACES AND HE HAD NO SKIN ON HIS ELBOW. [I know I've said this before, but: holy crap. -FC]

The fact that I had lost (that loving feeling) every scrap of feeling in my taint and left hand became less and less important. The fact that every time the road tilted upward I struggled to remain in contact with the guy with the broken collarbone was simply spurious. I had spent the day riding with Superman (Rick S.), and now, apparently, Batman decided to make an appearance. I am a boy among men. [Now how am I supposed to tease you when you're teasing yourself? -FC]

As we passed Jackson Hole and made our way across the 12 flat, easy miles to Teton Village and the finish line, I’m pretty sure Justin started going into shock. But after 11 hours in the saddle, and the finish line so close you could hear the crowds, there was no way in hell he wasn’t crossing with all of us together. He scrapped and clawed, and we all rode across the line together, in just over 11 hours. Kim and Rachelle had arranged to have Dominos Pizza waiting for us. Kim, I love you babe. I now revise my count, FOUR heroes that day, Kim, Rachelle, Rick S, and Justin. [You've got one warped scale for heroism, man. Either crash out hard and finish the race anyway, wait for you at the top of sundry mountains, or bare your breasts and buy a pizza? -FC]

And Now?
Well, now I can cross Lotoja off my LifeList. Done and done.

You know, I am tired, but I am not beat up in the way a Leadville beats you up (with apologies to Justin and that guy who went down into the ditch). I can walk normally, I actually want to ride my bike this week.

One thing though. I love Shot Blocks and all, they probably saved my life. But I’m pretty sure this morning, I excreted an entire, whole Shot Block, intact [You're supposed to chew them. -FC]. You’ll be happy to know I let sleeping dogs lie. [Um. Ew. -FC]

A word of caution from Fatty: I'm not at all certain that this kind of post belongs in a goofy cycling humor blog, but it's what I want to write today. For what it's worth, there is a part about biking, so this story isn't entirely out of context here. Of course, I understand you may be coming to Fat Cyclist for relief from today's 9/11 media inundation, in which case I recommend reading Review of Several Items I Recently Purchased from the Hammacher Schlemmer Catalog, which I just posted in the Random Reviewer blog.

A Progressively Bad Drive to the Airport
Back in 2001, I worked at Fawcette Technical Communications. I lived in Orem, UT, but made frequent trips to Seattle to meet with Microsoft. On September 11, I was driving to the airport for just such a trip, listening to the morning show on an alternative music radio station. I had only gone a mile or so -- I wasn't even on the freeway yet -- when the DJ said a twin-prop airplane had hit the WTC.

That barely registered with me. I don't think I thought anything more than, "Stupid pilot," and continued on.

Then, during the next traffic report, the woman said a second plane had hit the WTC. "We already talked about that," said the DJ, thinking she had her story mixed up -- there was no way two separate planes had hit two separate towers.

They finished the traffic report and then went on to their "Really Stupid News" segment.

I changed the channel, surfing for a real news station on the radio. Turns out there wasn't anyone with a better idea of what was going on. Lots of conflicting reports, lots of confusion.

So I finished my drive to the airport.

At the Airport
By the time I arrived at the airport, parked, checked in, and found my gate, it was obvious that something was going on, though I had no idea what. Flights were being delayed, but not -- technically -- canceled. Everyone was standing around the TV monitor at an airport bar, transfixed.

And that's where I saw Dug. He also worked for Fawcette, was also scheduled to travel that day, from the adjoining gate.

So at least I was standing by someone I knew when I saw the first tower collapse.

I called my wife, who I knew for sure would not be watching the news at that moment -- eight months pregnant with twins and getting two boys ready for school, she'd have her hands full with other things. "Turn on the TV," I said. "Doesn't matter which station."

I went to the gate counter to confirm what I assumed was obvious: flights would be canceled for the time being. I was behind a woman who was completely panicked -- she was demanding a refund immediately; she was never going to fly again, she had to get out of there. I remember feeling bad for her, but also a little bit amused. If my flight had been available, I would have gotten on without concern.

Things hadn't really sunk in, yet.

Back Home
I drove home, switching radio channels. Now they were all talking about what was going on, but the quantity of misinformation was incredible. Cars were exploding. The White House was on fire. No, the White House wasn't on fire, but something in DC was. Another plane had crashed, this time into a field.

I got home, and my wife was crying, watching the towers collapse, over and over. Watching the smoking hole in the Pentagon. Wondering what the deal was with the plane crashed in the field. Wondering what was coming next.

We watched for a couple hours, then I said I may as well go to work; we weren't going to learn anything else. I got there, and an hour or so later, Dug got there too. Like me, I think, he didn't have the stomach to watch any more.

Of course, neither of us got anything done. We either surfed for news -- I remember that news sites were slow because of being overwhelmed with traffic -- or talked about what we knew. Which wasn't much.

Get Away
Eventually, I had had enough. "How about we leave early and go ride Timpooneke," one of us suggested -- I don't remember which of us it was, but it sounded good. Of course, we channel-surfed the radio as we drove toward the mountain. Of course, we didn't learn anything new.

We got to the parking lot, got dressed, and got our bikes ready without saying much of anything. Then we started the four-mile dirt road climb.

And I started feeling better. Somehow, getting away from the media, being in the mountain, on a mountain bike, on a beautiful late-Summer day, helped things. I started going faster. Dug did too. I don't think we were racing, but we were both going for it.

By the time we got to the top, I felt clear again. I hadn't forgotten what was going on, but I no longer felt like I was in shock.

The descent down the Timpooneke singletrack requires your full attention. Hairpin turns come out of nowhere. Waterbars surprise you. You've got to descend through gauntlets of loose, fist-sized rocks.

It was just what I needed. Forty minutes of insanely good singletrack downhill, punctuated by three gut-bustingly-difficult climbs, is a good reminder that life is good. When Dug and I got back to the parking lot, we were both smiling.

We put away our bikes and started driving home. I didn't turn on the radio, and Dug didn't ask me to.