Eric Porter has been a pro mountain biker for the better part of 20 years.
He’s always riding a fresh bike with fresh gear, and traveling to incredible destinations.
He even has the dream backyard, nestled in a picturesque valley in Utah.
But despite this dream that Eric is living, his garage is a wreck.
Sure the view from it is incredible, but the only thing incredible about the inside is
just how much crap Eric has crammed in there.
And it’s not very organized.
I suspect that Drama takes more care in organizing his toy box than Eric does putting away his
things after a long trip.
He has a busy travel schedule, lots of hobbies, and a family all taking priority over this
garage.
But as a professional Eric needs to actually work on his bike in this space.
And that’s why I’m here this weekend.
We’re dragging everything out of Eric’s garage, hitting the drawing board, and then
hopefully, building a functional and attractive workshop—in under three days.
And it needs to hold what’s left of this stuff after we’re done sorting it.
Eric talking.
As we go through all this debris it’s becoming clear that Eric has some hoarding tendencies.
<y philosophy is that if you haven’t gone looking for something lately, you might not
need it.
But unlike a true hoarder, totally resistant to logic, Eric is very willing to retrain
himself to prioritize this space over the stuff in it.
Staying organized is all about finding a home for everything, and if something doesn’t
have a home, you need to either make one, or get rid of said thing.
Working late into Friday night, we were able to clear most of the garage out so we could
start bright and early on real projects.
Project number one is snack shelf, where Eric inventories all his bike fuel.
I’m working on a way to make it easier to access, and easier on the eyes.
Meanwhile, Eric is working on the corner by the wood burning stove.
While this stove is great during the winter, it heats up too much to use the surrounding
area for storage.
So we’re finishing the wall in galvanized sheet metal to turn the area into a kind of
backdrop and display case.
The wood burning stove will just stand there looking cool, while the shelf above will be
used for mementoes and trinkets that would have otherwise lived out their days in a heap.
With a very light spray of black paint, the metal will look raw and “garagy” without
being too reflective for video and photography.
Meanwhile I fit the snack station with angled shelves to make Eric’s cliff bar assortment
easier to get to.
It’s now possible to keep more boxes open and accessible, while the area behind the
shelves can be used for additional storage.
But this snack station and display area are basically side projects.
The main task at hand is Eric’s work bench.
In any shop, the work bench is where the magic happens.
So aside from clearing it off and making it functional again, we need to turn this bench
into something impressive.
To clear up the area below the bench I built a shelf which will contain wooden crates.
On the left side, I installed retractable spools for his air hose and power cord to
keep them neatly tucked away.
But making this bench more spacious and functional isn’t that impressive.
For it to be fit for a pro, it has to look sick.
This bracket attached to Eric’s chainsaw is called an Alaska Mill, and we’re using
it to cut planks from raw timber.
As you can imagine, these planks look friggin’ awesome, which is why we’re using them for
the tool wall.
As Eric cuts the raw planks, I square them up.
First by cutting one edge straight, and then measuring off of that edge to make a the whole
thing rectangular.
This would be a lot easier with a table saw, but we didn’t come across one while clearing
out the garage.
But these planks don’t need to be perfect.
The inconsistent thickness and finish on the wood is kind of the look we’re going for.
As this bench comes together, I’m getting a lot of ideas for what my next garage could
look like.
But you can be sure we used this fun project as a tool for procrastination, as all that
crap we unloaded yesterday still needed to be organized into bins.
Like we already discussed, an organized and functional workspace should have a home for
everything, and sometimes that home is a bin.
Late into the night we sorted the contents of the garage and filled these bins to create
space for—space.
And whatever we couldn’t get done that night would be left for the third and final day—the
day where we’d hopefully finish this project and get to do some celebrating.
We started the day by planning for success.
The first project of the day was to replace these florescent fixtures with LED’s.
These are brighter, more efficient, and flicker free.
While filming in here, these will end up being a huge benefit.
Then, to get the tools up on the wall.
Like any tool wall this can be altered and rearranged, however I left it with a pretty
good mix of commonly used tools with everything else in the box to the right.
The hex wrenches are front and center, poking out of his live edge block for easy access.
Everything else is hanging on nails, which is low tech but more secure than the pegboard
that was once here.
With everything coming together, I could work on the other work bench—the Grom bench.
It’s complete with everything a kid needs to transform nuts into circles.
We even installed a PCS-12 mounted at kid height.
Eventually we’ll need to raise the height of the stand and include a more complete set
of tools, but for now this is a great place to start.
And not only will Eric’s two sons get to enjoy this garage with him, they’ll also
remember the weekend toiling in here.
We spent the better part of 40 hours over the course of three days, all to achieve a
goal.
Eric has a lot of cool stuff, but kids don’t always get to witness first hand, the blood
and sweat that goes into earning cool stuff.
This garage serves as a reminder.
By late afternoon on day three, we had our celebration in sight.
After 20 years of riding bikes professionally, Eric finally has a workspace truly fit for
a pro.
Now there’s a home for everything, easy access to air, electricity, and tools.
Eric’s entire family can now locate their gear, and easily put it away when they’re
through with it.
And it’s all in a place that feels good to spend time in.
With a few hours of sunlight left to work with, I decided to use this new shop to assemble
my bike.
Even though I’d need to take it back apart before my flight the next morning, we were
going to ride and celebrate at all any cost.
Eric’s yard was covered in snow only a week ago, and everyone riding that night had basically
cleared the cobwebs off their bikes before arriving.
They could have fooled me.
Last year we built this small double for Milo, and now Owen is clearing it on his ridiculously
small bike.
Come to think of it, Owen sends it on anything he can get his hands on.
Dustin attempted this 360 TRIPLE barspin I don’t know how many times, and it was a
spectacle just to watch him masterfully bail out of it.
But if you want to see him land it, keep an eye on his instagram.
Somehow I didn’t leave in an ambulance that night either.
Aside from hacking a few landings I was feeling really good.
So, it was time to settle the score with Eric’s back porch.
Smiles, food, and good times all around.
We had the successful project and celebration we had originally envisioned.
This weekend of hard work could have ended in rain, or an evening flight out of town,
but everything came together perfectly in the final hours.
The entire Porter family is really stoked for this new space, and it was sitting right
under their noses this whole time.
All it took was a mark on the calendar and little planning to get it done.
And hundreds of dollars worth of bins.
And maybe a few impulse buys like this saw.
But my point is that we all have something we’ve been putting off doing, and finally
committing to that task can be intimidating.
But the reward can be way worth it.
So what project are you going to dive into this Spring?
Thanks for riding with me today and I’ll see you next time.