Bike Fest 2009

Oslo Open 2009

In the end of May 2009 I went on a little road trip. The goal was to get to the annual Bike Fest in Trondheim and Oslo Open in the capitol of Norway Oslo! The events where held the same weekend, that is Bike Fest on Saturday and Oslo Open on Sunday. I arrived in Trondheim on Friday evening (which is about 1000km or 621 miles from my home) and attended the Bike fest on Saturday and then drove to Oslo on Saturday evening (which is about 550km or 342 miles) Enjoyed the Oslo Open bike gathering and the Norwegian Championship of Custom Bike Building, and then drove home on Sunday evening.. A trip to remember with loads of cool bikes, interesting people and many nice hours in the saddle ;o)

Friday Metal...

One of my favorite Thrash Metal bands of all times Sepultura with one of their best song from the 1991 Arise album! Enjoy!!

Big wheels...

In Iceland there is a long tradition in building 4x4 cars! The most known concept is “Arctic Trucks” which actually is a company specializing in rebuilding Toyota jeeps and pick-ups. The tradition in changing other kinds of cars is much older and goes way back to the seventies. Back then there were mostly US cars people chose. Now days they rebuild almost any kind of car from any country. And they use them to get in to the back country and on to the glaciers. Check out more of Arctic trucks and other 4x4 on youtube.com ;o)

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=jeppaferð&search_type=&aq=0

Friday Metal...

For the past two, three years Lamb of God has been one of my favorite bands! Last Wednesday I saw them live for the first time! They didn’t disappoint me at all! One of the best bands in Metal ever if you ask me! Not as many people at Centrum Scene in Oslo as there where at the Download Festival in England! I personally think it’s much more fun to see a band like Lamb Of God in a small theater with only 1500 people, than in a huge arena or at a festival with 10 or even 100 times more spectators! A great experience that that I can strongly recommend ;o)

Weekend fun...

This weekend I have been busy in the garage. My good friend Benn Peter came to visit and we did some finishing touches on his Sporty Bobber. I welded the exhaust (again) and he did some gas tank repair. We also did some serious drinking on Friday night which included some fine Cognac from a guy named “Hardy” and some Norwegian booze called “Gammel (dirty) Oppland” Akevitt ;o) On Saturday my buddy Helge dropped in for a few hours to work on his Panhead chopper. The pictures are taken with Benn’s unique photo setup. There is no Photoshop effects used to get the pictures this way only a digital Canon camera and a 60 year old Kodak camera!! Check out the equipment and some more unique photos from Benn at http://www.flickr.com/photos/bennpeter/

ATV Racing..

In the early 90s me and my twin brother started racing our ATV’s in the Icelandic Championship series. Well actually we started the series by convincing the Motocross championship comity to let us compete on the MX tracks. The events in those days where not sponsored and the level of security and other things where at minimum ;o) But it was fun and I can’t recall any accidents during this period. After a few years of racing most of the guys went riding off-road or MX bikes and the ATV series was dropped! A great period in our lives with many great people and lots of fun both on and off track!

Friday Metal...

Blood Red Throne from Kristansand her in Norway is one of the best Death Metal bands around. The guys are amazing artists and musicians! I went to see them for the first time in December 2009 and they blew me away! The band has been around for some 10 odd years now and they have 5 full studio albums out. The last one called “Souls Of Damnation” is an awesome album that every death metal fan with self respect should have in his or hers collection!
Find out more about Blood Red Throne here: http://www.myspace.com/bloodredthrone666

Euro bikes...

A few pictures, of bikes that I like, that have participated in the European Championship of Bike Building. I like the European style in bike building better than the American because they actually ride their bikes. (Not so many trailer queens over here ;o)
The Swedish style is always cool and I love the bikes “Greven” at Hogtech makes.
These pictures are from the 2006 and 2007 championship. All photos taken by one of Europe’s best motorcycle photographer Horst Rösler.

Snow bike fun...

Today I got a visit from two of my off-road riding buddies from Kristiansand.
They had converted their bikes in to snow-machines with belt and ski kit from Explorer. I was sceptic as usual and didn’t think this was any good! Well, as it turns out the converted bikes where a blast to ride and I haven’t had so much fun riding off-road bikes during winter in a long time… The Ski-Doo (snowmobile) didn’t stand a chance in the deep snow and the bikes handled amazingly easy with the conversion kit. I want one to! ;o)
Thanks to Paul and Ivar for a great day in the snow…

Friday Metal...

I saw Iced Earth and Tim ”Ripper” Owens at Sweden Rock Festival in 2004. He has an amazing voice and, as I have heard, a big ego! He got sacked from Iced Earth and is now singing with Ingwie Malmsteen!? Well what can I say about the Ripper… He’s a screamer ;o)

Forty-Eight...

I can’t say that I like everything the Harley factory is making these days! Many of the new Harleys are ugly as hell (the Rocker-C for instance is one of the ugliest bikes on the market today;o) But once in awhile the designers at H-D come up with something cool. And this time it’s a Sporty. I have always been a Sportster fan, and I was very disappointed when H-D decided to put rubber mounts on the Sportster engine and at the same time making the bike almost as heavy as a big twin! Anyhow I have to admit that the new Forty-Eight is one of the nicest looking Sportys to ever come out of the factory. It still has the bullshit rubber mount on the engine (which in my opinion takes away the Harley feel of the bike) but its cool looking and has lots of attitude!

The Champion....

Congratulations to Pål Anders Ullevålseter who came in 2nd place at the Dakar 2010 rally.
A great achievement from the Norwegian who has been competing in the Dakar rally for 8 years now. The Dakar rally is held in South America and not in Africa due to terror threats.
The riders drive through 9000 km (about 5600 miles) of though terrain in the Atacama Desert. With temperatures reaching 50 degrees Celsius during the day, this has not been an easy task for the Norwegian. The best part is that Ullevålseter is not a factory rider as the KTM factory thinks he is too old (41 years) to get a contract. Well next year he will hopefully win the race and proof them wrong!

Friday Metal...

Friday metal is back after a holiday break! Today’s video is from a band called Killswitch Engage. A band that I really like! I think they perform better live than on album. And I have seen them play this great cover song live ;o) This is a classic metal song from the godfather of metal Mr. Ronnie James Dio. Sadly I heard that Dio recently was hospitalized with stomach cancer. Sad news as he is one of the greatest and most genuine heroes of metal.. Hope you get better soon Ronnie and can make us happy with your music for many years to come! A great tribute from Killswitch Engage to a true hero!

Caveman....

What better way to start the New Year than with some pictures from the cave-gang from Trondheim! Those guys are the funniest bunch you can ever imagine! And some real good friends! They do not take things serious no matter what… Which’s one of the things I’m going to try to live up to in 2010! Life is funny if you want to;o) Happy New Year!!