When Lee Benson heard the world was coming to his home state for the Olympics, his first thought was that someone better show them around and explain a few things right up front.
Who would tell them about the enigma known as Utah? Who would explain Mormons, the grid layout of our cities, the liquor laws or what the heck is that stink coming out of the lake? Who would tell them that the best place to get a burger in Salt Lake City is Hires, or that the best ski run is the west side of Jupiter Bowl in the afternoon? Who would tell them that if you're stuck in a downtown hotel looking for a jog in the mountains and woods, that it's just minutes away in City Creek Canyon. Who would tell them about the place without the cynicism, the defensiveness or the standard Jell-O joke?
"I decided I wanted to be the one," the Deseret News columnist said.
The result is "Lee Benson's Inside Guide to the Games," a 144-page, quick-read booklet (co-sponsored by the Deseret News and KSL-TV) that covers everything from where to get cheap food and deep powder without the lines, to why they call it "Heber," to where to park in Park City, augmented by maps, schedules and photos.
"I wrote this book because I wanted to read it," said Benson. "It had to be written by a native. You have to have lived here to tell someone about the place and what's really going on."
Benson is Utah through and through. He grew up on a small farm in Sandy, about where Larry Miller's office sits these days, served an LDS mission, attended Southern Utah University and BYU and took a job at the Deseret News, where he has written columns for two decades. He has lived, worked and played in the state for most of his 52 years.
"I thought it would be nice if people came to Utah and got a good impression, an honest impression," he said. "I mean, we're cool; people just don't know it. I wanted to be the one who explained it all. I can stand up and say what we are and aren't. I wanted to be the one who said what a Mormon was. Or where to go for fun. I wanted to do it instead of some press release that reads like a tract from the church or from some Gomer making jokes about Jell-O and clogging."
Aside from his desire to play the role of host for his home state, Benson had another motive: He wanted to explain the esoteric world of the winter sports that comprise the Olympics. Most of us are clueless when it comes to curling or Nordic combined and even, for that matter, figure skating. Benson, who has covered seven Olympic Games for the Deseret News and written five books about the Olympics, had to educate himself.
"I don't know where I first got the idea for this book, but it might have been Albertville in '92 when I had no idea where I should eat," Benson writes. ". . . The idea gained momentum in Lillehammer in 1994 when I watched a cross-country skiing and jumping competition called Nordic combined and came away thinking I'd just witnessed one of the world's best spectator events, even though going in I had no idea what was going on."
While covering the Games in Albertville, Benson discovered that the guy in the hotel room next to his was a CBS technician who had access to thick research books the network had compiled of facts about the events and the athletes, another impetus for the book.
"I thought, 'Wow, every journalist should have this,' " he said. "It was a big help."
As a result, Benson's Olympic guide is basically Cliffs notes for two subjects — Utah and the Winter Olympics. Let's face it, no one understands Winter Olympic sports anymore than they understand Utah. "I thought they fit together pretty well," said Benson. "Someone could come get this guidebook, and in a nutshell learn what the winter sports are about and what the host is about."
One caveat: The book is not officially licensed by the Olympic powers. Benson tried to get officially licensed but was denied. What does that mean? He couldn't put the O-word on the cover.
"It turned out to be for the best," said Benson. "I'm glad I'm not licensed. I didn't even want to be licensed, but I tried because I wanted the book to be sold in official places. I thought it would help sell books. But since the book is not official, I wasn't beholden to anyone. I could say the best cheeseburger is at Hire's. Or Tommy's in Provo. If you write for the powers-that-be, you're going to have to say the best cheeseburger is at McDonald's."
To keep the book an easy read, Benson, who wrote and researched with help from his son Eric and his twin brother Dee (the federal judge), maintained one standard for including information in the book. "It had to cause the reader to go, 'Hmmm, I didn't know that.' I just wanted it to be fun, not a social studies class," said Benson.
So in the section about the eight regions of Utah that will host Olympic events, did you know that . . .
— Al Capone once said Ogden was too wild for his tastes?
— Park City was included in travel guides to the nation's best ghost towns during the 1950s?
— Heber got its name because most of the people who settled there were from England and were converted to Mormonism by Heber C. Kimball? (Invited to give a speech at a ceremony in his honor, Kimball told the town, "Make sure you don't do anything to bring dishonor to my name?" said Benson. "People in Heber have been going around with a nervous twitch ever since.")
— Utah has the nation's highest birth rate, biggest household size and its highest literacy rate, and ranks 49th in death rate and poverty rate, and 50th in alcohol consumption?
— Utah's name comes from a Navajo word that means "People of the Mountains"?
— The best real American cheeseburgers near the Ogden/Snow Basin venue can be found in Huntsville, at the Shooting Star Saloon, the oldest bar in Utah? ("Eric and I tried them — in the name of research of course," said Benson.)
"We visited each area," said Benson. "We went to libraries and chambers of commerce. We talked to locals, bartenders, waiters, regular people. We asked them where the best restaurants were, where you went to get a steak or where the best cheap food was. We asked them what people did for fun. It took a lot of time, but the research was fun."
As for the Olympics, Benson compiled a sort of "Idiot's Guide" to the Olympic sports (if you think you're not an "idiot," just read this book). Did you know that . . .
— There are only three events in the entire Winter Olympics that you can determine the winner just by watching the finish line? They are Nordic combined, short-track skating and cross country pursuit; all other sports involve racing a clock or impressing a judge.
— The man who jumps the farthest isn't necessarily the winner in the ski-jumping event? An official goes to the hill the morning of the competition and measures the temperature of the snow and the velocity of the wind to determine the jumpers' starting point. The competition is designed so the top jumpers land at 120 meters (it's actually unsafe to jump beyond that point because the hill flattens from there). The jumpers are judged on distance, form in flight and landing.
— The axel is the only jump in figure skating that is executed with a forward takeoff? The others are all performed backward. On page 31, you'll find the Dick Button lexicon — explanations for terms such as Salchow, Lutz, toe loops and so forth.
— The reason you never see the fights in Olympic hockey competition that are common fare in the NHL is because it means a player is ejected for the next game? Since it's essentially a do-or-die tournament, players aren't willing to risk missing a game.
In the end, maybe the most surprising thing about the project for Benson was this: "To my knowledge, this has never been done for the Olympics before. Wish it had. I could've used it."
Editor's note: "Lee Benson's Inside Guide to the Games" will be sold in gift stores and bookstores beginning next month and are currently being sold at the Deseret News and KSL-TV offices.