I get soft & middle fat

For "get", I'm not using the vernacular meaning of "become", but instead the prescriptive definition: obtain or fetch. Yesterday I came home with a three inch wide tire, something I've been considering for some time. As forks on even hardtails, especially those with the slack head angles I prefer, gain more and more suspension travel, it becomes (not gets!) harder and harder to find rigid forks long enough to replace them, but I figured I could regain some of that height by using a huge tire up front.

It fits well inside the Carver fork,

 although for the first time, 

I had to angle a tire past the brake caliper.

I also like big tires. Years ago, one of the top three bike handlers that not just dropped me, but disappeared, on a descent, Chris (aka Hard Water Kiter) and I agreed that we'd take traction over suspension if given a choice. Chris isn't suspension phobic like I am, but we both felt we could ride faster with more grip versus any assistance suspension travel would offer. Big tires are great for traction!

Oh wow, I like it. I really like it. One of the last times I rode with Chris, he'd migrated to 27.5+ tires after being a long time hold out for 26 inch wheels, as I have been. After today's ride with a single 29x3.0 tire on the front of my bike, yup, I get it, although Chris is still not in any danger of me getting too much closer to him. (See, I can use that version of "get" too.) The traction is fantastic, and bonus, it slackens the bike's angles by 3/4 of a degree, and yeah, I gained about an inch of travel with how soft I can run a tire with that much volume.

Hard to say precisely, 

but looks it's single digits, 

with tubes!

In the 2.4 out back, I was at 17psi.

And bonus, arm recovery progress report:

I cleared this log!

No, it wasn't pretty.

But no, I didn't hit my chainring.

And a half mile later, 

I managed better on a similar height, 

without the uphill approach.