WIMA Victoria: A Life on Two Wheels

A Life on Two Wheels

My first bike was an X7 Suzuki (GT250EX), a 250cc two-stroke road bike, which I purchased in 1981 because I needed a cheap form of transport. At the time I was living in Kyabram, where public transport is non-existent, and I was taking lifts to work with a gentleman of advanced years whose driving skills gave me a severe nervous twitch. People ask me how I liked my bike. I never liked it, I was in love from the very first time I sat on it. (I still own this bike, even though it now acts as a barricade to keep cattle from wandering into the shed.)

Not long after buying the X7 I found that it didn't satisfy my need for speed. As a consequence of my search for ways to make it go faster, I ended up at Winton Raceway with some friends who'd booked the circuit for the day to practice on their superbikes. The idea was that they would try different tuning techniques and then test out the X7 on the track to see if its performance improved. I couldn't bear to see someone else on my bike so they tuned it and I took it out on the track. I was immediately hooked: one lap and I was a 'road-racer'.

My formal introduction to racing was at Winton, and as I lined up on the grid for my first race I realised I didn't know how to do a clutch start (push-start), which was the starting method for production racers. Having jumped that hurdle, and roared off around the first corner, a gentle drizzle started to fall and for the first time in my life I experienced riding in the rain. I got to the last corner on the first lap before I fell off. Slippery stuff, water on greasy bitumen. Back in the pits, a new set of handlebars and clutch lever, and I was back on the track for the next race. It was fortunate for me that I came to racing not long after starting to ride, as I had a real penchant for speed and contest. It is far more appropriate to express these things on the race track than on public roads. If you love speed and hammering away at the limit—go racing. It is a huge adrenaline rush, and if you fall off there will be an ambulance at your assistance within moments. There will also be an audience of course, so everyone will be able to laugh at you, and help you.

At the time it was of no significance to me that I was one of very few women racing; I was racing a motorcycle, not expressing my gender or my sexuality. Of course, others were at pains to point out that I was unusual in terms of road-racers; one racer (a man) suggested that it was more dangerous for a woman to race because if there was a bad accident she might damage her baby-making bits. This was my awakening to feminist issues (thanks Tony). I raced the X7 and then an RG250 for about four years and regard these years as the most thoroughly exciting and adventurous of my history so far. With friends I travelled to Oran Park in NSW, to Winton, and to Mac Park at Mount Gambier in South Australia to race and to party.

After I decided to keep the X7 exclusively for the race track, I bought a GPZ550 for road use. When I sold the RG250 which I also raced, I bought a GSX1100ez. The GSX (called 'the Ox') stayed for six years and over 100,000kms. We rode all over Australia together. The Ox and I parted company in 1989 when I had to raise the money for a deposit on a house—I was getting too old to be sleeping in the shadow of a motorcycle, and the arthritis was starting to play up. Since then I have ridden dozens of new models as a perk of working in the trade, without the burdens of registration, insurance and other associated running costs. I have ridden and enjoyed mainly road bikes, and my ambition is to own a Yamaha V-Max. My current occupation as a farmer has me belting about the paddocks on a four-wheeler bike, a YFM350, big bags of fun!

Before turning my hand to farming, I'd been working in the motorcycle trade. I started in 1981, not long after starting racing. I had no idea about anything to do with motorcycles, but a friend in Kyabram who owned a bike shop wrote me a bullshit reference saying I had worked for him on Saturday mornings. I took this to Peter Stevens in Elizabeth Street and told them I was looking for an apprenticeship as a motorcycle mechanic, which was true. They had a position for a salesperson in accessories, i.e. helmets, boots, gloves, tyres, 4:1 exhausts, oils, gearsacks, tankbags, etc. I only knew what some of these things were, but I wasn't going to let that stop me. I determined that if I had a job with them then I could be first in line when an apprenticeship came up. So they took me on, probably because I was cheeky and determined. Three months later a position came up at their Dandenong store for someone to manage the accessories department. I went, and twelve months later I was still there. I started to learn the spare-parts side of the business at Dandenong and decided that was more interesting than spannering (which I could still learn about on my own bike—since I kept crashing on the track), or accessories sales. I have a natural pragmatic inclination to sort, organise and match, and those are necessary for spare-parts work. This was when the motorcycle trade started to computerise so I got in on the ground floor with computers. This became a highly portable skill which meant I could work pretty well anywhere I liked, which suited my gypsy nature.

I worked with Peter Stevens at different branches, at Monza Imports (Peter Stevens' wholesale arm), and in many other motorcycle-related businesses over the next sixteen years. I loved my time working 'in the trade' and made many valuable friends. The management at Peter Stevens always treated me well and I remain firm friends with one of the owners even though I have not worked there for some years now. It always amazed me that there were so few women working in the field, but I felt that I earned the respect I was shown by my workmates. Attitudes to female customers were sometimes perplexing: the usual stuff—women riders were classified according to their looks (or how they might look draped naked over a bike), and pillion passengers were derided by some. It seems a more professional attitude has developed recently and there is less condecension than when I first worked in Elizabeth Street. Perhaps that is a response to changing community attitudes and to the fact that many women now ride their own motorcycles or are the main purchasers of goods. I like to think that some of it is due to my merciless pursuit of male sales staff who behaved in a sexist fashion, but that is probably wishful thinking.

It is hard for me to step outside of my inside view of the trade and be objective about how women are treated by trade staff now. I can say that some traders now actively encourage women by their even-handed attitudes and if you are being discriminated against or patronised, change your dealer. It's your money, and if they are rude to you, they deserve to lose your business. You have options. Many more women work in the trade now; seek them out.

Liz Olle