Full-throttle queens

Updated

More than bikes, beer and a mechanical bull, Sheilas Shakedown is a lifeline for women who want to ride fast. Warning: this story contains some nudity.

Tracy Stuart cascades her long blonde hair over one shoulder and sluices the chrome tank of her Moto Guzzi V7 with soapy water.

It's like a scene straight out of a 1980s biker magazine — except the bike is hers.

The Castlemaine house behind her is stuffed with her biking paraphernalia — books, photos, a wall planner of the rallies and rides she'll attend, often with her husband Mark.

One of these events will be an experience like none other. Sheilas Shakedown, a women-only campout, is now in its third year and Tracy is nervous to be attending for the first time.

She wonders if she'll be the oldest there, but thinks the one-hour squirt to Ballan might be good for her daughter, Cassie.

"I try to drag her out as much as I can," she says. "She's quite shy."

Biker stereotypes busted

A bloke on a gleaming Harley on a weekend jaunt has long been dismissed as a midlife crisis. But if there's a common theme among the 250-odd women who will gather for Sheilas Shakedown, it's that buying a bike marked a new era of life.

For some, like Tracy, it's the kids leaving home. For others, it's a breakup or getting sober.

"It opens you up to amazing friendships," says Sheilas Shakedown organiser Remmi Aloni, 37.

"If you're going on long rides you've got each other's lives in your hands. It's such an adrenalin rush, which is something you share, so it's one of those almost out-of-this-world, spiritual experiences."

Remmi found biking at 32, through her then partner.

"He booked his licence and I was like, all right then, I'm getting MY licence. I took to it naturally and became a much stronger rider than him.

"I've been riding now for about five years and he's long gone.

Remmi says she missed female company when she started out.

"I'd go out on these rides and I was often the only woman there. And the thing is, men want to race each other, like almost to the death."

'Mum convinced me to go'

Tracy's daughter Cassie is also often the only woman in her bike club. So when women start to fill the Old Bike Shop Cafe in Brunswick before travelling in convoy to the campout, it's is a real eye opener for the 27 year old.

The Bundoora book-keeper isn't into the black-leather-and-tattoos look so much; her favoured biker jacket is hot pink.

"Mum convinced me to go," she says of the Shakedown. "I'm not a party animal; she'll fit in more than I do."

Many of the others belong to all-women groups like The Leatherettes or The Litas, the latter of whom have infiltrated 29 countries and organised the 78-kilometre convoy from Melbourne.

Harley rider Tali, 40, calls for everyone's attention. She works in law enforcement, and there's something unflappable about her.

She reassures the riders that there'll be a "tail-end Charlie" to make sure nobody gets left behind.

Tali says when she met Laura Deverell, her co-founder of the Melbourne Litas, she quickly sussed they had nothing in common.

But biking brings people together whatever their backgrounds.

"It's a respect thing."

Laura, 32, says motorcycling changed her life.

"I'm into punk rock and that whole scene revolves around partying," she says.

"I was so over it. I basically gave up drinking and got the motorbike as something to do.

"It's opened up a whole new world of meeting people and made me feel more confident."

Let the games begin

By noon, the spacious campgrounds of Phoenix Park are buzzing with girls doing circuits on choppers.

Revving motors echo around the site: it's time for the "Sheila-lympics".

In the sausage-on-stick game, pillion passengers must use their mouths to snare the dangling snag.

The egg-and-spoon race is more sedate, as it requires riders to crawl along — a skill in itself.

Hooning around the site is Kelli Tindal, 41, who rode from Bendigo on her 2011 Harley Blackline Softtail. Her Captain America pants are in honour of Peter Fonda's chopper tank in Easy Rider.

Kelli grew up begging her older brothers for rides on their dirt bikes, and by 18 had started riding with bikie clubs through her now ex-husband.

"We rode with outlaw clubs for about 15 years," she says.

"The only positive thing I took out of that community is learning what I want for myself and riding fast."

When women were allowed to ride, they were usually designated to the back of the pack.

"I would make sure I was at the front, and that's hard, fast riding," she says.

"One day I pulled up and a guy I'd flown past walked up, all chest puffed, and said, 'What do you think you're doing, overtaking me like that?'

"I said, 'If you rode faster I wouldn't be overtaking you, would I?'"

Kelli's looking forward to stripping off later to a cover of Cosmic Psychos' Nude Sheilas on Motorbikes Drinking Beer, which Melbourne band Würst Nürse will be playing.

"I've been with my new partner two years and he's really empowering," she says.

"My body image has totally transformed. With my ex I went to the gym four times a week and was going to get fake breasts, because that's the whole scene. It's a pretty niche way of thinking about women."

Her experience of riding with men is echoed by Kerry Payne, a 53-year-old bus driver who's getting a tattoo in memory of her mum.

She founded The Grab Pack (Girl Riders Around Ballarat) just before Christmas. It's already accumulated 40 members.

"Men just take off and they leave you — it's ego," she says laughing.

"We embrace women of all abilities. It's just about getting them on their bikes and feeling confident."

Outside, Kelli's mate Kate Prior is taking one of the event's more unusual vehicles for a spin.

"Kato" is a motorcycle postie, but she'd rather get around in her Ural Sahara motorcycle and sidecar.

They've been around since 1939, a military vehicle designed in the Soviet Union.

Her sons regularly fight over who'll ride in the sidecar and who'll ride pillion.

"They love the fact that people are waving and taking photos," says Kato.

Even her 74-year-old mother loves a go.

It was a big spend, but Kato weighed it up carefully.

"I thought, if I don't jump on this now the kids will be at an age where they say, 'Sorry Mum, I'm going to hang out with my mates'," she says.

"They're not going to remember what they got for their birthday but they'll remember all the cool adventures they had with me."

'I was about to throw it all in'

Over near the stage, demonstrations are taking place. Blacksmith Alice Garrett forges a knife out of a motorcycle chain.

Jakuarah Westin, 31, gives a mechanics workshop and is called upon for some emergency clutch surgery.

She's worked on cars and bikes since she was 16, but struggled with her apprenticeship and then work in an all-male dealership.

"I walked out of my apprenticeship and felt like I hadn't learnt anything because I never got to do the big, heavy jobs," she says.

"In my third year, I was about to throw it all in."

Working at the dealership, she dropped a brake rotor on her foot. Even though her foot was broken, she thought that if she made a fuss, she'd be singled out as a whinger who couldn't hack men's work.

Now she's got her own business, Ballarat's Full Throttle Mechanics, she reckons women are more comfortable going to her — and less worried they'll be taken advantage of.

What happens at Sheilas stays at Sheilas

Before sundown has even hit, the mechanical bull has been forsaken for the dance floor.

There's stage diving, nudity and much spilling of beer.

One older woman elaborately ties up another, who quietly carries on watching the band with her arms bound by her side.

The schedule lists events up to midnight, where it simply reads: "See what happens?"

The next morning, Tracy knows exactly what happened.

"I slept very lightly because the music turned off at 4am," she laughs.

She and Cassie preferred to lie in bed, browsing for Cassie's next bike on their phones.

But Sheilas Shakedown has given Tracy food for thought.

"We'd been noticing there's no young people at rallies anymore," Tracy says of her outings with her husband. "When Mark used to go in the '70s and '80s they were all his age. They're still all his age now.

"There are lots of derogatory theories floating around, like millennials wouldn't want to break a fingernail, but it was really reassuring to see there is a future for motorcycling and there are younger people wanting to get out there and get dirty."

Credits

Words: Jenny Valentish

Photos: Nicole Cleary

Editor: Annika Blau

Topics: women, motor-sports, lifestyle-and-leisure, human-interest, australia, ballan-3342, castlemaine-3450

First posted