As I've reported elsewhere on the forum, well known Bendigo vintage racer Noel Clarke is in the spinal clinic of Royal Melbourne Hospital after a nasty getoff a month ago. Sadly, Noel is now a quadriplegic with a break to his T3 vertabra and other severe injuries. Surgeons have fused his spinal vertabrae from T2 through T5 to protect the damaged area and Noel now faces a long, painful and
expensive recuperation period. I've spoken to Tony Clarke this morning and he reports that Noel is scooting around the ward in an electric wheelchair which nurses have had to have two of its 3 speeds blanked off to slow him down!
Noels attitude is reportedly extremely positive and being a Clarke you can bet that he's itching to get out of hospital to resume his life in as normal a way as his injuries will allow. One of the keys to Noels future being as active as possible is resting on his ability to get around. He's a shearing contractor with the need to have access to shearing sheds and other farm terrain. To do that he's going to need the best wheelchair available and that's where Klub Kevlar and Darren Hill come into the picture. Darren Hill (
E74 on this forum) is the Australian distributor for the amazing Levo wheelchair system. These chairs allow the owner to stand and live a far more active life than the simple bog standard chair (
see links below). As with most groundbreaking innovation, technology costs money which will put a hefty financial burden on the Clarke family. In an amazingly generous gesture, Darren has offered to provide Noel with a Levo C3 wheelchair for cost. That offers a considerable cost saving to the family but as I wrote, the chairs are cutting edge technology and therefore still very expensive. That's where Klub Kevlar comes in.
A number of us are good friends of Noel and even though he's in Victoria and we're in Sydney we felt that we had to do something. The first step was to bring Darren and Levo Australia on board and the next step is to set up a program of fund raising activities to enable the family to purchase the Levo wheelchair.
Our first effort will be a Show'n'Shine tentatively called the
Klub Kevlar Show'n'Shine, Noel Clarke Benefit that's to be held at the historic Alroy Tavern in Plumpton. The Alroy was chosen because it is set on a couple of acres of park like landscape, with ample area for displaying our vintage bikes and for it's close proximity to two M7 freeway offramps, making it foolproof to find. I've had meetings with Alroy management and they're extremely keen for us to hold the event and have committed to assisting with media promotion in the weeks leading up to the event and have kindly offered a $10 spit roast and free schooner deal to all entrants and will donate all meal profits to the cause.
The event is still in the planning stage as I write this but we plan to have awards for Best British, Best Japanese and Best Euro bikes as well as other awards yet to be formalised. We encourage as many vintage dirt bike enthusiasts to bring as many of their bikes as humanly possible to make the show as interesting and entertaining to the public as possible. We will be inviting the classic speedway club to display their speedway machinery and hope to involve as many of the vintage movements suppliers and small businesses as possible. We encourage club participation and will approach both HEAVEN and Penrith club to set up displays and recruitment tables. At present we're thinking about holding the show'n'shine on either November 7 or 15 depending on the pub booking and the ability to encourage as much participation as possible.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/29029178@N03/3344050834/One of the toughest things to do with our sport is to see a fallen comrade do it tough. I feel it's imperative that we rally together as a movement to assist one of our own who's entering into a difficult future. I implore the vintage movement to support this event and to dig deep into your pockets to help raise as much money as possible to assist in the purchase of the wheelchair. Klub Kevlar won't be happy until we've raised the readies to cover the costs. Please, support this event with both your participation and bikes and by donating as much as you can spare. A side bonus to all that get involved is that we'll also have a bloody great time. If you've got any good ideas or comments please let us know.........
http://ozvmx.com/community/index.php?topic=7427.0http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eFWByyp7F6s&feature=emailhttp://images.google.com.au/imgres?imgurl=http://www.levo.net.au/images/product-LEVO-C3-v1.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.levo.net.au/company-profile.html&usg=__ogJ4uBDeE95qx2scg7Ms3BgynaY=&h=422&w=337&sz=86&hl=en&start=5&um=1&tbnid=1P4kUBg0v0BW2M:&tbnh=126&tbnw=101&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dlevo%2Bc3%2Bwheelchair%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DG%26um%3D1
