Meet Elton King and Brook James from Fitzroy Thumpers.
Join us for a ride with the dynamic duo behind the Fitzroy Thumpers, motorcycle repairers. In this latest episode of our Meet the Legends series we dive into Elton's and Brook's love for old dirt bikes and vintage cars. Discussing their journey from hobbyists to restorers, and the thrill of bringing life back to rusty relics. We also touch upon their adventures, beautifully documented through Brook's lens, and discuss how the legacy of the Hard Yakka brand has influenced their lives and work.
"Fitzroy Thumpers came about from building bikes, riding bikes, fixing bikes. Brook likes to ride things and break things which just keeps us super busy. We were super into old dirt bikes at the time and thought it could be fun to buy old bikes, fix them up and then document it all along the way."
"My favourite part about working on old bikes is when you first bring something home and you know it's got question marks around it, there's no better feeling than fixing something. Whether it's replacing a light globe because it's gone out and getting that instant satisfaction or getting the jumper cables out, taking it for a little bit of a ride down the street, that puts a smile on your face, makes the whole thing worthwhile every time. At the start of our journey we were just working on our own projects, then we had people drop their bikes around, we would just pull up the roller door, fix up a couple of things and then the workshop just started to snowball from there."
"We've certainly had some unforgettable adventures over the years. Brooksie was a real instigator into really documenting everything that we were doing. He's a great photographer so has been documenting our adventures along the way. We usually find older bikes and Thumpers on Gumtree or Facebook Marketplace. We drive out to the middle of nowhere, bring home these old dirty rust buckets to find out what we just wasted a thousand bucks on. It doesn't get any more exciting. My earliest memories around Hard Yakka is from my old man. He's a chippie, I don't actually think I've ever seen him not wearing a set of Hard Yakka overalls. At my birthdays or even at Christmas in an old dirty pair of khaki Hard Yakka overalls. It's been a part of my life as long as I can remember."
"Whether I'm out in the workshop, working on the bikes or recently we've been doing some house renovations and I can just throw on my Hard Yakka gear, do the work, clean them up, they just go the distance."
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