Max Monk Collection
This is the saying that 76-year-old Max Monk lives and drives. It might as well have come from Bert Munro, who persisted for years with his old Indian motorcycle, turning it into the world's fastest Indian and a brilliant Hollywood movie.
Monk never competed with Munro, but he competed on the same beaches in New Zealand and witnessed the fame and glory of a headstrong backyard mechanic up close.
“Bert competed in club competitions, so I didn't compete with him. He was 60 at the time and I was only 20,” says Monk. "Even at 70, he was still surrounded by 19-year-old girls."
If Munro impressed the young 20-year-old apprentice mechanic from Canterbury, his ancient Indian motorcycle made an even bigger impression. “I've never seen anything like it,” he says. "He wouldn't be standing on wheels, wouldn't be spinning on a wheel, he would just disappear over the horizon."
So, Monk became like his comrade from the South and continued to use the old technique. Today he lives in Brisbane and drives a 1989i 900 Saab owned by one of his two daughters. “I bought it six years ago for $4500 and it has done 350,000 km on it,” he says. "Everything is going well, and I would not part with him."
He also owns a 1984 V500 Yamaha RZ4 V12 two-stroke motorcycle that he bought 3500 years ago for $10,000. “Now they cost about $XNUMX for a good one,” he says, though it’s clear he won’t part with them.
Monk smokes as much as his beloved Yamaha two-stroke, but the wiry seventy-year-old is still fit and riding. “I got into cycling before I left school, so I became a mechanic, but it’s hard to make a hobby your job,” he says.
"I started racing when I was 20. My mother didn't want me to do it, but she said I could ride on the beach because it looks soft." Little did his mother know that riders like Munro and Monk were doing more on these beaches than the old mob. Monk raced a Triumph Speed Twin, a GP Triumph and then a 350 AJS 7R for about 10 years until one "bad day".
“The bike wouldn’t start and the field was long gone, so I drove like crazy to catch up,” he says. “Then the gear lever broke. The same thing happened in the second race and then I ran out of fuel on the last lap."
“When I got back to the pits, my mom and wife looked 30 years older because the ambulance came out and they thought it was for me. I had two little girls at this point, so I left and just tuned the bikes after that. I haven't skated again for about 20 years."
At that time, he worked as an auto and motorcycle mechanic, tow truck, welder, farmer, tractor driver, arms dealer and real estate agent. “You name it, I did it,” he says. Monk moved to Australia six years ago to run an apartment complex.
“The number of cars and motorcycles I have owned is longer than your arm,” he says. “The first car I owned was a 1937 Chevrolet that I found on a farm and restored,” he says. "It cost 10. I had it for a year and a half, and most of the time it was disassembled."
He then owned a series of old Chevs, Dodges and Vauxhalls. “The last (before Saab) was a 1984 Toyota Corolla hatchback. It was the last of the rear wheel drive models." You probably guessed it: "It was about half a million kilometers."
